Pitch your startup and grow your network
Startup events are a crucial part of the “find an investor” tool kit. It’s a great place to meet fellow founders, connect with investors and eye up your competition. It’s also a fantastic opportunity to practise your pitching.
These types of events tend to be expensive, however they offer tons of free tickets for early birds and startups, especially if these startups would like to pitch.
Below you’ll find a list of the next startups events in London and the UK. With categories, themes, dates and links to get more information.
A startup event is a meetup or a conference specifically organised to bring together entrepreneurs, investors, industry experts, and other players in the UK startup ecosystem.
These events are perfect for networking, knowledge sharing and collaboration. And they often serve as a showcase for new businesses.
Key features of startup events often include:
Startups often get the opportunity to pitch their ideas or products to a panel of investors, mentors, or judges. This can be a crucial moment for startups to attract funding and attention.
This is also just great for pitch practising. Do people actually get what you are trying to build? Don’t put too much pressure on yourself at these types of events. It’s all about practice.
Networking opportunities can be very structured and basically look like speed dating. But they can also just be an allocated time slot at the end of a talk, where founders and investors get to chat. Being genuinely interested in the topic of the talk will go a long way in building organic and lasting connections.
I like workshops. I’m not a natural networker, so learning something new in a group, with like minded people, has always been an easier route to building my network.
Some events feature exhibition spaces where startups can showcase their products or services to a broader audience. This allows for direct interaction with potential customers, investors, and partners. Think “booths”... lots of booths!
If you have a product that is very visual or interactive this can be a great connection point to find investors. Booths are sometimes offered by startup accelerators as a reward for their demo day winners!
When you send your pitch deck to investors by email, they are often in the middle of lots of other daily activities and they may just miss you.
At a startup event, angel investors and pre-seed investors are there to meet new founders. Make the most of it! It’s a great place to have an informal meeting and new schedule and more in depth look at your business later.
Startups events make money with sponsors and sponsored competitions are a really non-intrusive way to showcase corporate brands without seeming too pushy.
You quite often see theme based competitions. Think Barclays sponsoring a pitching competition for fintech startups.
These competitions often involve pitching to a panel of judges.
Influential figures from the business world, successful entrepreneurs, and industry experts may deliver keynote speeches, sharing their experiences and insights with the audience.