Hopefully I can help, i've helped over 125 start-ups raise money spanning every sector you could think of.

The first thing to note is everything has a value proposition.

In this instance you are suggesting it isn't the profitability of the company but the founder's profile that represents this value. In that case this becomes more of a marketing exercise than a fundraising exercise.

I've done part-time work for Sean Ellis' Growthhackers.com for just under a year and in that time been lucky enough to speak to some really impressive people and onboard some exciting guests to do AMA's (including Guy Kawasaki). Sean actually launched a conference that went really well, this was a profit generating exercise but the draw was him and the profiles of the speakers.

The point i'm making is you are right to single out the profile of the founder and most likely the 'cause' the organization is supporting. E.g. If it's a non-for-profit that pours Benzene into waterways you're not exactly going to have much success irrespective of the founder.

So the formula you have is prestigious founder + good cause. The good news is from my experience of dealing with 1000's of High Net Worths is sometimes returns aren't everything. It is highly unlikely our client base would invest into start-ups just for the 100x returns as most start-ups will fail, they do it because they believe in what it is trying to achieve. Simon Sinek does a pretty good Ted Talk on 'The Why'.

So some investors may just want to buddy up with the founder of the organization e.g. I would invest into the Bill & Melinda Gates foundation if I thought at their annual conference i'd get to speak to them.

If this direct approach doesn't work look at tangibles. I'm sure there are organizations that would like to be associated with your cause or your founder - can they offer up rewards or giveaways? You can then take the Red Paper Clip approach of trading up good will for tangible value supplied by corporates fulfilling CSR etc and then trade this for cash.

Equally is there an educational component to the conference? I think i've hammered the point enough, it's just to say sometimes people won't do stuff for money and that's okay just make sure you don't confuse the message and appeal to a different sense.