Announcing the WPBeginner Growth Accelerator Fund

At WPBeginner, we are on a mission to help small businesses grow and compete with the big guys. Today, I want to take the exciting step and bring these values to the WordPress business community with our new growth accelerator fund.

Note: Applications will be closed on September 7th, 2018

What is the WPBeginner Growth Accelerator Fund?

WPBeginner Growth Accelerator Fund is the first-ever growth fund focused entirely on WordPress businesses.

As part of this accelerator, we will invest between $100k to $500k in a small group of WordPress focused businesses. Along with the investment, we will work intensively with founders to refine and optimize their existing product / processes by using the Awesome Motive playbook.

Companies will also get to benefit from our vast media resources and the business network that we have built over the last decade.

The Story Behind WPBeginner Growth Accelerator Fund

Over the last decade, we have spent a lot of time talking to users and figuring out how to make things people want. Usually we can see fairly quickly the direction in which an idea should be expanded to make the biggest impact.

It took us a long time to get to this level, and I would have never been here without the help of my mentors and other amazing entrepreneurs who were kind enough to share their wisdom with me.

This kind of mentorship is available in a lot of other verticals, but it’s not openly available in the WordPress business community.

The WordPress small business community is full of amazing people. Over the last few years, I have had the pleasure to talk with so many of the talented entrepreneurs about their businesses and their inspiring journeys.

Several of them expressed interest in joining the Awesome Motive family, have me join their board, or getting an investment to fast-track their business growth. Few also expressed their frustrations about lack of investor interest in the space.

The problem is that the WordPress market is not very well understood by investors. And frankly, majority of WordPress businesses are not large enough to meet their criteria.

But this doesn’t mean that WordPress businesses don’t have the potential. It’s quite the opposite – they have a lot of potential. There are tons of opportunities to grow in the WordPress ecosystem with the right playbook, and I want to help prove that.

After a lot of thought and discussion, I have decided to create the first WordPress-focused growth accelerator fund to help boost the WordPress small business community.

Our Philosophy

We know that independence is one of the main reasons why people want to create a business in the first place, and it’s also one of the reasons why businesses succeed. Our goal is to interfere as little as possible with the day to day.

We believe that founders of WordPress-focused companies are great at hacking. We want to empower them with our framework and resources to do just that.

Most investors offer a combination of money and help. In our case, money is by far the smaller component. We want to share our experience, knowledge, and resources (collectively “needle-movers”) to help founders grow their business.

We will offer a lot of advice, but we will never force anyone to take it.

The kind of advice that we will give literally can’t be bought because very few companies have the WordPress-specific insights like we do. And those that do are not in the business of consulting.

Format

For our first round, we will start small by hand-picking five WordPress companies to invest and work with. And no, we won’t ask you to move to the Bay Area or another big city.

If you have an existing WordPress business, then you can apply here.

We will review your application and invite the most promising groups to have a series of conversations with us. We will make our funding decision shortly after that.

Once funded, we will work closely with you to identify the growth levers in your business and help you implement the right processes to take your business to the next level.

Below are some of the benefits that you will have access to:

• Our playbooks for product development, growth, and operations.
• Office Hours with Awesome Motive Partners (including me)
• Office Hours with Other Industry Experts
• Bi-Annual Mastermind Meetings
• Exposure on our media properties and access to our PR team
• Private Founders Slack

How to Apply

If you already have a WordPress-focused business, then you can fill out the application below.

Important Note: this fund is for existing WordPress-focused businesses (i.e WordPress plugins, themes, and services) that have been around for at least six months.

Deadline: Applications will be closed on September 7th, 2018

Final Thoughts

I am committed to the WordPress ecosystem, and I have two main goals with this fund:

1. Help WordPress-focused companies succeed
2. Help introduce more user-focused WordPress products

If you like a specific WordPress product that you think we should invest in, then please reach out to them and let them know about the growth accelerator fund.

Yours Truly,
Syed Balkhi
Founder of WPBeginner