Top 10 Tips for Crowdfunding Success for Nonprofits + 5 Platforms to Run Your Fundraising Campaigns

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Crowdfunding is a way of collecting small amounts of money from many different people to fund a particular project. This approach has become incredibly popular for nonprofits around the globe over the past few years. When used intentionally with an organisation’s social media,  a  crowdfunding campaigns can make it so much easier to reach your target audience online and hit your goals. 

I want you to be able to capitalise on this tool to help your cause spread its message! That is why I have pulled together some tips to help make your projects a success as well as 4 crowdfunding platforms you can try out and explore.

Now, let's be clear. I have run both successful and unsuccessful crowdfunding campaigns, so I get what it takes to make these work and I want to see you succeed. There is nothing more devastating than raising thousands of dollars on a crowdfunding platform but seeing none of it, because you didn't hit your ultimate goal. 

How to Make Your Crowdfunding Campaigns Successful

Crowdfunding is one of the best ways to leverage the power of social media channels and other online platforms to fund your project. So to help you out  to make your crowdfunding campaign a great success as a nonprofit, here are 10 helpful tips that you can explore and apply to your project. 

Activate Your Existing Connections

You may think it’s best to look for a wider audience to support you with your crowdfunding campaigns. But actually, activating your existing connections and followers is an incredible way to help you achieve your goals. So instead of reaching out to new people for support, make those that you've known for a long time  your priority. Tap into your old circle of friends, volunteers who have previously worked with you, supporters of years gone by, or the list of friends on your social media accounts who have been following your posts from time to time for years. Once people have known you personally, they tend to be more likely to trust you, be familiar with your work and give you the support you need. You don’t need to spend your precious time convincing uninterested people to get involved, instead find those that already align with your cause, those that support your cause and activate them into contributing. 

Planning and Preparation Bring Success 

Preparation is one of the most important elements that make any plan a success. Executing an existing plan takes far less energy than making it up as you go and when it comes to crowdfunding, delivering on the fly can be a fast track to an unfulfilled campaign. Prioritise creating a solid base of supporters before you launch your campaign, crowdfunding requires crowds (in real life or online) and it requires consistent and sustained effort so build a team to help you all the  way through the process. You will no doubt need to adapt your plan along the way, but having a clear direction to start will make this easier.

Facilitating a Crowding Platform Forum 

Facilitating a forum on any crowdfunding platform is a great way to engage with potential investors. However, it may also consume much of your time if you don’t have a concrete plan to do it in the most effective way. There might be other volunteers who can offer support by responding to questions and facilitating forum conversations. So one of the best things you can do is to make a list of responses ahead of time to any possible questions that your audience may have. Check other campaigns to get an idea of what questions may come up to help you develop your template responses. Use frequently asked questions (FAQ) on your campaign page to address potential objections or questions people may have from the outset.

Consistently share and shout your campaign from the rooftops

People are flooded with asks, advertising and information these days at a rate never before seen. It is important you keep communicating your campaign consistently across your social media platforms, your email list and through all your interactions with your organisation. You might feel like you are asking too much, but many studies have proven over the years that people need to see the ask multiple times before they take action (some estimates are now as high as 23 times) Importantly, you must sustain the asking and advertising for the duration of the WHOLE campaign, don’t let your communication drop in the second half, most donors will come on board in the final quarter so keep singing your cause from the rooftops right up until the campaign closes.

Get a Pro

Seeking help from an agency to support you all the way from the planning stage to the launch date can be a valuable investment, especially for high dollar value campaigns. There are  various agencies available that specialise in crowdfunding and that help you in setting up your campaign based on the market trends and previous success records. However, not all agencies will have experience with non profits or community groups so be sure to do your homework beforehand.

Make Your Goals SMART

As mentioned above, you need to create a concrete plan to reach your goals. However, do not set up goals that are impossible to achieve. Instead, make use of the SMART tool  as you plan every single step of your crowdfunding campaign. It’s a popular acronym for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound. These will serve as a great basis in creating a list of your objectives to be able to evaluate the success of your campaign once you have completed it . 

Establish Connections With Others in the Same Industry

Another way to make your crowdfunding campaign successful is to establish connections with others in the same industry. Get out there (in person and online) and let others see how awesome what you are doing is. Doing so will help you boost your self-confidence and even promote brand awareness in your target audience during the entire process. You can join discussion feeds and forums with other people who have the same interests within  your niche or industry. You can also find people online that are at the top of your field and make an effort to contribute meaningfully to conversation on their social platforms. These approaches  will make your presence more visible, establish you as a key contributor in your field and it’ll surely be a great help in attracting your audience for when you launch your crowdfunding campaign in the future. 

