Effectively Marketing Reg CF, Part 4: Content Builds Trust. How to Make Investors Feel Like They Already Know You Before You Launch

By the time most founders start thinking seriously about marketing their Regulation Crowdfunding campaign, they are usually already behind. You learned that in Parts 1 through 3 (LINK) of this series. Not because the paperwork is incomplete or the online offering page isn’t polished, but because they are still treating the offering like a transaction instead of what it really is: a trust exercise.

 Investors don’t wake up one morning eager to invest in a company they have never heard of, led by a founder they don’t know, in an industry they haven’t thought about since high school economics class. Trust has to exist before investment happens, and content is one of the best ways to build that trust.

The central idea is simple: investors invest in what feels familiar. Most people don’t invest the first time they hear about you, no matter how good your pitch is. They invest after they have seen you repeatedly, watched your progress, and started to feel like they understand who you are and what you are building. In other words, crowdfunding works a lot more like a relationship than a vending machine.

 You don’t press “Launch” and have money fall out. You introduce yourself, show up consistently, and earn confidence over time.

This is why pre-launch content is so important. Content is not about hype or trying to “go viral,” and it’s certainly not about shouting “INVEST NOW” into the social media void. It’s about letting people get to know you before you ever ask them to invest. Think of it as inviting supporters behind the scenes while the company is still being built, rather than showing up on launch day and saying, “Hello stranger, would you like to become a shareholder?”

 Founders often assume content needs to be expensive or perfectly produced. They imagine professional video crews, scripted commercials, and glossy brand campaigns with cinematic music. In reality, some of the most effective crowdfunding content is embarrassingly simple. A founder talking into an iPhone camera for sixty seconds can outperform a polished corporate promo because investors aren’t looking for Hollywood - they are looking for authenticity. People love to see a real founder building a real business, not a marketing robot reading bullet points off a teleprompter.

 That’s not to say that you should ignore the quality of your video or any part of your marketing outreach. If you’re shooting a video on your cell phone, make sure the lighting looks good and your audio quality is excellent. Nothing kills a potential investor’s confidence in you than to put out a video that looks like you don’t care about appearance or where you sound like you are in a tin can.  If you don’t care how you look and sound, what confidence are you building in your potential investor audience? They may think: Is this how they will market their products also? Low quality visuals and horrible sound? If so, they will run away and never come back.

 So what should you actually post? The most effective pre-launch content usually falls into a few categories, and none of them require complicated production. Founder story content is powerful because people invest in conviction, not just products. Progress content is equally important because movement creates confidence, and investors want to feel that the company is alive and advancing. Customer love, testimonials, and real-world validation are also extremely persuasive because social proof builds social proof.

 Mission content matters as well, especially in Reg CF where many investors are emotionally motivated supporters rather than purely financial analysts. People like investing in something meaningful, something they can talk about at dinner, something that feels bigger than “we would like more capital.” And finally, the most overlooked category is human content: showing personality, humor, setbacks, and real founder moments. Investors trust founders who sound like humans, not founders who sound like press releases.

 Consistency matters more than brilliance. You don’t need to post ten times a day like an influencer trying to sell protein powder. But you do need to show up often enough that people remember you exist. For many campaigns, two or three thoughtful posts per week in the month or two leading up to launch is plenty. The goal is not volume for the sake of volume, the goal is familiarity through repetition.

 One of the biggest mistakes founders make is producing content without a next step. A post that gets attention is nice, but attention that disappears is wasted. Every piece of pre-launch content should gently funnel interested people toward the waitlist or early access list. The post doesn’t need to be aggressive, but it should invite action: “If you want to be notified when we launch, join the early investor list.” That simple line is how content becomes pipeline.

 Founders also worry about what they are allowed to say, and that concern is legitimate. Securities offerings come with boundaries, and I will address compliance directly in Part 6. But the safest pre-launch content is almost always the most effective content anyway: storytelling, education, mission, traction, and honest progress updates. Avoid exaggerated promises, avoid “get rich” language, and focus instead on building belief in the business. Excitement is fine, exaggeration is not.

