Rapt Media’s fearless leader, CEO Erika Trautman, knows a thing or two about being a hardheaded woman in the male-dominated world of tech startups. After all, women only account for about seven percent of CEOs in the startup world. In a world where women are usually pitching to investors who are used to hearing pitches from men, should women be adapting to a more masculine style of pitching?
Trautman answers this question in her story recently published on Entrepreneur.com. As someone who’s given more than 200 pitches, resulting in $3M in funding, Trautman’s tried nearly every approach to pitching imaginable. But there’s one strategy for closing capital that this CEO really likes, and it might just surprise you.
“There is still subtle gender bias when it comes to how women are perceived that might actually make the ‘Billion-Dollar or Bust’ story ineffective,” Trautman says in her story. And though gender bias is very real, the good news is that the number of female-lead venture deals has more than tripled from 4 percent to 13 percent since 2004.
Check out Trautman’s story, “What This Female CEO Learned About Gender Bias After Pitching 200 VCs,” on Entreprenuer.com, and let us know what you think about her strategy in the comments below.