Identify the Best Ambassadors of Your Campaign

When you’ve been using any social media channels or other online platforms, you naturally attract many followers who would love to know more about you and your nonprofit cause. This means that those  loyal followers can be some of the best ambassadors for your crowdfunding campaign. The first step is to identify those individuals, reach out to them and ask them personally for feedback on your campaign. Use it as a genuine opportunity to get to know the people who are supporting you, build further rapport, share with them what you have coming up next and what they can do to support you. A lot of the time, we can get so caught up in what we are doing, we forget to actually ASK for the help we need. These brand ambassadors will help you spread your message far and wide. 

Make Use of High-Quality and Relevant Campaign Materials

It has been proven to be effective to make use of videos in any crowdfunding campaigns. It adds authenticity to your goals and projects. You can simply sit in front of your computer and start recording your video. People want to be able to connect with you, connect to your cause and get to know the human beings behind the cause. Video is a great way to start building connections, especially with your potential donors. 

Incentivise Donations

Another effective way to make your crowdfunding campaign successful as a nonprofit is to give your donors some incentives. You may offer various prizes for different levels of contributions. For instance, higher level donations might get an invitation to a thankyou lunch or you might offer a particular product created by the members of your organisation. You could  also send people ‘thank you’ messages via email with different photos of your activities or projects, the message could come from the CEO, the President or a service recipient of your cause. Get as creative as you like here, people love to get close to the causes they support and this is a way of acknowledging their help and contribution to the success of your campaign. Doing so will make them feel valued, help you build rapport and encourage people to become more active participants in helping your cause reach its goals.  They may even talk about their experience with their friends and family, further expanding your reach and awareness of your cause.

Make Your Fundraising Campaigns Easy With These 5 Platforms

Crowdfunding has been a popular form of fundraising for nonprofits worldwide. Because of that, the need for user-friendly and profitable platforms continues to grow as well. So here are 4 popular platforms I have found that you can explore and try for your upcoming crowdfunding campaign.

GoFundMe

If you want to fundraise for a cause, GoFundMe is just one of the perfect platforms you can explore.  This platform is great whether you are an individual, group, or an organisation. One exciting thing about it is that it has a platform fee of 0% and it relies on the donors’ generosity to contribute in sustaining it. There will only be a third-party transaction fee of 2.2% plus 0.30c payment for the processing fee. You can fundraise for medical needs, emergency, memorial, education, nonprofit, and coronavirus fundraising. You can start your fundraising campaign on the platform by telling your story and sharing what you want to achieve. You’ll then have a page for fundraising to be able to  share your campaign to start receiving donations. 

MightyCause

Since 2006, MightyCause has served many people in the nonprofit community by helping them run fundraising campaigns online and facilitate donor engagement. In fact, they have become the technology partner for hundreds of community-led Giving Days and have given support for more than 150,000 causes. Besides that, MightyCause has a solid team capable of working with a nonprofit organisation that has limited resources to help them achieve  their goals. With their fundraising methodologies and strategies and amazing customer support, you’ll be able to accomplish your mission for your organisation. 

Indiegogo

Before hitting mainstream availability, tons of new and exciting products take flight with the crowdfunding campaigns on Indiegogo. Indiegogo provides great free resources on their page to support your campaigns to hit their goals. 

Facebook 

There are various ways you can support any fundraising campaigns using your Facebook profile and the good thing about it is that Facebook won’t charge you any fees for any amount of your donations if you are a nonprofit organisation. You also can have supporters run a charity fundraiser campaign (or birthday fundraiser) on their private pages and you can be the beneficiary as the non profit. Don't forget to also add a donation button on your group or organisations Facebook posts and pages

Fund Landcare
Now you all know how much I love Landcare, well check this out. Landcare Australia Ltd have launched a fundraising platform designed with the Landcarer in mind. It allows Landcare groups to create campaigns and raise funds by using Landcare Australia’s DGS status.

Using Fund Landcare, groups will be able to:

  • Set up crowdfunding pages to raise funds for particular projects.
  • Set up fundraising events for groups and individuals.
  • Set up fundraising challenges – this could be for groups and individuals who have created their own challenge or for groups and individual who want to take part in an exciting challenge, such as a running event.


Have a look and feel around these platforms and see what works for you. Don’t be afraid to try different platforms. It's all a journey! Ultimately, you have an important cause to raise funds for and it is a gift and honour for people to know about it and be able to support you.

Did I miss anything? Let me know so  I can add it to the list. Also, be sure to bookmark this page because I will update it as new platforms or information become available.