A funding announcement press release will help you amplify one of the great milestones in building your company.
Raising money is a big deal for growing tech companies. Once your investors have signed their paperwork and the funds have been wired, it’s time to let the world know that you’ve secured new funding.
Writing a press release is straightforward, but it’s merely the starting point for a successful campaign. An effective funding announcement requires plenty of planning and coordination.
In the United States alone, 4,720 companies raised money in Q1 of 2024, according to York IE Fuel. That’s a lot of funding news floating around on the internet.
What’s the best way to cut through this noise? At York IE, we help our clients answer this question all the time. Our team has helped many clients — including Stay Ai and Lytica — successfully announce their funding and build momentum.
Let’s dive into the best way to write a funding announcement press release and how to amplify the news.
If you’re looking to kickstart your announcement, you can also download our free funding announcement template.
3 Important Aspects of a Startup Funding Press Release
Successful fundraising can be a watershed moment for your company. It can attract media attention, new investor interest and, most importantly, new customers.
This is why it’s so important to nail your announcement. Here are the three most important aspects of a successful funding press release:
Investor and Partner Relations
A funding announcement should be a collaborative exercise.
You could simply write your own press release, amplify it on your company’s social media channels, and call it a day. But you’re only likely to generate a small amount of buzz.
Instead, you should loop in your investors and partners at every stage: setting your announcement date, drafting your initial funding press release, sharing the news on social media, etc. This will give you access to a wider audience and generate potential connections to media members and other industry influencers or trusted voices.
Media Strategy
A funding announcement is a chance to gain third-party validation from a media outlet. In addition to announcing the news on your own channels, you should take the opportunity to pitch journalists that might feature your company on their site or in their newsletter.
Despite what you’ve heard, a feature in Forbes or TechCrunch isn’t the standard for a successful funding announcement. Sure, it’s nice to have your company’s name under the bright lights. But sometimes, a mention in a niche industry publication will reach your target audience in a more meaningful way.
With thousands of fundraising events each quarter, reporters might pass on your news. Nonetheless, you can still build relationships with publications for the future.
Repurposing and Distribution
A funding announcement press release is simply a vehicle for your news. It should only be the start of your promotional efforts.
This is where our drumbeat marketing philosophy comes into play. Your company should take the core messages of your funding press release and repurpose them across different channels.
The types of marketing collateral we might produce with one of our clients during a fundraising event include:
- A press release
- A founder’s story blog that profiles the company and founder’s journey towards the round
- A thought leadership article to pitch to a third-party media outlet
- Graphics and copy for your company’s social media accounts
- Graphics and copy for investors and employees to share on their personal accounts
- An email announcement to blast out to your network
Raising money is a big deal. Your announcement process should reflect that!
How Do You Write a Funding Press Release?
To write a funding press release, collaborate with your leadership team and investors to identify the core messages of the release — and then gather supporting evidence in the form of quotes and statistics. Setting internal deadlines will help everyone stay accountable to your target launch date.
Below, we’ve outlined seven key steps in the funding announcement press release process. We also have a guide to writing a press release if you’re looking for a high-level overview.
1. Set an announcement date.
Establish your launch date before you begin drafting your funding press release. This will help keep the process organized while holding your team accountable. Remember to factor in potential delays by adding buffers to your timeline. Pulling together your marketing materials might take a few weeks, so be sure to give yourself plenty of time.
Will you announce your news before attending a conference? Does your announcement have relevance to a holiday or seasonal event? Is there other industry news you can latch onto?
Consider all of these angles before setting your date. Once you do, make sure that all stakeholders are aligned.
2. Establish your company boilerplate.
If your announcement goes well, new people will start learning about your company. That’s why it’s so important to have clear, consistent messaging before your startup funding press release goes live.
We always recommend conducting a messaging hierarchy exercise with your executive team. This will help you re-establish the core aspects of your message: who are you, what you do, how you do it and who you do it for. You don’t need to reinvent yourself; just make sure your wording is current and captures your brand.
These elements will make up your boilerplate, which is the paragraph that appears under the “About Company X” section at the end of a press release.
3. Define your dream headline and key takeaways.
Before you write your release, it’s important to establish what you’re trying to say. In other words, you’re answering the question, “so what?” Why should your target audience care about your new funding?
Let’s compare two different headlines:
Headline A: “Company X raises $5 million Series A to add new features to its car dealership customer service platform”
Headline B: “Company X raises $5 million in Series A funding to help car dealerships deliver better customer service.”
What do you notice? Whereas Headline A focuses on the funding, Headline B focuses on the impact of the announcement.
A funding announcement press release isn’t about patting yourself on the back. It’s about showing your audience (potential investors, customers and partners) how you’re executing your vision.
For key takeaways, consider how this funding round fits into your company’s overall growth strategy. Are there specific initiatives, product development or expansions that the funding will support?
4. Finalize your funding round details.
Make sure you have answers to the following questions:
- What stage of funding are you announcing?
- How much did your company raise?
- Which investors participated in the round? Who led? Is anyone joining the board?
These are table stakes for any funding announcement.
5. Gather key metrics and milestones.
In addition to your funding, you can also share recent highlights to show your company’s momentum. Consider specific growth metrics, product launches, notable customer additions, awards, expansions of your team, etc.
