Free guide
Fundraising kit, guide 6 of 6Your application is 10 straight answers.
Reviewers read thousands of applications in a few days. Answer the question asked, in plain words, with the same facts as your deck. Ten answers cover Y Combinator, Antler, Techstars and most forms in between.
- Answer the question asked
- Specifics, not adjectives
- Same facts as the deck
- Short beats long
At a glance
Ten answers, one story
The questions that recur across the big programmes, in the order the forms tend to ask them. Tap an answer to jump to it.
Answer by answer
What each answer must do
The question behind the box, what to say, what to leave out, who asks it, and a test to check it passes.
The shortest answer on the form and the one read most. Y Combinator gives you fifty characters. Say what you make and for whom, in the words a customer would use.
Say
- What you make, for whom, in plain nouns
- Under fifty characters, so it fits every form
- The same line as your deck cover and your one-pager
Leave out
- Category words: platform, ecosystem, solution, AI-powered
- A slogan
- Two ideas in one line
Pass test: A stranger reads it and can guess what your product looks like.
Example
Payroll for restaurants with hourly staff.
The product as it exists or will exist, described so the reviewer can picture using it. What the user does, what they get, and what is built today.
Say
- What the user does with it, in three lines
- What they get at the end
- What exists today, and what is next
- A link to the product or the demo
Leave out
- The vision before the product
- Features nobody asked about
- Adjectives: seamless, powerful, intuitive
Pass test: The reviewer could sketch the main screen from your description.
Answer 03 of 10
Why this idea
Why this idea, and what do you know that others miss?
- Y Combinator
- Antler
The reason you, of all people, are building this. Time spent in the problem, a pain you had, a system you built before. Then the one thing you understand that competitors do not.
Say
- How you found the problem: the job, the pain, the moment
- The insight in one sentence
- Domain experience, with years and roles
- How you know people need it: interviews, waitlists, usage
Leave out
- We are passionate about
- Market size as the reason
- An insight anyone could have read in a report
Pass test: The reviewer learns something about the market they did not know.
Your first customer, described so precisely the reviewer could find ten of them, and the evidence that they want what you make.
Say
- The first customer: role, company size, situation
- How many you have spoken to, and what they said
- Who pays and who uses, when they differ
- The evidence: interviews, pilots, waitlist, usage
Leave out
- Everyone, or SMEs
- Demographics with no job to be done
- Survey percentages with no sample size
Pass test: You can name ten real people or companies that fit.
What exists, who uses it, and how long you have worked on it, all with dates. Reviewers weigh speed: how much you did in the time you had.
Say
- What is built and live, with the launch date
- Users, customers, revenue, with the date
- How long you have worked on it, and how much of that full-time
- What changed since you last applied, if you did
Leave out
- Projections
- Rounded-up numbers
- Traction words with no number: momentum, interest, buzz
Pass test: Every claim carries a number or a date.
Example
Live since March. 140 restaurants, 31 paying, £4.2K MRR at 20 September. Two of us full-time since January.
Case rule: Nothing is live yet. Answer progress with evidence of demand and speed: interviews with dates, a waitlist with numbers, a prototype with a link, and what you shipped each week since you started.
The alternatives your customer has today, including doing nothing, and what you understand about the business that they do not.
Say
- Direct competitors, named
- The indirect alternative: the spreadsheet, the agency, doing nothing
- What you understand that they do not
- Who you fear most, and why
Leave out
- We have no competitors
- Trashing the competition
- A feature comparison table
Pass test: The reviewer can say why a customer would switch.
Answer 07 of 10
How you earn
How do you make money, and how big can it get?
- Y Combinator
- Techstars
Who pays, what they pay, and the bottom-up maths of how large that gets: customers times price. Hypotheses labelled as hypotheses.
Say
- Who pays and what they pay for
- Pricing and the model, with the current price
- Bottom-up size: customers you could reach times price per year
- What is proven and what is still a guess
Leave out
- Three revenue models
- A share of a market-size number
- Hiding that pricing is untested
Pass test: The reviewer can compute your revenue from one customer and from a thousand.
Each founder in two lines: the thing they built or achieved that matters here, and their role. Then how you met and how long you have worked together.
Say
- Each founder: role, and the most impressive thing they built or did
- How you met, and how long you have worked together
- Who writes the code, or does the technical work
- What each of you owns: product, engineering, sales
Leave out
- Full CVs
- Titles with no achievement behind them
- Claiming a technical founder you do not have
Pass test: The reviewer can say who builds and who sells, and one impressive thing about each.
