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Personal branding · Consultants, coaches and advisers

Founders pick the mentor who has done the thing, not read about it.

Personal branding for a startup mentor is the operating history a founder checks before taking your advice seriously: what you built, the stage at which you are useful, and what you want in return.

Tell us what you needor call +91 80958 58589

Scope, fee, reporting and term are agreed in writing after we have read your brief and spoken to you.

A professional shares her expertise in a recorded interview

In one paragraph

Personal branding for a startup mentor is the operating history a founder checks before taking your advice seriously: what you built, the stage at which you are useful, and what you want in return. GullySales writes it and takes the substance from the conversations you are already having free.

Also written for

Startup mentor, Startup adviser, Angel adviser, Incubator mentor.

For startup mentors and advisers

Where it usually goes wrong, and what we would do.

  • “Mentor is what people write when they have stopped doing something”

    The word covers a retired vice president, a busy operator and somebody between jobs. A founder in Koramangala with eleven months of runway cannot afford to discover which one you are over coffee.

  • “Stage is the only filter a founder trusts”

    Advice for a company at two crore of revenue is wrong for one at twenty. When your profile does not say which end you are useful at, founders select themselves badly and your Saturdays go to waste.

  • “The return is deal flow, and deal flow follows specifics”

    An accelerator mentor list runs to three hundred names and nobody reads it. The founders worth your time arrive through something you wrote about the exact problem they have this month.

  • “If you take a fee for introducing investors, the rules change”

    Arranging capital for a fee is a different activity from mentoring and it touches securities regulation. Have your own adviser tell you where your arrangement sits before you describe it publicly, because the exposure is yours.

What we do

What we deliver for startup mentors and advisers.

Every deliverable, what it covers for you, and the result it is there to produce. Nothing here is an extra.

  1. A profile built on what you operated

    The company, the years, the function you actually ran and the stage it was at while you ran it. Advisory titles come after the operating history, never instead of it.

    Result: A founder can tell in one screen whether you have solved his problem before.

  2. Writing pitched at the stage you serve

    The first ten hires, pricing a first enterprise contract, what to cut when runway reaches eleven months, how to refuse a customer who wants a custom build.

    Result: Founders arrive with a real question instead of asking for general advice.

  3. The conversation about your office hours

    An hour on the mentoring calls you took this month and the pattern running through them. Nothing identifiable is published without the founder's permission. Lose that hour and all we can produce is a generic mentor bio, which is free to write and worth about as much.

    Result: Real material out of unpaid work you were doing anyway.

  4. Your terms stated openly

    Whether you mentor free, take advisory equity, charge a fee or invest, and the point at which the conversation changes into one of those.

    Result: Founders stop guessing, and the awkward call stops happening.

  5. A pack for accelerators and demo days

    A short profile, a photograph and the subjects you take office hours on, ready for the programmes that keep asking for it at two days' notice.

    Result: You are on the list before the cohort starts rather than after.

  6. Office hours made visible

    A standing slot, published, with what a founder must send in advance so the half hour is worth taking.

    Result: Fewer coffees, more conversations that go somewhere.

How the result is measured

  • Enquiries that name you or came through your profile
  • Searches for your name, from Search Console
  • Profile views and connection requests from your industry
  • Speaking invitations, press enquiries and podcast requests
  • Posts published against posts planned, and what held up the rest

Recorded as a baseline before work starts, so every later report has an honest comparison.

Read the full personal branding page

How it works

How the work runs for startup mentors and advisers

The work itself, in order. How an engagement starts, from your brief to a written scope, is set out on our method page.

  1. 1

    Work out whether this is even your bottleneck

    The first conversation covers how enquiries reach you today. If the company's own site is the weaker link, that comes first, and we say so.

  2. 2

    Search your own name with you

    We look at what a buyer sees today: every profile, old listing and photograph. Some of it you will want taken down, and some of it only you can take down.

