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Editor's Notes

• #2: In previous modules, we discussed the preparation and management of the campaign. The following module 4 includes all activities which are done after the end of the campaign, so either when the funding goal is achieved or the the funding time has ended. Its subchapters are: Thank - how to interact with your audience Fulfil - how to deliver on the promises of your campaign Grow - how to use the post-campaigning to prepare the next steps in your business The focus on this chapter is on reward-based Crowdfunding. To some extent, this applies also to donation-based Crowdfunding as well, because one goal of a donation-based Crowdfunding campaign can be to turn one-time donors into long-time donors. In equity-based Crowdfunding, there are a number of steps that are required by platform and by law - especially in communication to the investors. Each platform and each country is different, so we can cover only some very basic steps regarding investor communication. In lending-based Crowdfunding, the main legal requirement is to pay back the loan during the time specified in the loan contract. Lending-based platforms have specific rules on what happens when you fully or partially default on the loan. We cannot cover these here in the training material because the situation depends very much on the legal framework in each country and the platform rules.
• #3: After a successfully finished Crowdfunding campaign, project owners often focus on their businesses. But do not forget your Crowd, as your supporters often are also your first customers and influencers, who recommend your product or your brand. So thank everyone for joining the campaign, fulfill your promises like rewards and last but not least, involve your supporters to further grow your business by sharing insights and regularly communicate with them.
• #5: The moment your campaign reaches its goal or ends successfully, is the moment to tell everyone about it. We recommend to do the following steps: Spread the word on Social Media Send an email to your network. Send an email to all supporters through the functionality of the campaign. Create an update/blog news on the Crowdfunding platform and/or use the integrated communication tools on the Crowdfunding platform. Prepare a press release or update journalists and bloggers that you have been in touch with. For example, on Facebook, German startup Bionictoys told their fans and supporters that the goal was reached, but also reminded them about the remaining hours of the campaign. On Kickstarter, they also created an update and gave a short outlook for the next steps concerning their project.
• #6: As mentioned on the previous slide, as soon as you finished your campaign you should thank all your supporters through various channels. You can write or post a general thank you-update on Facebook etc. Facebook, Twitter and other social media channels allow the tagging of your network in a post. The supporters will be notified when you tag or mention them. Try to thank every single supporter by emailing or tagging him or her. The more personal the better. This is especially effective if the funding goal is reached, but the funding time has not ended and you are trying to create awareness that stretch goals (see module 2 and 3) are still available. Tagging supporters can be an effective advertising tool as well for corporate and public partners of your Crowdfunding campaign, even during the campaign. You can incentivize the support from companies by promising that you will use your channels to highlight their support, especially on social media. For them, the social media reach might be worth the equivalent of the amount that they contributed to your campaign. You can use this as well when you receive non-financial support during your campaign. For instance, if you create an event during the campaign and the venue lets you use the space for a discounted price. On most reward-based Crowdfunding campaigns, you can evaluate the monetary value of these in-kind contributions and pay them into the campaign yourself. Do not forget to thank the people who are giving you non-financial support.
• #7: On many platforms you can add an additional block to inform visitors about the successfully funded project and possibly redirect them. For example, Slovenian project Zen Egg embedded a button-graphic directly on top of the project-page on Kickstarter and redirected users to their website, where they continued their storytelling and also integrated a webshop for further selling their product. For many Crowdfunding-campaigns this makes perfect sense, as media coverage is still high after successfully finishing a campaign.
• #8: German startup Luuv used their blog on Medium.com to reflect upon the Crowdfunding process. For instance, they wrote: There were many learnings over the course of the Kickstarter campaign but the most important ones were the importance of our backers and our community, how things always take longer than what you think they will take, and when to take advice and when to stick to your guns. These lessons, along with a solid business and marketing strategy, strong analysis, and good communication were our key to a successful campaign. So now we move to the production phase of our crowdfunding, and the moment that everyone is waiting for. This is an exciting moment for us, because we can’t wait to see solidLUUV and ultraLUUV in the hands of our backers. It’s also a super busy time where we are perfecting the electronic components of ultraLUUV, finalising the packaging and doing everything to make LUUV a great success. It helps to make supporters feel as part of the campaign when they hear the personal stories of the project owners.