 The deeper truth is that equity crowdfunding investors don’t invest because your Form C is beautifully drafted. They invest because they feel connected. They invest because they have watched you build, and they want to be part of what comes next. Content is how you create that connection at scale, long before launch day.

The bottom line is that Regulation Crowdfunding is not just about filing and going live. It’s about building an audience that trusts you enough to invest, and that trust is built through familiarity over time. If you let people meet you now - through consistent, authentic content - then when launch day arrives, investing will feel like a natural next step rather than a cold ask.

 Coming next in Part 5: Launch week strategy, opening weekend momentum, investor champions, events, and how to convert a warm crowd into Day One traction.

To read Part 1 of the six part series, click here.

To read Part 2 of the six part series, click here.

To read Part 3 of the six part series, click here..

This article is not and should not be considered legal advice. Yes, I am a securities lawyer but no, you did not hire me to provide you with legal advice. In all cases, consult with your own lawyer as every legal situation is unique and do not rely on my educational and informative article as legal advice.

Marketing Securities Online Is Different From Marketing Everything Else: Three Basic Rules To Follow To Avoid Trouble

I’m not sure that my AI image generator could possibly make a creepier person than this guy

Since the advent of the intertubes, we live in a world of constantly being marketed to. Back in the “good old days” it used to just be TV and radio commercials, junk mail in the mailbox and ads in newspapers and magazines. You could easily avoid or ignore them. You could change the station on the radio when commercials ran. You could fast forward past taped TV ads in shows, or switch channels while watching live. Newspapers had ads, but your eyes knew to ignore them. But today, wherever you are online, it’s impossible to not be bombarded by ads. They are everywhere, and they are so well done that sometimes you do not even know you are seeing or hearing an ad. 

This is truly the golden age of marketing. So much data is available that you can literally drop an ad in front of a group of people online in your exact customer demographic  and have that ad tailor made for your product or services, then have that ad follow them everywhere they go online. Nearly everyone buys things online now, and we never have to look far to find what we want because the wonderful people at Google and Meta and Microsoft mine so much data that they can have an ad in front of you in seconds after you showed even the most remote indication that you are interested in buying something. 

With the passing of the JOBS Act in 2012, we suddenly had the ability to sell something else online – investments in private companies and startups. Small businesses had a new tool to raise capital and the restrictions against advertising that existed for more than 80 years were gone. The prohibition against the general public investing in startups and small businesses that were not publicly traded were gone.

So why has this golden age of marketing not allowed free-wheeling, Katy-bar-the-door marketing of these securities online? Sure, we see ads for companies raising capital, but why are these ads so limited in what they say, or how they look?

This article will explore some of the reasons why marketing securities online is not as easy as marketing almost anything else online. It will also delve into some tips on how to stay out of trouble when your private company decides to sell securities using marketing and advertising online and in traditional media.

For the most part, this article will discuss three methods of raising capital online: Reg A, Reg CF, and reg D, Rule 506(c) which are all parts of the 2012 JOBS Act. Some of what I write may apply to all securities in general, but I’m mostly focused on how small businesses raise money online under these three JOBS Act laws to raise capital to try to become big businesses.

The First Step: Avoiding “Securities Fraud” in Marketing

I know what you’re thinking. “I’m not committing fraud, I’m just running an ad to try to sell stock in my company!” The reason rules for marketing securities are different from the rules about selling almost anything else online is that if you screw up in your online securities ads, you may be guilty of what federal law refers to as “securities fraud.” You could face civil penalties. You could face lawsuits. You could go to jail. This is serious stuff. Imagine running a relatively innocuous ad about how your company’s new T-shirts are the best and most comfortable T-shirts in the world, and having someone knock on your door and arrest you. That never happens. But say that the stock you are selling in your company is the best investment in the world, and you can expect a knock on your door, or more likely a nasty letter from a state or federal securities regulator before a knock.

Securities fraud under federal law is the misrepresentation or omission of information to induce investors into purchasing securities. The primary applicable federal law is Rule 10b-5 of the Exchange Act of 1934. Rule 10b-5 states that criminal and/or civil liability may occur if (a) there was a misrepresentation of a material fact (2) done knowingly (3) that a securities purchaser relied on and (4) the reliance on the material misrepresentation caused a loss.

