Episode 90: Are Allocators Even on LinkedIn? How to Build Relationships With Investors on Social and Beyond | Story Snack Series

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Raising capital starts with real relationships. And in 2025, social media is the easiest way to make those connections…right?

Well… not always.

What if the allocators you’re trying to reach aren’t posting? You can’t comment. You can’t DM them. Heck, maybe they don’t even accept your connection requests on LinkedIn.

Then what? How do you reach someone who seems impossible to reach? How do you start a conversation without sending an email pitch that gets buried?

If these questions sound familiar, you’re in for a treat with this Episode because Stacy is breaking down:

Why skipping LinkedIn could be a huge mistake (just because allocators aren’t posting doesn’t mean they’re not watching)
What to do when an allocator really isn’t on social at all
How to use the give, give, give, ask framework to book more meetings when social media isn’t an option

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TRANSCRIPT

Below is an AI-generated transcript and therefore it may contain errors.

[00:00:00] Stacy Havener: Hey, my name is Stacey Havener. I'm obsessed with startups, stories, and sales. Storytelling has fueled my success as a female founder in the Toughest Boys Club, wall Street. I've raised over 8 billion that has led to 30 billion in follow-on assets for investment boutiques, you could say, against the odds. Yeah, understatement.

[00:00:24] I share stories of the people behind the portfolios while teaching you how to use story to shape outcomes. It's real talk here, money, authenticity, growth, setbacks, sales and marketing are all topics we discuss. Think of this as the capital raising class you wish you had in college mixed with happy hour.

[00:00:46] Pull up a seat, grab your notebook, and get ready to be inspired and challenged while you learn. This is the Billion dollar Backstory podcast.

[00:00:59] [00:01:00] Craving more knowledge, but don't always have time to sit down for a five course meal? Take a quick snack break with StorySnacks, bite sized content to feed your funnel. Each short episode features Stacey digging into one question. This series has her talking stories, sales, and so much more. Oh yeah, it's time for story snacks. How do you build relationships with allocators who are pretty private and they're not active on social media? Oh, this is a great question. I've had plenty of allocator friends who keep their cards very close to their chest. So listen, you gotta go old school on this.

[00:01:41] So if they're active on social media, that's great. Then you can become their friend on social media, which is essentially not really the same as becoming their friend in real life. But it's like the next best thing if you don't live in their town and you're not getting together. But. I also want you [00:02:00] to remember something.

[00:02:01] Just because they don't post on social media does not mean they're not active on social media. Let me remind you of one of my favorite terms that I use with LinkedIn. I. Shadow fans. There are a whole bunch of people who just go onto LinkedIn to scroll and search and follow their favorite people, not comment, not raise their hand, not create anything.

[00:02:28] They're just there to consume the content. So if you agree with me that that's happening and maybe that's you, then it's still worth it to send them a connection request or a note on LinkedIn. Or social because they're there. They're just not actively posting food for thought. But let's go back to my, the but on the whole thing, which is, look, becoming friends with somebody on social media is a second best to becoming [00:03:00] friends with them in real life.

[00:03:01] So I hate to break it to you that if they're not active on social media, you can't play that card, which is a little bit easier than trying to be their friend. Like in 3D here. So you know what? Allocators like coffee. They need coffee because they have to go through all the emails they're getting and all the pitch slaps are getting on LinkedIn.

[00:03:23] They need lots of coffee. So do you have to be friends with someone before they're gonna say yes to coffee? Probably. But what's easier to do? I'm gonna give you two scenarios. Mary, you pretend you're an allocator, you can't see, but Mary just got real profesh for a second. Um, if I send you an email and it's four paragraphs long, all about our firm and how we're really good at long-term capital appreciation and we manage risk and all these really awesome compliant statements, and then buried at the end of the big four [00:04:00] paragraphs is like, should we grab coffee sometime?

[00:04:04] Versus if I say, Mary, I was on your website and did you write that copy? 'cause you're hilarious. And all I know is I need to have a coffee with you. Can I come by and and grab coffee? Which one would you say yes to? Tell me Mary. She said two. So it's a very, very extreme example, although I would say something like that to someone.

[00:04:29] If you want to be friends with someone, be somebody worth being friends with. Show up as a human with some humor, with some compliments, with something that makes the person feel good. They probably have a website, read it. Okay. Read the commentary. If they wrote a commentary, read news. If they're in the news, try to figure out, everybody likes to put a fun fact in their bio.

[00:04:56] So what's the fun fact? Acknowledge the fun fact. [00:05:00] Just try to show up as a human. And I'm gonna say the framework that we teach and everyone likes, but it's difficult to implement, which is give, give, give, ask. So before you can ask for the coffee, you have to give three times. And if you have no idea what this allocator might be into, you know what works like a podcast or a book, know why allocators are wicked smart.

[00:05:24] And they like that shit. They like to learn. They're intellectually curious. They love podcasts. They like to read books. So maybe there's a topic that you saw in their commentary, or maybe there's just a good book and it's an investment book, or maybe it's just a good book in general, or who knows what, but pop something into the mail.

[00:05:43] Oh my God. She said mail, I don't know. Call them on the telephone. Sidebar. I had a hilarious conversation when I was in London last time about who uses their phone as an actual phone, and people were visibly distressed. When I said that I actually will call [00:06:00] people, they were like, are you gonna call me?

[00:06:02] Because I'm having feelings about it. Like I don't talk on the phone. I like to text. I actually ask my friend's permission, like, is it okay if I just call you? I don't know. So do the old school things. Do the things that don't scale and try to be their friend in real life, because that's ultimately where you want the social media friendship to go.

[00:06:23] Anyway, so just skip that. Skip it. It's not available. I don't know if that's helpful or infuriating to people, but here we are. That is so good. I hate that. I hate this podcast. You, you're telling me things I absolutely don't wanna do. I have a friend, I'm not a phone person, as you know, and I have one of my good friends who always wants, she's like, it's too much to text.

[00:06:49] Can I call? And I was like, I would like to inform you about this feature on the iPhone where you can record a voice message. And so she'll record, she'll record. A voice [00:07:00] message? No, it transcribed it for me and then I text back. Okay, so wait, I want this to stay in the podcast episode, Mary, because that's actually something that people can do that's above my pay grade.

[00:07:10] I don't know how to do that. But listen, everybody who's in Mary's sort of mindset, you need to take that, send a voice memo that's human. It's your actual voice. Oh, I have a friend on LinkedIn who sends videos through like the LinkedIn messages, like he records little videos. Oh, that's fun. Oh, listen, we're giving you, this is extra.

[00:07:31] If you stayed to the end. This is like, what is it? The director's cut. The director's cut that. Not everyone's gonna hear, but if you stayed good on ya. Uhhuh. It's like an Easter egg. Congrats. We're like a Marvel movie. That's what they do at the end. Yeah, we're, we're like a Marvel movie right now. Mm-hmm. I love it.

[00:07:47] This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be relied upon as a basis for investment decisions. The information is not an offer, solicitation, or recommendation of any of the funds, services, or products, or to [00:08:00] adopt any investment strategy. Investment values may fluctuate and past performance is not a guide to future performance.

[00:08:06] All opinions expressed by guests on the show are solely their own opinion and do not necessarily reflect those at their firm. Manager appearance on the show does not constitute an endorsement by Stacey Haven or Haven Capital Partners.

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