A few weeks ago, the MUCrowd blog started a small experiment – up close, live and on a living object! In a mini-series, the Munich Chamber of Commerce and Industry the SWOP Team on their crowdfunding adventure. The SWOP team consists of Matthias, Christoph, Tom, Matthias, and Thomas. They have developed a "charity flea market app" that converts used items into monetary donations for non-profit organizations. Now they want to gain the crowd as supporters and thus make their app more well-known, feature-rich, and user-friendly. The MUCrowd blog is there every step of the way: from campaign planning and shooting the pitch video to building the community and the campaign launch on the platform. We look over the shoulders of the six social entrepreneurs and learn what's important in a crowdfunding campaign and that even with the best planning, life is full of surprises—especially with crowdfunding. We don't know whether the campaign will ultimately be successful. That, too, remains a surprise!
From the SWOP crowdfunding diary: A lamp for 10,000 euros – a real bargain, right?
Even before the first planning steps our campaign We faced a huge challenge: the rewards we could offer our supporters in return, which would finance our actual product, the app. The app itself is free.
It usually works like this: The startup has a product that it hopes will become more widely known through the crowdfunding campaign, or even be produced in the first place. These products are then directly linked to the campaign. The backers buy the product and thus help the startup. There are many examples: musicians who want to finance their albums – the album then serves as part of their thank you. Or honey from the neighborhood, as with "nearbees", where the honey is used as a thank you. However, not all startups have a product or service that they can offer in return for financial support. While it is possible to ask the crowd for money without any consideration, as in the campaign by OceanCleanUp does. But that's very difficult.
As you read in one of the previous blog posts, we chose our old desk lamp as the face and vehicle of the campaign, and thus also as the vehicle and source of meaning for the thank you gifts. We created a "thank you concept" around our small, black desk lamp. This concept also sparked criticism. In the first week of our campaign, we received a lot of attention from bloggers, including a lot of positive feedback. But there were also points of criticism: One blogger described our thank you gifts as arbitrary. That's an impression that can arise at first glance. However, precisely because we don't have suitable products to use as thank you gifts, we have conceived a concrete story. The story comes to life through the main protagonist of our campaign, the cute little lamp.
Most thank yous are derived from it:
- Replicating the lamp itself would be quite a challenge. But we've found a manufacturer that stocks this retro lamp.
- The lamp needs a light bulb – one of the old ones, with a nice spiral wire and still energy efficiency class A.
- The lamp needs a power socket – ideally a stylish power strip, e.g. from the designer startup “Peppermint Products”
- The lamp needs electricity – ideally green electricity, e.g. from the startup “Polarstern”, which has provided us with vouchers for new customers.
Now you have everything together to make the lamp shine.
Of course, there are also fan items, such as an autograph card for our lamp for five euros. More of a joke than actual value, but it looks great. The T-shirts and hoodie with our slogan are worth much more. They're not cheap products sewn in the Far East, but high-quality textiles specially made for SWOP Team by the young German streetwear label. BAPTIST B. Designed in Germany, produced in Europe. A friend of ours runs this label.
And finally, the best part: You can buy the original lamp! Our star from the video, Hollywood up close, right at his workplace, and all for just 10,000 euros! A bargain, right? Well, not entirely serious, but definitely unusual. Unusual is always important. This creates vital attention for our campaign.
(Author: Christoph Kastenbauer)
This is what the Chamber of Commerce crowdfunding consultant says:
"Say thank you when you get something" – everyone probably knows this phrase all too well from early childhood. Even with crowdfunding, you shouldn't forget to say thank you. There are essentially no limits to the ways you can repay the crowd for their support. Thank you gifts range from a personalized video message or a hand-signed greeting card to limited-edition goodies and products, exclusive premiere invitations, or workshops with the project's creators. Just as every project is unique, the thank you gifts for a crowdfunding campaign should also be unique in their own way. That's certainly easier said than done. The following tips will help:
- Thank you gifts tailored to the crowd: Campaigns often have not just one target group, but several, each supporting the project for different reasons. In reward-based crowdfunding—as with the SWOP team—it's primarily altruistic and hedonistic motives that motivate the crowd to donate money. Some simply want to support a good idea. Others, however, want to be the first to own an innovative product. Accordingly, there should be different rewards that appeal to different target groups.
- Emotional connection to the campaign: The thank you gifts are the "tangible" component of the crowdfunding campaign. However, it doesn't always have to be a massive merchandising machine that gets going. Exclusive experiences related to the project can also be a good way to say thank you. They create a unique experience and a direct connection between the project and its backers.
- Not too much of a good thing: Thank you gifts should be something special. Therefore, they should be limited, not only for cost and resource reasons. A limited number increases the pressure on backers to act quickly before the unique goodies are sold out. The number of different thank you gifts should be kept manageable to avoid making the selection unnecessarily difficult for backers.
- Keep an eye on costs: Thank-you gifts don't just fall from the sky. Therefore, all costs incurred should be included in the campaign's cost calculation to determine a realistic price (e.g., production and shipping costs, VAT, and any applicable customs duties). Most supporters donate between €10 and €80, so attractive thank-you gifts should be offered, especially in this price range.
- Bring partners on boardWhen looking for rewards, keep your eyes open for partners willing to offer their products at a discount for the campaign. These could be companies whose philosophy fits well with the crowdfunding project and who will support your campaign materially with goodies. The question is, what can you offer the partners in return?
All in all, the thank you messages should fit harmoniously into the overall campaign image and not appear random. After all, the "thank you" should come from the heart.
(Author: Linette Heimrich)
