When you were a kid how many times did your parents say No! N-O, NO! More than once, we’d wager. How many times did they say, Yes, Y-E-S, YES!’ Bet I can count the number of times on one hand – zero. Never happened.

We did notice this at a fairly young age – long before we knew that there was such a word – that NO is an acronym. It was parent-code for ‘keep trying’ or ‘change the talking points.’ In some cases, and we found that if we changed our approach or arguments, we could get a yes. Persistence pays. And the same can be said of investors. Investors hate to miss opportunities, so they don’t really like to say No. Investors like to hedge their bets and keep their options open. Sometimes they will give you a hard and fast No and mean it. Still, that said, things change, so one never knows if it truly is a hard No.

No, by the way, is an acronym that stands for Not Ordinarily:

Avner Ronan founded a company called Boxee, a cross-platform freeware media center with social networking features that eventually spun out the Boxee Box.  When he was going for funding, Avner decided that Fred Wilson of Union Square Ventures – a very successful NY based investor who saw billion dollar exits five years in a row – would be the perfect investor for Boxee, so he targeted Fred exclusively and did get the meeting with Fred, but Fred said No. Undeterred, Avner sent Fred monthly updates on Boxee’s pivots and progress and stumbling blocks which they had overcome. The answer continued to come back as No. This went on for 18 months, until there came that one update that changed everything.

And Fred said ‘Yes!’

Confirming what we had suspected since childhood: that ‘No’ is an acronym. At least some cases. You don’t want to pursue an investor in such a way that they will be moved to take out a restraining order.

We host a breakfast twice monthly with one investor and a small group of entrepreneurs.  It’s a great way for entrepreneurs to get to know the investors and directly ask questions without having to find a warm introduction. Networking events and conferences are a great way to meet investors.

We’re going to share with you some of the information that the various investors have shared at the breakfasts and the pearls of wisdom that they have imparted. And speaking of NO as an acronym, in smaller groups, investors tend to say things they might not ordinarily say when addressing a larger group.

Howard Morgan, founder of Idealabs with Bill Gross, Founder of the New York Angels, founder of First Round Capital and Chairman of B Capital – Eduardo Saverin’s fund, Eduardo being the co-founder of Facebook for those of us playing the home version, offered the 6 P’s he looks for in a company: people, product, plans, profits, passion, and persistence. (Product also includes knowing the market you are going after, and planning mostly means financial planning.) Mr. Morgan also believes that one of the most frequent startup mistakes is coming up with the wrong pricing, whether it’s too high or too low.

When he said Persistance, he meant that yes, every startup hits roadblocks – investors want founders who are persistent and passionate about what they’re doing and who will prevail – they won’t let stumbling blocks stop them – persistence, again, does not mean that he may need to take out a temporary restraining order.

Some investors want to make sure that you’re a subject matter expert. You hear that a lot. We have mentored at three top accelerators in NY and attend many accelerator demo days. At every demo day, without exception, each company will talk about how their backgrounds make them subject matter experts. Sometimes – usually – a startup is there because the founder experienced a pain point and decided to address it. Jeanne Sullivan, founder of Starvest, understands the pain point issue over subject matter expert – when a question came up – and said that she doesn’t put an inordinate amount of stock in that subject matter expert thing, or as she put it more succinctly, “the Wright Brothers didn’t have a pilot’s license.“

Being an entrepreneur – especially a founder – is a lonely and tough business. In fact, it does have a pretty high depression and suicide rate, sorry to say, so Peter Shankman, angel investor and successful serial entrepreneur, remarked that it’s important to have honest, supportive people around you. In fact, Peter advised that if you can’t change the people around you, then change the people around you.

One of our favorite pieces of advice came from Steven Messer, a very successful serial entrepreneur and angel investor who advised entrepreneurs not to go to investor, but rather, build a business and go the funding route only as a last resort. “Why would you want to go to an investor?” he said, “Frankly, you’d get better rates from the Mafia.” By the way, we are throwing that out for perspective. Neither we nor Messer are advocating that you do that.

Joshua Siegel of Rubicon Ventures advised attendees to make sure to network with each other when attending events. You never know who’s in the room and how they can help you with your product, with building your team or whatever else you may need that you may not even know yet that you need. Adam Quinton of Lucas Point Ventures also advised not to go to events just to meet or speak to the speaker/panelists: to network with fellow attendees; you never know what might come from it. Do business with each other, he said.  Your next customer or strategic partner might be in the room.

Siegel also advised people to go to events and meet investors, even if they’re not yet looking for investment. Always good to establish a relationship early. In fact, the earlier, the better.

David Arcara of Laconia Ventures also advised the group to establish relationships with investors early. We hosted him last June and he said that that week he was writing a check to a founder whom he had met the previous August. And who had been following up with him and keeping him in the loop as to his progress ever since. Said David, you want to get to know your investors. I’m sure that you’ve heard that getting involved with an investor is like a marriage and that is not true. If that marriage goes bad, you can get a divorce. You cannot divorce your investor. That union is for the life of the company. You’re stuck.” Ok he might not have used the word ‘stuck’ exactly. Sounded kind of like it, though.

Most investors like the founding team to have two co-founders. Why? Good to have a cofounder to bounce ideas off and get you through the tough times. Another reason: they like to know that – no matter which co-founder had the original idea – that person was able to convince another person to buy into it.

One of the reasons that David had taken 10 months to write the check is that the company had just one founder – no co-founder. But he had gotten to know the founder quite well – the company had gotten considerable traction in those 10 months, the founder had been emailing him consistently with updates, despite the fact that he wasn’t getting a fast yes, and David was impressed with what he had seen and heard.

“Did he manage to find a co-founder in that time?” we asked.

“No,” David answered.

“But you said you never invest in solo founders.

To which David answered.

“No, we don’t.” he answered, then paused and added, “Wellll, not ordinarily.”

We rest our case. Onward and forward.