Many entrepreneurs find it difficult to navigate the options when it comes to raising capital for their nascent businesses. The competition for investor attention can be fierce.

Twenty-eight percent of business owners who attempted to raise capital last quarter were able to do so from wealthy individual “angel” investors, up from 13% in the second quarter, according to a survey of 2,361 entrepreneurs by Dun & Bradstreet Credibility Corp. and Pepperdine University’s business school that was fielded from July 22 to Aug. 15....