How fast should the follow-up go out?

The same day if you can, the next morning at the latest. Partners meetings are weekly at most funds, and an associate who has your materials by Thursday can put you on Monday. One who gets them the following week puts you on the one after. Draft the email before the meeting so all you add afterward is what you heard.

Should I send the financial model before a term sheet?

Yes, if they asked for it. The model is how an investor tests whether your plan hangs together, and refusing it reads as a model that does not. Send the version you would defend line by line, with the assumptions on their own tab. What you hold back is the detail behind it: customer contracts, payroll and the general ledger.

Is it a problem to send the deck as a PDF attachment?

It works, and it is the version that gets forwarded to people you never met. A link lets you see whether the partner opened it, lets you replace a page after you fix a number, and lets you withdraw access if the conversation ends. For the cap table and the financials the case for a link is stronger, because those are the files you least want circulating.

What if they ask for everything at once?

Send the five documents that support a decision and say plainly that the rest is organized and ready for confirmatory diligence once there is a term sheet. Most investors accept that, and the ones who do not are telling you something about how the process will go. The exception is a round that is moving fast with several funds at the table, where being first with a complete record can matter more than holding back.

Do I need an NDA before sharing financials?

Most venture investors will not sign one at this stage, and asking marks you as new to the process. Protect the material by controlling it instead: share it through a link tied to one recipient, watermark it with their name, and keep the documents that would genuinely hurt you out of the first send.

Guide

What to send an investor after the first meeting, and what to hold until later

Send it within a day, and send less than you think. After a first meeting an investor wants enough to take the company to their partners: the deck, a one-page summary of the round, the cap table, the last twelve months of financials and the model. Hold the contracts, the employee files and the full legal record until there is a term sheet, because nobody reads them before then and every copy you send is a copy you cannot take back. Share through a link you can scope and withdraw rather than as attachments, and note which investor opened what. The follow-up is the first test of how you will run the company after they invest, so it should be quick, complete for its purpose and easy to read on a phone.

By Vanward. Published 2026-09-27. Updated 2026-09-27.

The meeting went well. The investor said to send over some materials, which could mean anything from the deck to the full data room. What they need is narrower than that: enough for an associate to write a two-page memo and for a partner to decide whether you get a second meeting.

The five documents that belong in the follow-up

Document	Why they want it now	What good looks like
The deck	It goes to the partners meeting; the associate works from it	The version you presented, with any number you corrected in the meeting fixed
A one-page round summary	Amount, instrument, use of funds and who else is in, in one place	Short enough to paste into their memo without editing
The cap table, fully diluted	Ownership after the round decides whether the check size works	Every SAFE and note shown with its terms, and the round modeled at a stated price
Twelve months of financials	Revenue, burn and runway checked against what you said	Monthly, from the books, matching the deck to the dollar
The financial model	Tests whether the plan and the ask fit together	Assumptions on their own tab, with the next 18 months in monthly detail

What to hold until there is a term sheet

Customer contracts, employee agreements, the option ledger, board minutes and the legal record all matter, and none of them decide whether an investor wants to lead your round. They decide whether the deal closes on the terms agreed. Sending them early costs you control of sensitive files and gains you nothing, because nobody at the fund reads them until counsel starts confirmatory diligence.

Have them ready, though. The gap between a signed term sheet and a closing is where rounds lose momentum, and the founders who close in three weeks are the ones whose record was organized before the term sheet arrived.

How to write the email

Keep it to what they can act on

Three lines of thanks and context, the one-page summary pasted into the body, and the link. Name the one question from the meeting you promised to answer, and answer it. Leave out the company history, which they already heard.

A worked example

Halyard Systems, a fictional software company raising a $4 million seed round, met a fund on a Tuesday. The partner asked about customer concentration. The follow-up went out that evening: the round summary in the email, a link scoped to the deck, the cap table, twelve months of financials and the model, and two sentences answering the question: the largest customer is 18 percent of revenue, down from 31 percent a year ago. The associate opened the model twice on Wednesday. Halyard was on the Monday partners agenda.

Share it so you keep control

Send one link per investor, not one link for everyone. Watermark each file with the recipient's name so a forwarded copy points back to its source. Turn off downloads for the model if it holds anything you would not want in a competitor's hands. When a conversation ends, withdraw the link. And look at who opened what: an investor who read the financials three times is having a different conversation internally than one who never opened the deck.

Questions founders ask

How fast should the follow-up go out?: The same day if you can, the next morning at the latest. Partners meetings are weekly at most funds, and an associate who has your materials by Thursday can put you on Monday. One who gets them the following week puts you on the one after. Draft the email before the meeting so all you add afterward is what you heard.
Should I send the financial model before a term sheet?: Yes, if they asked for it. The model is how an investor tests whether your plan hangs together, and refusing it reads as a model that does not. Send the version you would defend line by line, with the assumptions on their own tab. What you hold back is the detail behind it: customer contracts, payroll and the general ledger.
Is it a problem to send the deck as a PDF attachment?: It works, and it is the version that gets forwarded to people you never met. A link lets you see whether the partner opened it, lets you replace a page after you fix a number, and lets you withdraw access if the conversation ends. For the cap table and the financials the case for a link is stronger, because those are the files you least want circulating.
What if they ask for everything at once?: Send the five documents that support a decision and say plainly that the rest is organized and ready for confirmatory diligence once there is a term sheet. Most investors accept that, and the ones who do not are telling you something about how the process will go. The exception is a round that is moving fast with several funds at the table, where being first with a complete record can matter more than holding back.
Do I need an NDA before sharing financials?: Most venture investors will not sign one at this stage, and asking marks you as new to the process. Protect the material by controlling it instead: share it through a link tied to one recipient, watermark it with their name, and keep the documents that would genuinely hurt you out of the first send.