Ways to Strengthen Your Crowdfunding Campaign

You’re running a crowdfunding campaign (or thinking about it) - congratulations! You’re one step closer to getting the funding you need for your business, but now you’ve got a little bit of work ahead of you. Read on for some tips on how you can strengthen your crowdfunding campaign to ensure greater chances of success and hitting your maximum fundraising goal.

Start out strong, but (sort of) silent

One way to start out your campaign by hitting the ground running is by lining up some people you know will want to invest in your campaign before you launch and tell them about the opportunity. Then, when you launch, reach out to them first, and try to fill up at least 10% of your fundraising goal with them.

Once you’ve got that momentum going, that’s the perfect time to publicly launch your campaign - then, the general public will see that it’s already got some funding! It’s kind of like the logic of a tip jar - you always see a couple of bucks thrown in there, which might motivate you to tip in return, right?

Consider debt crowdfunding instead of gift or reward crowdfunding

The kind of crowdfunding tool you decide to use can also be part of strengthening you campaign. Did you know there are different types of crowdfunding tools you can use?

Two of the most common types of crowdfunding (because they’ve been around the longest) are gift and reward crowdfunding. Gift crowdfunding is like what you see with GoFundMe - usually meant for charitable causes, people donate to a cause without any expectation of return. Reward crowdfunding is a similar idea, except sometimes they include rewards with certain levels of donation, like free merch or gift cards to the business.

However, neither of these tools offer any kind of financial incentive to contribute to a campaign. If you choose a debt crowdfunding campaign, you invite your network to actually invest in your business by contributing to a loan. That means, you’re paying back your neighbors their principal plus interest. This leads to more people wanting to invest, and often higher investment amounts.

Nippitaty Distillery owner Traxler Littlejohn ran a Kickstarter (a reward crowdfunder) campaign to finance the build-out of his taproom, but experienced lukewarm results. Then, he ran a Honeycomb campaign and raised $68,877 in investments!

“[With a Kickstarter campaign] You’re getting nothing back, except maybe some cool swag and thank you, and making yourself feel better for helping out a small business,” says Traxler. “But in all real sense, you’re not gaining a return on that. And with me trying to be as frugal with my personal money as I can, that’s something that I would personally only kick a couple of bucks too.”

Reach out to strategic community partners

Another way to strengthen your crowdfunding campaign can be to strategically link up with partners in your community who might help you promote your campaign, or even invest in it.

Honeycomb is delighted to have several institutional partners in various regions who help support and strengthen certain businesses' campaigns. For example, the Souls Grown Deep Foundation invests in campaigns run by Black, creative entrepreneurs such as Kaye Bakes and Dope Pieces Puzzle Company.

Maybe there’s a partner in your community, such as your local chamber of commerce or neighborhood business association, who could help you put the word out about your campaign, or who might be interested in making an investment in your campaign.

Host a pitch event for your crowdfunding campaign

As part of this partnership, or on your own, hosting a pitch event could be a really valuable way of meeting potential investors and telling them about your campaign in your own special way. If you’ve got a brick-and-mortar space, invite investors into your space (or your new space, even if it’s not entirely built out) and pitch your campaign!

People are much more likely to invest in a business they can put a face to, after all, and a single pitch event can work much better than a social media post could thanks to that interpersonal interaction.

Enlist help for your campaign promotion

One of the common pitfalls we see business owners fall into is losing momentum on their marketing for the crowdfunding campaign. Promotion is key when it comes to crowdfunding - oftentimes investors need multiple touches before they actually invest in your campaign.

We get it, it’s busy as a small business owner! It helps though if there’s one person who’s dedicated to promoting the crowdfunding campaign. It could be you or your partner, your social media or marketing specialist, or heck maybe your Gen-Z nephew - as long as someone is doing it, and doing it consistently, your campaign will be all the more stronger.

A crowdfunding campaign that can get you money, fame, and friends

Well… in a way. Honeycomb Credit loan crowdfunding campaigns are unique in that they help you access the capital you need to grow your business, but they also can help you market your business to the greater world and strengthen your already-existing customer relationships! Fill out the form below to learn more.