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Inform (previously Investor Updates)
p/inform-previously-investor-updatesThe simplest way for founders to keep investors informed.
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Brenden Mulligan

Inform (previously Investor Updates) - The simplest way for founders to keep investors informed.

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Great founders keep investors informed. Investor Updates makes that effortless.

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Brenden Mulligan
Maker
Hi everyone! I haven’t launched anything on here since LaunchKit joined Google. It’s time to change that. 😊 I’ve been building this over the course of a few weekends, and it’s time to just share it publicly with the community. When running LaunchKit, I updated our investors monthly, which I thought it was very important (I wrote about that here). Many founders don’t do it because it can be a pain. So I made a simple app that helps with that. This tool is a super easy way to generate and send an update to your investors. You can send the same info to all, or only send growth / financial info to investors you designate having information rights. The tool will also automatically compare this month to past months and show how you’re growing over time. There are a few more bells and whistles too. But I’m trying to keep it simple. For people who have no problem sending updates, this probably isn’t for them. Which is fine. (Though I’d still love your feedback.) For people who need some help, give it a try! It’s free while in beta. Post-beta pricing is on the homepage. Lemme know what you think! Hope it’s useful! Brenden
Shashwat Pradhan
@mulligan from cluster to Launchkit have been a big fan of your products! My company is bootstrapped so won't get a chance to try it, but it looks great as usual
Brenden Mulligan
Maker
@shashwatpradhan thank you! And congrats on bootstrapped. That's a good place to be :)
Pulkit Agrawal
@mulligan good problem to solve! what do you think AngelList misses in their updates capability that you're looking to better?
Ognjen Vukovic
@mulligan Congrats on launch. I will need this product for sure. Interface looks really amazing! Be sure to check out our tool , it will be very interesting to you. https://www.producthunt.com/upco...
Michelle Crawford

Would also like to have a secondary group of interested

parties. These are people who would receive a less detailed

report.

Pros:

Removes the tedious work out of IR.

Cons:

Wish I could import my IR google contact group

Brenden Mulligan
Maker
Thanks Michelle! You could add your secondary group as Stakeholders who dont have Information Rights. They wouldn't get growth or financial info, but would get the other sections. That's the only way to separate it for now.
Ryan Hoover
Back to your LaunchKit roots, @mulligan. 😊 A big concern founders have with sharing sensitive data is security. How is this information protected?
Brenden Mulligan
Maker
@rrhoover oh I like the "PRO" badge! :) Totally hear you on security. All connections are over SSL and report data is fully encrypted before saved to the database.
Andy O'Dower
@mulligan good to hear on security. You get lots of customers and then hacked tons of very sensitive data in here. No more/less secure than Dropbox/emails/etc I suppose. Will try it out!
Lisa Dziuba
I logged in, here is what made me confused: 1. why I can't login with Facebook, Twitter, Gmail account? 2. why there is no example template? 3. what can I do with 1 free report in the free plan? It's useless... It shows the product functionality, but probably will not make me stick around I didn't play with it for a long time, because I didn't get what information should I fill in :( Our investor updates are pretty custom and we're an early stage to have some stable pattern for updates. So the first usage of your service was a bit confusing for me. Anyway, good luck with your product :)
Brenden Mulligan
Maker
@lisadziuba happy to respond, though it seems like you want a very specific product, and this isn't it. 1. why I can't login with Facebook, Twitter, Gmail account? --- because honestly i dont think that's necessary at this stage. Out of all the priorities, social auth didn't make the list. 2. why there is no example template? --- can you say more about this? The whole thing is only one template, and there's a form to fill out to fill out the template. Need to figure how to communicate this better. Do you mean you just wanted to see https://www.investorupdates.net/... first? 3. what can I do with 1 free report in the free plan? --- You can try out the service. That's generally the point of free trials. It gives you full functionality for one month of report to see if the worldflow is better. Also, as a note, right now all plans are free during beta. It's useless... It shows the product functionality, but probably will not make me stick around --- What is useless? The plan, or the product? How many months of free use do you think is appropriate for you to potentially stick around? I didn't play with it for a long time, because I didn't get what information should I fill in :( Our investor updates are pretty custom and we're an early stage to have some stable pattern for updates. So the first usage of your service was a bit confusing for me. --- What do you mean by "I didn't get what information should I fill in"? Would love to know more here ---- Yeah, for startups with very custom reports that they're already sending out, this probably isn't for them. It's more for people who need help getting organized and doing it regularly.
Evan Zhou
Perfect timing! Need to send November update haha 👍
Brenden Mulligan
Maker
@evanczhou well please send feedback once you do!
Antonio Altamirano

Great for creating a good report and getting into the habit of sending one.

Pros:

Easy way to speed up your investor updates

Cons:

I wish I could add custom boxes directly in the interface

James Mundy
Great product @mulligan, had an idea of doing something similar myself floating around after my previous startup so happy to see someone built it! Compiling the data quickly into an easy to read format was a pain, but what I think is more important is that this could be a great tool to keep you honest and updating investors when things get a bit shit. I know from my own experiences when things go south and your metrics make you feel pretty miserable it's very easy to put off sending the update until next month. Once you've skipped one month it is easier to put off the next time. Simple nudge emails if an update hasn't been sent could help remind founders that this might be the time their investors could help them the most! Looking forward to using this product in the future.
Brenden Mulligan
Maker
@_jamesmundy 100% agree. Nudge emails are in there. Looking forward to seeing if they're effective :)
Anthony Sutardja
This looks awesome; always a plus when it looks nice too. This would definitely help keep our investors updated more frequently. That being said, the terms of service on user submission data are extremely loose on this app for me to fork over sensitive investor-only information.
Brenden Mulligan
Maker
@anthonysutardja would love more specific feedback! info@investorupdates.net
Moe Abbas
Looks good. I am a bit concerned as to providing access to sensitive information. In your TOS does it protect the information we share or do you have rights/access?
Jim Knutt
Great concept, looking forward to future updates!
Manish Malik
Looks great - congrats on launching this. I've witnessed investors (and their analysts, in cases of large investors) even work with Google spreadsheets, so this format will be a welcome change with the same simplicity. Two questions for you to think about: 1. In what ways is the current functionality different than a (Google spreadsheet + script to send formatted email out of spreadsheet) combination? (feature-wise). Would a tech founder have the tendency to see this, and then ask an intern to cobble a dirty hack together in few hours that sends an email from a spreadsheet? 2. Since a lot of comments here on PH (and otherwise too) would be about data security, have you also thought about providing a case where the data stays within the user's already-trusted services (Google Docs / Dropbox / etc) and your product fetches info on the fly and generates updates for investors? (as opposed to storing data at your end forever). This option may be more comforting for some audience. All the best!
Tony Freed
Cool stuff! Simple and helpful. Love it.
Al amin
hi