6. Source quotes from key stakeholders.
A compelling startup funding press release usually includes multiple quotes. You should always include a quote from your founder or CEO that highlights their unique expertise and explains how the news aligns with the company’s vision.
You should also include quotes from your investors and key customers for added validation. We recommend drafting a quote on behalf of these stakeholders as a starting point and sharing it with them before including it in the release. This gives them something to work from, while still offering flexibility to tweak or personalize the quote.
7. Coordinate necessary approvals.
Approvals can often be the longest part of the announcement process. But you can’t announce funding without first achieving sign-off from everyone involved in the news: investors who participated in the round, partners who were quoted and, of course, your internal leaders.
Your funding announcement press release should be fully approved by all parties well ahead of your launch date. This gives you adequate time to pitch media outlets (more on that shortly) with a fully approved release for their preview. Many reporters won’t consider featuring your company if they can’t look at the press release before.
How Do You Promote a Funding Announcement?
To promote a funding announcement, follow these steps:
- Create graphics and promotional materials
- Coordinate with key investors and stakeholders
- Build your media list
- Conduct targeted media outreach
- Send the release over the wire
- Promote the announcement on owned channels
- Execute a thorough messaging audit
1. Create graphics and promotional materials.
We recommend accompanying your announcement with a graphic. This could be a simple social card that reads “Company X raises $5 million” with your logo or a picture of your executive team. These graphics can be used on social media or as a featured image for your press release. (Check out the example above that we created for our portfolio company, PeakMetrics).
If you have time, you can also make custom graphics for your investors and partners to share on announcement day. Simple and clean graphics will do wonders!
2. Coordinate with investors and key stakeholders.
Keep your partners in the loop on announcement time and any anticipated media coverage. Consider writing social copy for your investors and key stakeholders; this will make them more likely to post on announcement day.
Your announcement will land much better if you’ve got multiple people ready to like and share right when the news drops.
3. Build your media list.
Identify your key media targets. Look for outlets that cover your industry, as well as journalists that cover your field for their publication.
Speak with your executive team. Do they have existing relationships with reporters? What about publications they want to be featured in? Remember to set realistic expectations for any public relations outreach.
When your news goes live, your executive team might receive media requests. Do some prep work before to establish key talking points, as well as topics to avoid. Your execs will feel much more comfortable after some preparation, and you’ll feel better about the messages they’re sharing.
4. Conduct targeted media outreach.
The first four steps focused mostly on your internal team. Now it’s time to think externally.
You should proactively pitch your finalized funding announcement press release to media outlets before it goes live on the wire. We recommend starting this process two weeks prior to launch.
Sometimes, you will share your news under embargo or as an exclusive:
- Under Embargo: Offer the news to a reporter before the news goes public, with a mutual agreement to hold off on coverage until the announcement date. This gives the outlet time to review your press release, interview sources and prepare stories prior to the launch date. Keep in mind that a reporter must agree to the stipulations of the embargo.
- Exclusive: Grant exclusive access and an early reporting opportunity to a single news outlet. The publication is incentivized to cover your story, but this also limits your press options to a single party.
5. Send the release over the wire.
Many companies pay to post their releases to a newswire, which is a feed of releases from companies that journalists and media outlets can easily access. At York IE, we recommend our clients use ACCESSWIRE, as it offers broad media exposure without a hefty price tag.
Be sure to prep your funding press release on the wire at least a few days in advance, so you can see what it looks like in preview form. Some wire services allow you to include a featured image, which is where your graphics come in handy.
6. Promote the announcement on owned channels
Promoting your announcement includes repurposing the release on a few different channels:
Company Website
The funding news should live on your company’s website. You can post the press release as-is or write a short post that summarizes the news and adds a new spin. Consider adding a callout banner to pin the news to your website homepage.
One of our favorite tactics is writing a founder’s story blog post that accompanies the press release. This post, from the perspective of your founder(s), will mention the fundraising news. It’ll also focus on the genesis of the business: the problem you’re solving, the early days of the company and any other personal anecdotes.
Having follow-on content will help you maintain momentum with your audience after capturing their attention with the first announcement.
Social Media
Plan to share your news on all of your company accounts: LinkedIn, X, Facebook, etc. But don’t stop at your company accounts! As I’ve alluded to, a great announcement is a product of collaboration.Ask employees to share the news on their personal accounts. Encourage investors, partners and key customers to share. For each of these parties, write up some short sample copy (and consider making a graphic) to make their job easier.
Email and Newsletter
Don’t forget to engage your network over email, too! We work with clients to write up a short email announcing (and linking to) the news. This can be shared with your customers, investors, partners, friends and family, etc. If you have an email newsletter, be sure to feature your funding front and center in the next edition.
7. Execute a thorough messaging audit.
As your announcement gains steam, your company profiles will garner more views. Go back through all of your public accounts to ensure that your boilerplate and messaging are consistent and up to date.
Consider asking employees to update your company description on their personal profiles, if applicable.
Fundraising news involves a lot of moving parts. But successfully issuing and promoting your funding announcement press release can be a game-changer for developing new relationships with investors, reporters and potential customers.
Raising money is a huge accomplishment. Make the most of this milestone moment!