In addition, state governments may also impose civil and criminal liability on those engaged in securities fraud based on state laws. But for the most part, if you follow the federal law as it applies, you will almost always be in good shape with state laws.

The key here that makes securities marketing different is the absolute prohibition on misrepresentation in your ads. We have all seen ads for cereal, shoes, cars and almost every consumer good that say things we all know are simply not true. Companies selling products and services have, for decades, been given some leeway for “puffery” or certain exaggerations of marketing claims. The courts tend to use this test, or something similar, to walk the fine line between puffery and false advertising: Is the claim “blustering and boasting that no reasonable consumer would rely on?” If so, it is puffery and not false advertising. One court said “a general claim of superiority over comparable products that is so vague that it can be understood as nothing more than a mere expression of opinion” is puffery, and not false advertising.

Unlike the rest of the marketing world, there is no place for “puffery” when marketing securities. Don’t expect the general rules of puffery above will be used when the SEC, a state securities regulator or a competitor makes a complaint or starts an investigation into a potentially false or misleading statement.

Under securities laws, you must be clear to not be false or misleading in any manner. When you plan to make any statement, or use any language or graphics in any marketing material, review it in the most critical fashion you can – not in the most favorable manner. Assume the regulator or court will construe it in the worst manner possible, not in a manner favorable to you. If it could be considered misleading, don’t take any chances. Do not use it.

You do not want that knock on your door.

Here are the three basic rules to avoid committing securities fraud. Of course, there are just guidelines. In all instances, get legal advice from a securities lawyer.

Basic Rule 1: Be 100% truthful and use verifiable facts in all marketing communications

Ads, interviews, social media posts, emails and every other form of marketing need to be 100% truthful and all statements presented as facts must be 100% verifiable as true.

My basic rule is... if it could be read in any way as being misleading, do not say or use it at all. There is no reason to take a chance. Securities regulators do not care about “puffery” and will look at any statement that exaggerates, even if it is not believable at all, to be a false or misleading statement and a violation of securities laws.

Basic Rule 2: Use Qualifying Words and Terms When Giving An Opinion

If you have to discuss anything uncertain (I’m not talking about something false or misleading) make sure you qualify your statements.

For example, if you want to talk about your product being the best in the marketplace, understand the fine line between these two statements:

(1) We have the best product in the marketplace.

(2) We believe we have the best product in the marketplace.

The second statement is clearly an opinion, and while it is best to avoid even these types of statements when discussing a securities offering, sometimes it happens anyway, especially in a live interview. In those cases, be sure to qualify your statement with “we believe” or “we feel” or similar language. It’s not a perfect defense, and if the words after the qualifying statement are false or misleading, then qualifying it will not help. But always train yourself and your marketing team to qualify any opinion statement that cannot demonstrable be proven as fact to give your company the best chance to avoid problems.

Again, review all securities marketing statements in the most critical and negative way before using them because that is how a regulator or court will read them. They do not care if you interpret what you said differently. Your opinion as to how it could be interpreted the way you want it to be interpreted means nothing in this context. That is not how a regulator will interpret it.

Basic Rule 3: Try to avoid making statements about future projections unless there are lots of disclaimers and qualifying language

Projections of future sales, revenues, profits, etc. are rarely accurate, despite everyone’s best efforts. Once those projections are made public, they become fodder for regulators and plaintiff’s lawyers to make claims that you promised something that was false or misleading. It’s better to stay away from projections altogether. I almost always advise my clients to not use projections at all to promote the sales of their securities because of their uncertainty and the potential liability. But in circumstances where projections are used despite the great risk they bring to the table, there should be significant and thorough disclaimers surrounding the projections if they are in writing. If used in a media interview, they should be tempered by qualifying words and language – and best to do so in excess of what I discussed above given that you are talking numbers that people will rely on to make investment decisions.

But in my opinion, the best policy is to not use projections at all when marketing securities.

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This article is not and should not be considered legal advice. Yes, I am a securities lawyer but no, you did not hire me to provide you with legal advice. In all cases, consult with your own lawyer as every legal situation is unique and do not rely on my educational and informative article as legal advice.