Crowdfunding Campaign Guidelines 10 Must-Do for Success

Fito Benitez Growth & EngagementNovember 2016fito@fundyou.fi

Introduction

• This document aims to identify the main factors of success for a crowdfunding campaign.

• Once identified, we will explain what these mean in practice.

• Each factor will also be supported with an example of how to make it work in practice.

Guidelines Summary1. Start by creating or gathering a crowd.

2. Write a business plan.

3. Define the audience and create personas.

4. Write your pitch.

5. Keep the communication relevant.

6. Create an engaging campaign video.

7. Come up with relevant and engaging rewards.

8. Have incentives for contributors to share the campaign.

9. Pre-campaign production of contacts and content is critical.

10. Create a campaign schedule and check-lists to stay on top of the project.

1. Start a Crowd• It is not a causality that the word crowd is on front of the word funding. The crowd is your most precious asset,

and the start of all your efforts.

• Your crowd or tribe are surely your family & friends (30% of the crowd), and colleagues (30%), and it extends to anyone that has involved in any of your projects before.

• If you don’t have a crowd yet, start one right away. You won’t have a successful campaign without one. It is better to delay your crowdfunding campaign a couple of months while you build your crowd, than start it without one.

• The easiest way is to start your crowd is by asking your first degree contacts for feedback on your current project. An online survey can do. Make sure to add an incentive to engage your crowd into sharing the feedback with you. Another easy way is to find forums related to the kind of project you are doing, and interact with the community by asking questions, etc.

• When you “talk” to your crowd, ask more than tell, and make sure to customise the message to the different groups. The more relevant they will find your communication, and the more “involved” you can make them feel, the greater chance they will answer back and start becoming part of your crowd.

• Strangers like to build and buy into momentum. Make sure you are agile in your communication to make the most out of strangers.

Example: The Tribes We Lead (Seth Godin)

2. Write a Business PlanMany crowdfunding projects fail because they start the campaigns without a business plan.

Without a business plan, you fail to:

• define what’s the market opportunity and the competition, • exactly know what funds you need, • how you are going to use these, and • to be credible among backers, specially those who might risk the most by making the biggest

contributions.

Your business plan at least needs to cover:

• market analysis • product / services • strategy implementation details • financial plan

Example: How to Finnish a Biz Plan in 1 Day

3. Define the Audience and Create PersonasAUDIENCE/S

No, it can’t be everybody. Not everyone needs your product/service. And even if they need, you don’t have the time and resources to try to reach them all. Yes, biz 101.

If you have customers, go out and interview them. With that, start sketching personas. Boil it down to 4 and you are off with the right start.

Now, if you don’t have customers, you need to sketch out those people that need your product/service the most. Focus. Yes, you too try to boil it down to 4.

In both cases, you can’t be certain, but fortunately you will obtain valuable data as you go that will help you find out if you were right or wrong. But most importantly it will save you time and money by telling you who are the people that not only are most into pledging to your project, but those “social butterflies” that can help you reach out to more people that will pledge.

EARLY-ADOPTERS & INFLUENCERS

After sketching out those audiences, you need to try to identify which of those four could be an early-adopter of your product/service. These people are the first ones ready to give out sincere reviews that you can use to bring others along. If that person wants to buzz to his network, he is an influencer too, but don’t expect everyone to want to actively do so. You need to ask for a sincere review, and have the right to publicly share it during your campaign.

Apart from the influence that one “happy customer” can bring, there are other type of influencers. The most powerful these days are bloggers, so make sure you research who they are, select those that could be most interested to try your product/service, and go contact them. Indeed celebrities are influencers too, so if you have anyone at hand make sure you get them to participate and reach out to their fans online, before and during the campaign.

Example: How to Research & Create Personas

4. Write your PitchOnce you know who you are targeting, and identified early-adopters and influencers, you are prepared to start writing your pitch. If you had not done so, you wouldn’t know who you are “talking” to.

If you don’t know who you are talking to, you will fail in reaching out to them with relevant information that will engage them in the project.

The written pitch includes:

• putting the most important information first,

• telling a compelling story, and keep it short,

• explain exactly why you are raising money,

• share details about yourself, the team, and anyone that helped shape your project,

• build trust with a specific budget breakdown

• spelling and grammar are important, so be sure to proofread,

• break long text into sections with headings,

• and include pictures of your perks in the pitch text.

