Top 5 Investor Questions Your Data Room Should Answer

Here are the top 5 questions your data room should be built to answer, clearly, confidently, and without the investor having to ask.

1. How Fast Are You Growing?

What VCs Want to See:
Clear signals of traction: revenue charts, user graphs, cohort data, or even just weekly signups.

What to Include in Your Data Room:

• Monthly Recurring Revenue (MRR) sheet

• Growth rate over last 6–12 months

• Active users (DAU/WAU/MAU) graphs

• Key milestones (with dates) in a timeline

Investors want proof, not promises. Show numbers over narratives.

2. How Are You Making (or Planning to Make) Money?

What VCs Want to See:
A business model that makes sense, and scales.

What to Include:

• Unit economics (LTV, CAC, payback period)

• Revenue model breakdown (SaaS, marketplace, freemium)

• Pricing tiers or screenshots

• Pipeline or sales velocity (if B2B)

If you’re pre-revenue, include projections and how you validated willingness to pay.

3. How Is Ownership Structured?

What VCs Want to See:
A clean cap table that shows clarity in founder equity, investor stakes, and option pool planning.

What to Include:

• Updated cap table (Excel or PDF)

• SAFE/convertible notes (if any)

• Option pool allocation and usage

• Vesting schedules (if relevant)

Pro tip: Don’t hide surprises in your cap table. Investors will find them.

4. How Strong Is the Team and Vision?

What VCs Want to See:
They’re betting on people as much as numbers.

What to Include:

• Founder bios or team slide

• Hiring plan for next 12–18 months

• Org chart or key hires

• Culture or mission doc (optional but powerful)

Great teams showcase not just résumés, but clarity of thought.

5. How Much Are You Raising, and Why?

What VCs Want to See:
Confidence in how you’ll use their money.

What to Include:

• Fundraising target & terms (SAFE, equity, etc.)

• Use of funds breakdown (team, product, marketing)

• Runway extension with new funds

• Milestones you plan to hit with this round

Don’t just say you're raising $1M, show what $1M unlocks.

Bonus: Presentation Matters

A chaotic data room signals a chaotic company.

Structure it clearly:

• Use folders: “Pitch Deck,” “Financials,” “Cap Table,” “Traction,” etc.

• Use clear file names: “MRR_2025_Q1.xlsx” > “final_final_v3.xlsx”

• Add short descriptions to files (if using Plox or similar)

Make Your Data Room Do the Talking

You only get one shot to impress an investor. Your data room should answer all the real questions before they even ask.

Plox was built with this in mind — a fast, lightweight virtual data room designed for startups:

Clean folder organization
Secure sharing with viewer tracking
Watermarking, expiry links, and email gating
Page-by-page analytics to see what investors actually read