Well, I don’t know about South Africa but in America if you are a small business (and you sound really small) a venture capitalist won’t be interested unless you have a really great/new idea. However, many businesses that are looking for funding start with an angel investor first. This is someone who likes your business plan and is willing to invest his own money in the venture.

You do have a business plan don’t you? If not, no serious investor will go near you. If you want to attract investors you need to have a plan for launching, running and growing the business.

Be prepared to give up a large portion of your business and when all is said and done your investors may end up with majority ownership. Also be prepared to demonstrate that you have the experience and background to run this business. You started a year ago and bombed and by your own admission you didn’t know what your target market wanted. You need to be able to answer tough questions like this. Venture capatilists want a significant return on their investment so they are very selective with choices for their funding.

I don’t mean to sound harsh but it sounds like you think enough money will make your new idea successful and this is not the case. True, a lot of start-ups fail because they are under-capitalized but there are many other factors that determine business success.