Overall, 2022 was a massive year for dealmaking. As covered in our 2023 Investment Benchmark Report: Global Unicorn Edition, there were more than 1.5 million deals added and managed using the Affinity platform, and new deal volume was up by 70% from the year before. At the same time, quality deals are becoming harder to source and harder to close. Relationships play a huge role in success —many of which are years in the making.
In our new guide, 5 ways Affinity customers are driving success with relationship data, you’ll learn how Affinity customers like Buoyant Ventures and Alpha Partners are leveraging relationship intelligence to accelerate decision-making, improve shortlisting, and increase annual deal flow.
Relationships with LPs are a significant driver of business growth
Raising funds in the current economic climate is no small feat. Taking on this goal while also identifying new opportunities can feel daunting. It gets to a point where traditional CRM platforms and spreadsheets simply don’t cut it.
For firms like Redalpine, a seed and early-stage Venture Capital firm focused on investing in disruptive technologies in the ICT and life sciences sectors, the team has developed hundreds of relationships with LPs. Affinity enabled them to effectively manage their fundraising process from start to finish. Using the platform’s relationship intelligence, Redalpine tracks the status of engagement by both organizations and individual investors throughout the raise, gleaning valuable insights on where to devote their time and resources.
Relationship intelligence accelerates decision-making and shortlisting
When it comes to deal sourcing, speed and a strong network go a long way. Yet, there’s a fine line between waiting on a lead too long and acting swiftly but with little or no strategy. Investments are happening at earlier stages now, which presents its own set of unique challenges. Getting the right shortlist of people ready to close deals as efficiently as possible requires a deep understanding of the behaviors that drive success.
Notion Capital, a venture firm made up of SaaS entrepreneurs and operators turned investors that specializes in early stage SaaS companies, relies on data from multiple sources for much of their decision-making. Ready to switch from the very limited CRM they were using, Notion Capital integrated Affinity with their proprietary data analysis tool to better identify potential investments in the market. The integration yielded a 50% increase in annual number of relevant companies that Notion screens.
Analyzing past decision-making informs future investments, faster
Due diligence can be challenging and time-consuming but without it, there’s a lot that can fall through the cracks. In no short terms, not doing due diligence can be costly.
For Buoyant Ventures, an early-stage venture firm with their first fund totaling $81.7 million, Affinity proved a viable solution to more strategically manage their new and existing relationships. Buoyant Ventures went from evaluating over 1,000 companies to investing in nine. They were eager to analyze the factors and characteristics that led to their decisions and to replicate this success in the future. Using relationship intelligence, they set up their own scoring system and method of evaluating any business. They also created a dashboard where different people in the firm could quickly and easily add notes, making for a more collaborative experience.
Automation frees up time and can grow annual deal flow by 3x
Considering that a very small percentage (less than 1% in fact) of initial meetings turn into investments down the road, firms need a steady flow of incoming quality opportunities. Automating this process not only saves team members considerable time on low-value work, it also provides real-time reporting features that increase understanding around how efficient your dealmaking operations are and where the most valuable deals are coming from.
Companies like New York-based growth equity firm, Alpha Partners, were looking to save time on manual data entry while also growing their deal flow year over year. They knew that insightful pipeline management would enable them to select, pursue, and close the right opportunities. The team benefited most from Affinity’s syncing of the firm’s contacts, emails, and meetings—an automation that was costing their team a hundred hours of work each week—as well as the functionality of customizing fields and templates that made for better note taking.
Intelligent portfolio management provides significant returns to invested LPs
In the midst of an uncertain market, investors must be dual-focused. On one hand, they need to ensure that their investments are being properly managed (often in the form of offering advice or guidance to the founders) while also being open to new investment opportunities. Being both a hands-on coach and high-level strategist isn’t easy, but having a strong portfolio management process in place makes it possible.
Rise of the Rest (ROTR), the seed fund arm of Revolution, a Washington, D.C.- based investment firm with a mission to invest in early-stage companies located outside of traditional tech hubs, unlocked the full potential of their network through relationship intelligence. Going so far as to call Affinity their “relationship ChatGPT,” ROTR uses Affinity’s platform to support its 200+ portfolio companies. They have streamlined their processes, tracked interactions and introductions and used data-driven insights to aid in their decision making.
How your firm can drive success through relationship intelligence
To date, Affinity’s relationship intelligence platform has helped over 3,000 investment firms across the world to find, manage, and close more deals. We empower firms in more than 70 countries to find more time to spend on the relationships and activities that have the biggest impact on their business.
To learn more about how companies are using Affinity’s relationship intelligence to drive success, download the full guide.
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