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That old baseball adage from Field of Dreams also seemed to work in the early and heady days of hedge fund/alternatives marketing, assuming you had the performance to back up your infrastructure.
Getting institutional investors’ attention today, let alone an allocation, requires more than just strong performance. It requires thoughtful, articulate messaging, a well-organized business plan, strong performance and marketing perseverance, all of which takes time. And let’s be realistic, it takes a lot of time. So how does one accomplish this when a fund manager’s “day job” is consumed with portfolio construction, risk management and ultimately putting up a good monthly performance number? One solution to seriously consider is Outsourcing – a cost efficient and effective tool that fund managers of all sizes should think about adding to their marketing toolbox.
Outsourcing can play a role at multiple levels in the marketing process:
Finding the right outsourced experts can be instrumental to a fund’s ultimate growth and success.
Getting to first base starts with a good deck and tear sheet
Fund managers tend to be a bit myopic when it comes to their marketing materials but putting oneself in the shoes of an institutional investor can be helpful to the process because, guess what, institutional investors are reading and reviewing a MULTITUDE of pitchbooks ALL day long. A tear sheet needs to really pop when it comes to describing fund strategy, edge and monthly statistics. If your one-page tear sheet doesn’t say something that grabs an investor’s attention, you’ve just diminished the likelihood an investor takes the time to open your more detailed presentation.
The more pitchbooks we see, the more they look the same. No one will argue with sleek styling, just make sure there’s substance behind the shades of blue cover page and stylized fonts and icons. A good pitch book will outline:
Most importantly, the theme of “differentiation” needs to be woven through each page of the marketing deck because differentiation goes way beyond a fund’s track record is, it is the driving force in getting investors to take notice. Differentiation include a range of factors, including:
So what’s the right size for a marketing deck?
Investors do not have the luxury of time, so get to the point in your marketing materials ASAP! Assuming your tear sheet has grabbed an investor’s attention, you’ve got about +/- 20 pages (think bullets, not long-winded full sentence paragraphs) to get your message across, enough that they want to follow your progress and even better that they want to talk to you.
Using a Designated Hitter to design or retrofit your marketing materials
Investors do not have the luxury of time, so get to the point in your marketing materials ASAP! Assuming your tear sheet has grabbed an investor’s attention, you’ve got about +/- 20 pages (think bullets, not long-winded full sentence paragraphs) to get your message across, enough that they want to follow your progress and even better that they want to talk to you.