Case rule: You are applying alone. Say so in the founders answer, then cover it: why you can build and sell this alone for now, and what you are doing about a co-founder. Antler exists to match co-founders; Y Combinator funds solo founders and asks anyway.
Full-time or not, where you live and where the company will be, how equity is split, and whether you will relocate for the programme. Straight answers; hedges here end applications.
Say
- Who is full-time, since when, and when the rest will be
- Where you are based, and where the company will be
- The equity split, and whether it is agreed
- Whether you will relocate or attend in person, if asked
Leave out
- Full-time once we are funded, with no date
- Skipping the equity question
- Different answers in different boxes
Pass test: Every founder would give the same answer in an interview.
Most programmes ask for a short founder video, and some accept a product demo too. Y Combinator asks for one minute of the founders and up to three minutes of demo. Link them here, unlisted, and make sure they match every answer above.
Say
- An unlisted link that plays without a login
- The founder video: sixty seconds, every founder on camera
- The demo video: under three minutes, one flow
- The same facts and numbers as the written answers
Leave out
- A private link the reviewer cannot open
- Slides read aloud
- A five-minute video where one minute was asked
Pass test: Both links open on a phone and say nothing the form does not.
Make it yours
Pre-product, solo, reapplying, themed
The default answers fit a small team with a product and early users. Four cases change the rules, and a few answers are optional.
Pre-product
When: Nothing is live yet.
Change: Answer progress with evidence of demand and speed: interviews with dates, a waitlist with numbers, a prototype with a link, and what you shipped each week since you started.
Solo founder
When: You are applying alone.
Change: Say so in the founders answer, then cover it: why you can build and sell this alone for now, and what you are doing about a co-founder. Antler exists to match co-founders; Y Combinator funds solo founders and asks anyway.
Reapplying or pivoted
When: You applied before, or the idea changed.
Change: Say what changed, with dates and numbers, in the first line of the progress answer. Reviewers see your previous application; pretending it did not exist costs more than the pivot.
A themed programme
When: The programme has a location, an industry or a stage in its name.
Change: Answer why this programme in one specific line: the city you will move to, the vertical you sell into, the stage you are at. Never paste the same answer into a different programme.
Optional answers
- The hack story. The form asks for a time you hacked a system to your advantage. Tell a true story with a result, in four lines.
- Other ideas you considered. The form asks. One line each, and why you did not pick them.
- How you heard about them. Name the person or the event. A referral from an alum carries weight.
- Anything else. There is a fact the boxes did not ask for that changes the picture. Otherwise leave it empty.
Build it with AI
Hand this framework to your AI
Drafting answers with ChatGPT, Claude or any AI? Point it at this guide so it answers the question asked instead of writing marketing copy. The whole method is published as two files, built from the same data as this page.
Or paste this prompt into your AI, then paste the form's questions and your facts:
Act as a startup application coach and follow the MrAdib application framework at https://mradib.com/application-answers/llms.txt. Ask me the facts behind each of the ten answers, then draft every answer in plain prose: three to five sentences, the first one answering the question asked, every number with its date. Specifics over adjectives, the same facts in every box, no invented numbers.
Sources
Where this comes from
The answers distil what the programmes themselves publish about how to apply. Forms change every batch; the questions behind them do not. Read them.
Questions founders ask
How long should each answer be?
As short as the whole truth allows. Three to five sentences for most boxes, one line for the tagline. Reviewers skim; the first sentence must carry the answer.
Can I paste text from my deck?
Paste the facts, not the slides. Deck lines are headlines; application boxes want full sentences that answer the question asked. Same numbers, same names, plain prose.
What if we have no traction?
Say so, then show speed and evidence: how much you built in how many weeks, how many customers you spoke to, what they said. Programmes fund trajectories, not snapshots.
Can AI write the answers?
It can draft them if you give it the facts and this framework. It cannot invent your insight or your numbers, and reviewers recognise generic text instantly. Edit every line until it sounds like you.
The fundraising kit
Six guides, one set of facts
The whole kit, in the order you build it. Every piece draws on the same facts, so none of them contradicts another.
Ten straight answers.
The programmes fund founders they can picture. Plain answers with real numbers get you the interview. Questions about yours? Say hello.