General partner at Upfront Ventures, writer of Both Sides of the Table.
Suster's most famous mental model: every founder-investor interaction is a dot, and investors gain conviction from the line those dots draw over time. Argues founders should meet investors months before raising and show progress against stated plans.
Suster's process playbook: qualify investors like a sales pipeline, research partners not firms, sequence your best prospects after warm-up meetings, and manage the raise like an enterprise deal.
Suster argues against DocSend-style gated links from the receiving end: friction kills investor attention, deck-tracking paranoia is misplaced, and your deck's job is to travel inside the partnership without you.
Long-form conversation with Upfront Ventures' Mark Suster on how to pitch VCs, why he dislikes demo days, what separates the best founders, and how Series A decisions really get made inside a firm.
Mark Suster returns to TWiST on the ANGEL podcast: alignment between founders and investors, setting reality with your board, and raising in down markets.
Mark Suster's 'Always Be Raising' doctrine in brief: relationship-building between rounds so the round itself is a formality.
Mark Suster on qualifying which VCs are actually right for your startup: stage fit, check size, partner-level fit, and portfolio conflicts.