Crowdfunding Startup tips for UK University students in 2022
Crowdfunding Startup tips for UK University students in 2022
So you’ve decided to start a business. Presenting Crowdfunding Startup tips for UK University students in 2022. Your startup idea has brilliant potential, and you’re ready to rake in those millions. But hold on—where are you going to get the cash to do it? Unless you know some deep-pocketed angel investors or venture capitalists, it’s time to appeal to the masses! The bank isn’t your only option to fund your business venture these days.
Crowdfunding sites connect your startup to willing investors and fund contributors—and we found the very best fundraising sites for UK University students in 2022.
Choosing the right kind of crowdfunding
Crowdfunding portals that are built like social media sites connect you to investors and other folks willing to help small-business owners get products and services into the market.
But not all crowdfunding sites are alike. There are many types of crowdfunding for UK University students in 2022
Rewards crowdfunding: You create a campaign for your startup, then individual contributors donate funds—usually in small amounts—to your campaign in exchange for some kind of a reward. The reward could be a preordered purchase of your product, a shout-out on a website, or even a T-shirt.
Equity crowdfunding: Equity crowdfunding is popular for startups because the platform connects you to investors who are willing to make larger donations in exchange for a stake in your business. That may mean treating your contributors like minority shareholders—with all the associated reporting duties.
Debt crowdfunding: Also called “marketplace” funding, debt crowdfunding is when business owners borrow money from other individuals, instead of from a bank. You borrow at a set annual percentage rate, and loans are often structured similar to those of a traditional business loan.
Donation crowdfunding: If you’re a nonprofit or local business, donation-based funding might work for you. It simply requires you to create a campaign asking for donations for your business. The money is donated, and there is nothing to repay.
Most crowdfunding platforms in UK focus on one of these types, but some offer both. And some UK crowdfunding sites allow you to keep whatever funds you raise while others let you keep the funds only if your campaign is fully successful (commonly called “all-or-nothing campaigns”).
List of crowdfunding websites, that UK university students can exploit.
1. Kickstarter
Kickstarter helps artists, musicians, filmmakers, designers, and other creators connect with the resources to bring their ideas to life. Since its launch in 2009, the company has helped 15 million people pledge $3.7 billion to successfully fund more than 143,000 projects. Funding is all or nothing, so you must meet the goal you set within the allotted time or everyone gets their money back.
Price: It’s free to create a project on Kickstarter, but if it’s successfully funded, Kickstarter applies a 5% fee to the collected funds. There will also be processing fees between 3-5%.
2. Indiegogo
It offers both live crowdfunding campaigns and a marketplace for innovative products. It’s helped entrepreneurs raise over 1 billion dollars for more than 650,000 projects. Acquire starter capital and find out quickly whether your idea has legs with Indiegogo’s “global network of early adopters.”
And with this platform, you don’t have to stop raising money at a specific time.
Price: Indiegogo charges a 5% platform fee for all projects. If you’re raising money for a cause, you won’t pay a dime on Indiegogo’s sister platform, GoFundMe.
3. Crowd Supply
Crowd Supply’s mission is to “bring original, useful, respectful hardware to life.” Whether you want to bring a family recipe to market, create cutting-edge open hardware, or build electronics, Crowd Supply can help. 80% of launched projects have been successfully funded and the average amount raised per successful project is $61,000.
Price: Crowd Supply has a variety of plans. The Standard plan is 5% of gross campaign sales, not including payment processing fees and the Custom plan is 6-15%. Features differ among plans and include campaign management, media asset creation, and even a dedicated PR team.
4. Experiment
Experiment is a platform dedicated to funding scientific discoveries. From dinosaur fossil excavation to the historical study of medieval monasteries — Experiment backers will fund it if it “pushes the boundaries of knowledge.” They fund projects themselves, so there’s no overhead like the 50-60% that comes with a university grant. Here are the guidelines for what makes a fundable experiment.