• #9: Although it is important to get some press coverage at Crowdfunding-start, do not forget to update journalists after you finished your campaign. You will need so more press-coverage for your product-launch in the future. Try to stay in touch with them and send them regular updates, even if your campaign failed. Sometimes it is also a good story to tell, how a company went successful after a Crowdfunding-campaign which has not been perfect. Try to focus on your achievements and offer interviews or if possible your product for testing.
• #10: Sometimes a Crowdfunding campaign seems like a 24/7 job. After you reached your goal, take a moment, breathe and celebrate. But do not forget to take a picture and share it with your community. It is totally fine to post some personal content and people will be happy for and with you. You can also use the final party to prepare the next move in your Crowdfunding campaign - such as kicking off the next Crowdfunding campaign, announcing the production of your rewards, or simply evaluating with your team what went well and what did not go so well.
• #12: If you ran a reward-based Crowdfunding campaign, make sure all your backer/investor-data is correct before sending out rewards. The best way to do that is through a survey send to all supporters. Some platforms offer basic features to manage those informations, but most project-owners use external tools like Backerkit to send out surveys to all their supporters, aiming to get correct contact details and sometimes even to up-sell their funded product. For further information on these tools see Module 5.
• #13: After you finished your campaign the “real” work starts/continues and you have to make sure to start with producing your product properly. Many reward-based campaigns launch with a first prototype, to show potential supporters how the product will look like and how it will work. But there is mostly some more prototyping ahead until they hold the final prototype in their hands. Also they have to find a manufacturer, who will produce the product, based on the final prototype and negotiate contracts with them. Additionally many companies need to find one or more retailers too, who will further sell their product once it is produced and finally have to organise packaging and shipping. These tasks might distract you from fulfilling your rewards or communication duties you promised during the Crowdfunding-campaign. So make sure to also share each of these milestones also with your community, but at least with your supporters!
• #14: Organise a supporters/investors party to show your product and give away your rewards, if promised. Fashion label VRESH did not only organise a Kick-off party when launching their campaign for fairtrade, urban Jeans, but also announced a release party during their Kickstarter-campaign. This seemed important to them, because they wanted to offer a possibility to try out their Jeans after the funding and if necessary, change them to another size.
• #15: When using reward-based Crowdfunding, you probably are pre-selling a product. That is why after the campaign, you have to provide a bill to all supporters. CFPs will let you download all information necessary to correctly create those bills. There are number of ways to make this automatic - see for this Module 5 (Fulfillment Tools).
• #16: As mentioned before, talking to your tax consultant is important - not only before starting a campaign, but especially afterwards to avoid unexpected payments. Your consultant can support you in correctly sending out receipts and adding it to your tax account. Note: We will be updating this slide after the research on the legal systems is finished.
• #17: No matter if you promised a reward or regular updates, do not forget to fulfill them as soon as possible. Although only 9% of Kickstarter projects never got their rewards, according to a study of the University of Pennsylvania (https://www.kickstarter.com/fulfillment), 65% of all rewards were sent on time. The earlier you ship your rewards, the better, not only for statistics, but for the satisfaction of your customers, who are also micro-influencers who recommend your product. Supporters can be dissatisfied as well. Mostly this happens, if there is no communication between the project-owners and their supporters. If you have to reschedule shipping, tell your supporters and explain why this happens. Most of them will understand.
• #18: Investors of equity-based Crowdfunding-campaigns are receiving regular updates of the project. Some equity-platforms require the projects to give regular updates with the following information: Profit- and Loss Statements Cash Flow Key Performance Indicators Special events Changes in the management or investors structure A sample of project requirements for German equity-based Crowdfunding platforms can be found here: http://www.bundesverband-crowdfunding.de/reporting-guidelines-fuer-crowdfunding-plattformen-im-bundesverband-crowdfunding-e-v/
• #19: Sometimes the production takes longer than expected, sometimes a longer production period was planned. In any case, update your fans and supporters and share those news about important milestones, the good and the bad ones. Try to involve them and be honest. If necessary, also ask them for help. Your community will understand and sometimes is also willing to support you.
