Article · 7 min read

4 Reasons to Send Investor Updates Even When Times Are Tough

Jason Lemkin · SaaStr Free Beginner

This is the founder-voice argument for our exact answer, written by the founder of EchoSign. Lemkin's four reasons map one-to-one onto why you send updates with zero legal obligation: they force you to face your own numbers honestly (he tells of a founder who dodged updates for four months and only then saw his unit economics had rotted), they end the isolation, they create financial-discipline checkpoints, and they respect the people who wired you money. It nails the point that the update is most valuable precisely when you least want to write it.

  • Writing the update is a forcing function: it makes you confront metrics you would otherwise rationalize away
  • Silence during a rough patch erodes trust faster than the bad news itself would
  • Regular numbered checkpoints catch a creeping burn rate before runway becomes an emergency
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The question it answers

  1. Do I really need to send investor updates if I have only raised a small angel round and have no formal reporting obligation?

Read with it

  1. Written from the investor's side of the table by Elizabeth Yin, who backs pre-seed founders for a living, so it answers the... Hustle Fund Article · 6 min read Why You Should Always Send Your Investor Updates Elizabeth Yin
  2. A copy-and-fill template built for exactly the founder in this question: it is structured around a five-minute read (matching... Founder Institute Template · template The 5-Minute Investor Update Template Founder Institute
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