  3. 3

    Agree what you will and will not say

    The subjects you know cold, the ones that belong to your clients, and the lines your regulator or association draws. Written down before anything is published.

  4. 4

    Rebuild the profiles

    The bio page, LinkedIn and the directories that matter in your field, done once and done properly.

  5. 5

    The routine

    Interview, drafts, your approval, publication. The interview is the only part that needs you, and it is the part that cannot be skipped.

  6. 6

    Hand it over

    The subject list, the drafting notes and the calendar are yours. If you would rather keep it running yourself, that is a fair outcome.

Before you hire anyone

The first thing to do yourself.

It costs nothing, and it shows what a buyer sees before they ever call you.

  1. Search your own name and your practice or business name in a private browser window, and list the first ten results.
  2. Open your profile on each major platform and check that the name, photo, description and contact details agree.
  3. Ask two people who recently chose you what they looked up first, and write down their answers.

Judge any provider

What to ask any agency or ghost-writer.

Useful whoever you choose, including us.

  • Who writes my words, and do I approve everything before it goes out?
  • Which of my own details and claims will you need to check with me before publishing?
  • What will you not write because of the rules my profession follows?
  • Whose account do the profiles and the content sit in, and what happens to them if we stop?
  • What do you count as a result, and what will you not promise?

Where this fits

Three pieces of sales work, in this order.

GullySales builds every engagement from three pieces of sales work. This page is not one of them, but the same three steps apply to the business behind it.

  1. Step 1

    Sales audit

    Find where deals are being lost and what to fix first.

    Start here if you cannot say where orders are lost.

  2. Step 2

    Sales process design

    One written way to sell, from first enquiry to repeat order.

    Start here if every salesperson sells differently.

  3. Step 3

    Sales management

    A target, a review routine and someone who owns the number.

    Start here if the team has targets and no routine.

Tell us what you need Your brief is read before we call. Scope, fee and term in writing.

FAQ

Questions owners ask before they call.

Not here? More answers, or ask on WhatsApp.

Tell us what you need
Most of this mentoring is unpaid. Why would I spend on it?
Because fees are not what it returns. Board seats, advisory equity, a first look at a round, and a reputation that brings better founders rather than every founder. If none of those matter to you, this is not a good purchase and we will say so in the first conversation.
Can you get me onto accelerator mentor panels?
No. We write the profile and the material, and we neither apply on your behalf nor hold relationships with programmes. What we can do is make the application you send look like it came from somebody they should want.
I also invest. Should the angel side sit on the same page?
Keep them on one page and separate them clearly. A founder needs to know whether a conversation with you is advice or diligence. Blurring it costs you the candid conversations, which are the reason founders come back at all.
How much does it cost?
There is no price list, because the work differs by business. The fee is scoped after we have read your brief and spoken to you, and put in writing before anything starts, split into our time, your media spend and production.
How long is the contract?
The term is agreed in writing after we have spoken, along with the fee and the reporting. It is never a default twelve months, and renewal is decided on the numbers against the baseline recorded at the start.
How soon will we see results?
It depends on what is being changed and how many of the people who matter see it. After we have read your brief and spoken to you, we say what we would expect to move first and how it will be measured against the baseline. Nothing here is guaranteed.
Who will actually do the work?
The person you speak to before anything starts. We work from one office in Nagarbhavi, Bengaluru, with no account managers in between.
What do you need from us?
Your brief, and a conversation. After that, access to whatever the work touches, such as your profiles, your website or your accounts, and time with the people who can answer our questions.
What if we are not happy with the work?
Tell us and the plan changes. Everything is reported against the baseline, so a number that is not moving is visible to both sides. The term is in your written scope, and the refund and cancellation policy sets out the rest.

Consultants, coaches and advisers

Personal branding for the rest of the consultants, coaches and advisers.

Or start from personal branding.

Your next practical step

Tell us what you are trying to grow, and we will read it before we call.

Eight short steps, mostly taps. Skip anything you would rather answer on the call.

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