• #21: Supporters of your campaign do not only want to receive their rewards or interests, but also want to be part of your story. So let people know that you are running a business now and your product is finished by redirecting them to your online shop. Ask them for helping in spreading the word. Ask them to provide testimonials for further growing your business or launching your market entry. For example, soon after reaching its goal on Kickstarter, Fidget Cube added a link to the online shop, where people could pre-order the product. Existing customers used this link to tell their friends about this trendy product they purchased on Kickstarter and helped the company in selling even more units after their Crowdfunding campaign.
• #22: Even if you fail, try to document your learnings and take your business to the next level. Austrian project Mikme failed on Kickstarter first, but sent out a survey to all (existing) backers and friends right after the campaign ended and rebooted the campaign on Indiegogo later - with success. In an interview, Philipp Sonnleitner, CEO of Mikme told the journalists that this was crucial for their second campaign, as they learned much about expectations and how the product needed to be re-branded and communicated.
• #23: There are always a few supporters who stand out of the Crowd. Contact them and make them to friends or team. You can identify engaging supporters on your project-page, as some of them write on your wall or leave a comment. Also keep an eye on your Facebook posts and remember or note people who always comment or like. If you are using email-marketing software such as Mailchimp, you can also identify people who opened your emails more often than others and re-address them again with special content.
• #24: Sometimes the success of your Crowdfunding campaign leads to another project. Embrace this opportunity! The Crowdfunding Project by Enno Seifried asked the supporters to create another campaign when they reached the target goal. In the end, Enno did not only finance a second campaign, but until now successfully finished four of them.
• #25: A successfully funded Crowdfunding campaign helps you reaching your further goals, e.g. more press coverage, new investors etc. Try to integrate the achievements you made directly or indirectly through your Crowdfunding campaign into your overall, but especially into your communication strategy. Inform the press about those achievements, but also mention them when holding talks in public or in front of investors.
• #26: You can use Crowdfunding several times, e.g. for getting initial funding and later finance another product or part of your project. Sometimes it will be necessary to create another campaign for the next step - you can use the update function of the campaign to ask your supporters to help you with the next step of your campaign.
• #27: Companies also grow with the Crowd and first start with reward-based and later switch to lending-/equity-based Crowdfunding. For example, Austria startup nuapua launched a soft market entry by funding its revolutionary drinking system on reward-based platform Startnext. They finished at EUR 47,445 and 418 supporters respectively first customers. They directly re-directed their potential customers to their online shop after the campaign and steadily established their business in the upcoming months. With these first experiences they started an lending-based campaign on Green Rocket and again reached their goal.
• #28: Some artists, but also creative entrepreneurs or journalists integrate Crowdfunding in their business models and follow new approaches. Like Sarah Burrini, comic artist from Germany, who uses Patreon for getting regular funding by her fans, who subscribe to here funding-page. Each time she publishes a new web-comic, the money is transferred from her subscribers to her account. This new approach in Crowdfunding is called Crowd-Sustaining.
• #29: German-based Company StarterStore offers the reselling of existing crowdfunded products. They scan the crowdfunding platforms and buy large amounts of the product directly from the producer. This allows them to reduce shipping costs and custom fees. Starterstore also partners with campaigns that are still in the funding phase or even in the pre-campaign phase by sending their community to the Kickstarter or Indiegogo page for a discounted price. For more tools like this, see Module 5 with additional tool descriptions.
• #30: The reward-based platform Indiegogo offers campaign an InDemand Functionality. In order to use this function, Indiegogo users have to opt in when creating a campaign. Only if the campaign is successful and reaches its funding goal, then the InDemand functionality is triggered.
• #31: Notes to Consultants: The post-campaign phase is especially important for a project to ensure that the supporters are kept in the loop. In consulting and training your clients, do not omit these steps.