Soft Commitments

Gather and Track Investor Interest in New Opportunities

With Soft Commitments, Sponsors can now streamline the entire capital raise process - from planning a new capital raise to gathering interest in the opportunity to converting interest into a firm commitment. Using the new Soft Commitments feature, Sponsors can also leverage new tracking tools to monitor investor engagement in new opportunities, including tracking document views, email opens, response rates, and more.

Creating an Opportunity

On the top navigation panel, select CRM > Soft Commits

To create a new opportunity, select the blue Create Opportunity button in the top right corner.

To manage an existing opportunity, click on the name of the opportunity from the opportunities list.

Creating the Investor Interest Form

Begin by giving the opportunity a Name and Goal Amount. You will first design the Investor Interest Form. The Text Editor will allow you to create a custom message within the Form, which you can preview on the right side of your screen. Any documents and marketing materials can be attached at the bottom under Documents. When complete, select Save in the bottom right.

Track Investor Interest

Within your opportunity, you will track and manage investor interest, send interest forms to investors, and move the allocated interest into a project when ready. The table includes all Individuals from your CRM. It can be searched using the topmost row and sorted or filtered via the column headers and tools on the right. The table was designed to function similar to your current spreadsheet, so each cell you select can be edited – this becomes helpful when you get verbal commitments from investors and would still like to track their interest level here as well.

1. Search and Filter – Each column can be searched or filtered.
2. Investor Profiles – By selecting the arrow next to an individual's name you will see any investment vehicles the individual is connected to (eg Trusts, LLCs Joint Accounts, or IRAs). While in the expanded profile view you can double click on the Interested or Allocated columns to enter interest for investors who do not complete the interest form, this is helpful in the event you have verbally confirmed interest from an investor.
3. Choose which columns you’d like to see and apply additional filters.
4. To send the Opportunity Interest Form to select investors, search and click the checkbox by their name. When you have all of the investors checked, select the Bulk Actions button and select Send Opportunity. You will be taken to a 3-step summary wizard, where you will have one more chance to 'Customize Opportunity Email', 'Review Investor Interest Form', and 'Review Recipients & Send'. You may select the Previous button if you need to go back to a previous step for any reason. Once you are satisfied with the information in each step, select Send Opportunity. Any investor interest coming in from the forms will populate on the table in real time. Once sent, you will be able to track investor activity by selecting this symbol:

Investor Experience

The investor will receive something similar to the email notification below. This can be customized by going into Investor Settings > Portal Notifications and selecting the edit pencil icon to the right of the 'Investment Request' notification.

Selecting the Reserve Now button will take the investor to the Investor Interest Form. From here, they can select a response. If 'Yes,' they can move forward with selecting a connected profile (or create a new one), select their Interested Investment Amount, enter an optional written response and select Select Response. Choosing 'Maybe' or 'No' will only give the option to enter a response and submit the response.

Investor Allocations

Select the right-arrow to the left of the investor name to expand that investor's soft commitment information. Enter the interest amount that you would like to allocate into the Allocated column by double-clicking on that field. Once entered, this moves the investor's interested investment vehicle and their allocated amount into the Investor Allocations tab. From here, select the investors you’d like to Connect to a Commitment through the Bulk Actions drop-down. Note: You may do this one at a time or wait until you have entered all of your allocations. Select the open Firm Commitment that you would like to connect your investor(s) to. If you see a yellow triangle appear, go back to the commitment as this means not all of the requirements have been satisfied for that particular class. Once connected, select Add.

When you are ready to take the Investor Allocations to Firm Commitments in a Project, this guide is helpful in setting up the hard commitment process: Commitments. This article is also helpful for setting up any documents that need to be electronically signed by your investors: eSignature Document Checklist.