Investor Question Simulator

Why this question matters

Preparing for an investment conversation is more useful when you practise the questions your evidence cannot yet answer. A polished pitch can conceal gaps until the first detailed follow up. This simulator organises eight areas of an investment case and selects questions from the weakest ratings. It helps you rehearse explaining the business with records and reasoning. It does not act as an investor or decide whether the venture deserves funding.

Define the investment case before scoring. State the customer problem, the reachable market, the evidence of demand, the economics, the reason customers choose the business, the capability of the team, the intended use of funds and the main risks. Those subjects are connected, but each needs its own evidence. A large market estimate does not establish that the business can reach customers profitably. A strong team biography does not establish that the proposed use of funds is coherent.

Rate the evidence you can show today. A customer interview, a repeat purchase record and a signed contract are different types of support; explain what each actually demonstrates. Keep projections separate from observed trading. Use the optional short summary to clarify the context in your own words. Avoid confidential deal terms, customer identities or personal financial details. The core score uses the ratings, so a longer or more persuasive summary cannot increase it.

Understand the method

1. Eight evidence ratings are normalised to a 0 to 100 readiness rubric.
2. The lowest rated topics determine the first questions to practise.

The eight ratings use a one to five scale and are converted to values from zero to one hundred. The overall readiness result is their arithmetic mean. A rating of three maps to fifty. This gives each topic equal influence in the published rubric. The questions selected first come from the lowest rated topics. The result is a preparation order based on your answers, not a measurement of how an investor would react.

Read a weak topic as an invitation to make the next question more specific. If the market area is weak, identify who can buy, how you can reach them and what source supports that estimate. If economics are weak, explain the contribution from a sale and the cash required to deliver it. If the use of funds is weak, connect each amount to a milestone and identify how progress will be checked.

Practise answering aloud with the evidence beside you. A useful answer distinguishes what is known, what is assumed and what will be tested next. Invite a colleague to ask a follow up question when an answer is vague. Record the missing evidence as an action rather than inventing a confident response. Repeat the simulator after the evidence changes, and retain the earlier result so that improvement can be traced to actual preparation.

Keep the result in perspective

This is a transparent planning calculation or self assessment, not a sector benchmark, professional valuation or a prediction of an outcome.

The ratings are supplied by you. The tool does not perform due diligence or assess investor suitability.

The tool does not perform due diligence, evaluate a free text pitch, determine an enterprise valuation or match you to suitable investors. It does not assess the legal terms of an investment. A high self rating may still rest on weak evidence. Ask someone familiar with the underlying work to challenge the ratings, especially where the business has limited trading history.

Different investors pursue different mandates, stages, sectors and risk profiles. An investment case can be well prepared and still fall outside a particular investor mandate. The equal weighting here is a teaching choice, not a claim about the relative importance every investor assigns to each topic. Do not use the score as a fundraising probability or an external endorsement in a pitch deck.

Read the full limitations or explore how Ayodeji approaches this work.