Example: How to Write a Crowdfunding Pitch

5. Keep the Communication RelevantThey way you communicate your campaign is going to have a critical influence on your chances to engage your audience, specially those outside your first degree contacts. Some recommendations are:

• customise your communication to each target segment. Keeping the message relevant to each group’s interests and motivations will be key to get them engaged in participating and buzzing it.

• don’t ask for donations, ask for involvement. Get them to be part of this movement. Your wins are their wins, and let’s do it together.

• make people feel part of the project. If they do, you won’t even have to ask them to help. They’ll do it cause they feel the are contributing to a good cause.

This does not mean that you won’t get more from them by asking. It is how you ask that can make the difference. The video for this section is a great example. You’ll be enlightened after watching it.

Example: The Art of Asking (Amanda Palmer)

6. Create an Engaging Campaign VideoYour campaign video is the corner stone of your campaign’s content. This is because:

• a video is by far the most engaging type of content to get people interested in knowing more, and activate them to contribute or share.

• a short video has the ability to share your passion quick and fast, and the mix of sound, images, and texts can take your message to another dimension.

• it’s the most efficient way to connect with your tribe, specially if you can sound real and passionate.

Your campaign video should answer this critical questions:

• who you are, • what you have done before • what are you raising money for, • how, when, and where can people contribute to it, • so end it with a concrete call-to-action.

Other factors contributing to the success of your video are:

• adding a famous face to the video, • have others talk about your project and why they are inspired by it,

Example: Amazing Videos (Indiegogo)

7. RewardsRewards and perks are the best way to motivate contributions. Every contribution to the campaign has to be tied to a reward.

Make sure you have between 5-8 contribution levels with proportionate rewards. Having a $10 and $25 contribution is critical as this is proven to convert a big amount of potential project backers.

The most engaging rewards have these attributes.

• personal - if possible, personalise in some way, • visual - an image says more than a thousand words, • sharable - to increase the chances of exposure and buzz that attracts more backers, • immediate - to build on the momentum and increase the chances of being buzzed.

Out of ideas? You just have to ask your tribe what would they like and what would they share.

Example: Crowdfunding Rewards

8. IncentivesAn incentives program helps you turn backers into ambassadors of your campaign, and stimulates them towards sharing your campaign with their contacts.

The different types of most used incentives are:

• sharable rewards - as explained on the rewards section, one that is personal and visual has the potential to be shared. Make sure your rewards achieve that.

• money / gift cards - many platforms will give a % of money back to backers whose sharing has brought other backers along. In many cases, and because of the law, money can’t be given out, so gift cards are the best alternative.

• turn into donation - based on the same scheme as the previous incentive, instead of choosing a gift card, you can donate the whole amount to a preselected social change cause.

Example: Incentives (Seed&Spark)

9. Pre-CampaignPre-campaign is the part of your campaign that is crucial for success, and it is divided into two stages that normally last one month each. These are:

PLANNING

At this stage you need to:

• gather all your contact details so you can reach them by email, phone, etc. Pay special attention to contacts that can open you a bigger reach through their networks.

• plan and start preparing all the campaign content that you are going to need, specially your pitch video

• assign resources and responsibility among your team

• compose your pitch and decide what is the realistic amount of funding you can raise

• brainstorm perks and price points

PRODUCTION

At this stage you need to:

• have all your email lists ready, divided by 1) family, friends and close contacts, 2) former colleagues and fans you have gathered throughout your career, 3) everyone else.

• finalise your pitch, pitch video and supporting pics/videos

• finalise perk descriptions and prize points

• start preparing soft launch

Example: Organisation (Seed&Spark)

10. ScheduleScheduling your efforts before and during your campaign is going to help you make it successful.

Three things to keep in mind are that:

• the more team members you have, the more you can share the tasks.

• you should make a master schedule before assigning team members.

• each team member must have his/her schedule customised to each individuals’s tasks.

The total schedule last for 3 months, and is divided into three calendars. These are:

• preparation - 2 months before schedule.

• production - 1 month before schedule.

• execution - campaign schedule.

Example: Calendar & Checklists (IndieGogo)

Indiegogo provides a fantastic master schedule example with checklists. You can download it from the link provided.

www.fundyou.io

by Fito Benitez