Welcome back,
I am writing this newsletter for people building in the real world, where plans change, the timing moves, and you still have to make decisions without the “correct” information.
Each week I share the thinking, the frameworks, and the practical lessons that help you build with more clarity, more momentum, and fewer avoidable mistakes.
This week I’m talking about raising investment properly, using it effectively when you get it, and the mindset you need to keep moving when the fog shows up.
Most founders treat fundraising like a finish line.
It isn’t.
It’s a tool. And if you pick it up too early, you usually just get better at spending money, not better at building a business.
Here’s a simple way to think about raising investment, using it well, and moving from one stage to the next.
1) Raise in stages, not in one big leap
The biggest mistake I see is raising “proper money” before you’ve proved what works.
Bootstrap until you know what you’re doing, so don’t raise a lot of money.
Early on, your job isn’t to win a round.
It’s to win evidence. Remember, you are still in the Potential* stage.
You want to reach the point where you can say, with a straight face:
“Give me X, and I’ll turn it into 10X.”
Once you know what you are doing and what works, then you can go big and raise a lot of money.
That’s the sequence.
Small money to learn.
Proof to de-risk.
Then scale money to grow.
And in case you are new to the newsletter, this is what I always say:
Potential → Evidence → Momentum*
2) Investors don’t fund excitement, they fund clarity
Investors aren’t funding your passion.
They’re funding your ability to explain what the money actually does.
One of the cardinal sins is not knowing what you plan to spend the money on.
That’s when they say: I’m out.
So before you raise, you need a playbook.
Not just a deck.
A playbook.
Something that shows:
where growth comes from
what you’ve tested
what converts
what doesn’t
what the next £1 buys you
When you have that, fundraising gets simpler.
3) The point of investment is repeatability
If you raise money without repeatable levers, you’ll spend it on motion.
More content.
More features.
More hires.
More “activity”.
But activity isn’t traction.
Money only helps when you pour it into something predictable.
That’s why I keep coming back to this:
Build the marketing playbook first, then scale spend. Marketing is something that nobody and everybody knows how to do. You have to figure out what works quickly. Usually, you are pulling lots of different levers at the same time, and at some point something will work.
If you can’t get results in a small test, you won’t magically get them with a bigger budget.
4) Don’t let valuation ego trap you
A big valuation feels good.
But a big valuation without the performance to match it becomes a problem.
The valuation is crazy, and you can guarantee a down-round at the next hurdle.
The market has returned to its senses.
Investors are pushing back on valuation and demanding faster paths to breakeven.
So if you’re raising in 2026, you need to be ready for the practical questions:
When will you breakeven?
What does “good” look like in 3, 6, 12 months?
What’s the most direct route to commercial reality?
5) This is how I decide whether I invest
I’ve invested in over 15 businesses and helped another 40 raise investment at various stages of growth.
And this is the simplest way I’ve found to make an investment decision.
I made a LinkedIn post about this, so if you are coming from that post, I thought it was extremely important to repeat myself in terms of my thought process.
I use the CUTE model.
1) Customer
Who is your defined target customer?
Do you understand these people?
Are you solving a real problem for them?
2) Universe
Are there lots of these people and/ or will they buy repeatedly?
Can you scale this long term?
Can you bring more and more customers into the target group in a cost effective way?
3) Team
This is where everything gets defined.
Can you make it work?
Despite all the headwinds and obstacles that will come your way?
4) Economics
Can you make money form this idea?
When will you breakeven?
What is my RoI?
A small tip.
The most important one of these is Team.
It is you.
Especially in the very early days, when you don’t have much evidence and everything is still potential.
It’s like any relationship.
An investor needs to trust you know what you’re doing, and that you can implement, in mostly extreme circumstances.
You need to be comfortable with risk, understand it and mitigate it as much as possible.
It’s often difficult to objectively demonstrate that until you’re in the eye of the storm.
The takeaway
If you want to raise investment and use the money most effectively, earn the right to scale.
Bootstrap until you know what works.
Build the playbook.
Prove you can turn X into 10X.
Then raise the big money.
And if you want a clean way to think like an investor, use CUTE.
1) Customer.
2) Universe.
3) Team.
4) Economics.
Raising investment is just one moment in the journey.
What decides whether it helps you or hurts you is how you operate when things get uncertain.
Can you make decisions without the correct information at the perfect time?
Can you take rejection without losing momentum?
Can you keep going when you don’t feel ready?
That’s exactly what Simon Alexander Ong and I get into on the podcast, the mindset and decision-making that sits underneath every stage of building.
The latest episode of Cutting Through The Fog has dropped on YouTube.
Simon Alexander Ong (author of “Energize: Make the Most of Every Moment) get into the stuff most people only learn the hard way: confidence, resilience, decision-making, rejection, uncertainty, and how you build momentum when you don’t feel ready.
If 2026 is the year you want your business to win, this one is for you.
We cover:
the mindset that actually holds up under pressure
Simon’s origin story (success, failure, growth)
uncertainty, luck, and building in public
playing bigger, handling rejection, and the real price of entry
making better decisions and trusting yourself
quickfire questions to end it
Head to my YouTube channel now, subscribe, and make sure you watch it!
