Post crowdfunding — what now?. A lot of people think that your…
By: Jes Bailey
Tags: Startup, Fundraising, Crowdfunding, Kickstarter, Social Enterprise

A lot of people think that your crowdfunding campaign is over when the money stops coming in. But not us! You have put all that hard work into the pre-launch and campaign phases, why let it go to waste now? You don’t see the contestants on The Apprentice disappear post show, or the businesses on Dragon’s Den disappear do you. In fact most of the time you think… when will they stop milking this! It is the same for crowdfunding, a successful campaign can be used as leverage for so much more in your business’s quest for a sustainable future.

1. You can crowdfund again

The obvious way to make your crowdfunding campaign work for you post campaign is to, of course, crowdfund again! In your second campaign you know what worked well with your audience. You know what type of marketing they responded to and what you needed to do to get them to support you and you also know how stressful it was to raise a certain amount of money so will bear that in mind when choosing your next financial goal. In addition, so long as your audience got what they were promised and had a great experience, why not back you again?

For this, we recommend waiting either 6 months before launching a second campaign or until you have delivered all your rewards and satisfied all the backers — whichever comes later.

Vitae London are a prime example of this. They crowdfunded their first round of watches in 2017 and then went on to release another new range in 2019. By this point they had already understood what their target market likes, as well as the entire crowdfunding process and therefore new what to expect and what they needed to deliver to make a second campaign another roaring success.

The top image is of Vitae London’s 1st rewards campaign, the bottom image of their 2nd rewards campaign

2. You can access grant/trust money with more ease

Having a successful crowdfunding campaign shows to grant bodies and trusts that you aren’t just relying on them and their money. Should it not work out, you have other sources of income to fall on. It also shows them there is an audience out there you’re serving and who believe in your project. More than that, it shows them you can tell a story and market what you do. You probably also have validations on your page in the form of testimonials and press coverage etc which again adds to the trust level of your project and when pitted against other projects, it will make yours stand out.

3. You can prove to investors you have a market

Similarly to above, a successful crowdfunding campaign can be used to attract investors. Once they see you have traction and a market that obviously wasn’t faked, your company rises in prestige. Many organisations have started off via crowdfunding and then either gone down the VC funding route or the equity crowdfunding route.

Swytch Bike is one example of this. Below is an image from their first crowdfunding campaign. Since then, they went on to raise investment from both the crowdfunding route and the traditional route. Before this campaign, the company was brand new, with no customers and no track record for investors to look upon. Following this crowdfunding campaign the company’s projections and customer base seemed a lot more realistic to investors making it easier for them to raise £795k from private investors.

Here is a screen shot from a press piece about Swytch Bike’s investment injection

4. You can grow your new partnerships

During your crowdfunding campaign, you probably got a lot of PR. You probably made connections with influencers, and potentially started discussing some brand collaborations. However, in the short time frame of the campaign, you may not have been able to utilise all these opportunities. Now, post campaign however, you can. Whether the due diligence took longer than you thought or the level of bureaucracy was a nightmare, now, with no time limit on you, you have the opportunity to grow and nurture these relationships.

Equally, with those press contacts who did write about you and partnerships which did manage to work out, you have connections for life there. Take the time to nurture these and grow them so you can continue to go back year after year for collaborations and partnerships.

An example of this is Bristol Refugee Rights. They successfully raised £34.5k (original target £20.5k) in 2017 with their crowdfunding campaign. Three months later, the UNHCR picked their campaign up and wrote about it and added extra validations to the organisation.

Bristol Refugee Rights got recognized by UNHCR following their successful crowdfunding campaign

5. You can transfer your marketing skills

By the end of your campaign your marketing skills have no doubt increased. You will be writing better emails, better social media posts and your click though rates and engagement rates will have sky rocketed. These skills are transferable across other sales funnels too. You have the option of taking everything you learnt during your crowdfunding campaign and applying it, with a few simple tweaks, to your general sales and marketing to bring in the money through ordinary sales.

Silfir is a great example of this. They sold their sustainable fashion workwear suit through a Kickstarter campaign in summer 2019 and have since launched the sale of their outfit via their website. They have been constantly in demand and used FOMO and its popularity to keep on selling out.

Silfir’s crowdfunding campaign from summer 2019

Whichever route you go down to make the most of your experiences, well done for crowdfunding in the first place! It was hard work I am sure and you deserve all the successes possible both now and in the future!