Purpose: Existing literature shows that marketing capabilities of new ventures are critical success factors affecting venture capital funding, startup performance and business failure. The purpose of this study is to investigate whether venture capitalists reward extensive marketing strategies in their startup valuation and whether the marketing mix planning and early strategies on customer orientation predict long-term development of startups. Design/methodology/approach: To address these gaps, this study investigate 107 business plans of new ventures which received venture capital based on these planning documents. The authors use computer-aided text analysis and regression analyses. Findings: This study’s findings show that customer orientation has positive effects on new venture performance and intensive marketing mix planning increases the likelihood of survival. However, venture capitalists decrease their startup valuation when they read too much about customer orientation and operative marketing mix planning. Originality/value: This study relies on unique internal documents and therefore provides valuable and new insights for research and practice. Further, this study investigate various short- and long-term effects from marketing and customer orientation for a startups’ development.