Price: It’s free to start a project, but once you receive full funding, Experiment charges an 8% platform fee plus payment processing fees between 3-5%.
5. Chuffed
If you have a social cause organization aimed at helping animals, your community, or the environment — to name a few — Chuffed can help. For nonprofits and cause-based organizations exclusively, their most successful campaigns raise an average of $7,000. Nearly 8,000 campaigns have successfully raised $18 million collectively.
Price: Donors can opt to pay your processing fees. Donors are also encouraged to make a small donation to Chuffed on top of that.
6. Patreon
Patreon allows artists, musicians, writers, and more to receive compensation for their work via memberships that their fans purchase. Providing a meaningful revenue stream, fans pay you a subscription amount of their choosing in exchange for exclusive experiences and behind-the-scenes content. Over $350 million has been paid to creators, and the average patron pays a monthly fee that’s more than most consumers pay for Netflix or Spotify.
Price: Patreon takes 5% of successfully processed payments. There’s also a payment processing fee each time a payment is processed (usually batched at the beginning of each month). You can also expect payout fees charged for moving funds from your creator balance to your bank or PayPal account.
7. Fundable
Create a profile, then choose whether you’d like to raise funds by selling your product, taking pre-orders, and selling merchandise or by raising funds from accredited investors. The former, the rewards program, is recommended for consumer-facing companies aiming to raise up to $50,000. The latter, the equity program, is recommended for between $50,000 and $10 million funding goals for product, service, or B2B businesses.
Price: It’s free to create a company profile then $179/month to fundraise. There are no success fees, but for rewards-based raises there is a processing fees of 3.5% + $.30 per transaction.
8. WeFunder
WeFunder allows you to raise between $50,000 and $50 million from investors. Most campaigns take between one and three months to reach their goals. From breweries and restaurants to tech startups and fashion businesses, you’ll be able to solicit funds from WeFunder’s more than 150,000 investors.
Price: It’s free to create a profile. WeFunder doesn’t charge management or transaction fees. Administrative fees are charged to investors which covers all the costs of operating WeFund.
9. SeedInvest
SeedInvest works with high-growth, professional, and early-stage companies. You can raise either preferred equity or convertible note funding. For priced rounds (preferred equity), you’ll need to provide the pre-money valuation. And for convertible notes, you’ll need to provide the valuation cap, conversion discount, interest rate, and term length. You’ll need to create an application for crowdfunding, make it through a screening committee, and conduct your due diligence before making a profile and closing your round. This is a platform for companies that are ready to make it big. You should expect the process of crowdfunding to take a minimum of 60 days to complete.
Price: There’s a 7.5% placement fee charged on the total amount raised on SeedInvest, and it’s paid only on the successful completion of your offering. You can also expect a 5% warrant coverage based on the amount raised and up to $10,000 in due diligence, escrow, marketing, and legal reimbursement expenses.
10. Fundly
“Raise money for anything,” no raise requirements or startup fees involved. That’s the message Fundly’s homepage puts front and center. They fund everything from personal health needs to politics and even trips. Create a page, manage your campaign from the Fundly app, and use Fundly’s Facebook OpenGraph integration to maximize your reach.
There’s no minimum amount to raise to keep your funds, payments can be withdrawn within 48 hours of the donation, and automatic transfers can be arranged.
Price: Everyone pays a platform fee of 4.9% plus a credit card processing fee of 2.9% and $.30 per transaction (depending on your country).
UK startup crowdfunding platforms for UK university students. This is a comprehensive guide about crowdfunding platforms designed for startups or scaleups. Find out crowdfunding opportunities in UK, with each of these listed above. Be sure to decide on business idea, write a business plan. Then consider crowdfunding to launch your startup in UK by using crowdfunding ecommerce portals. You dont have to fundraise yourself, but these UK firms will do on your behalf. So the use above crowdfunding startup tips for UK University students in 2022. As a startup that can be film, music, art, theater, games, comics, design, photography, the pre-launch of UK startup business. There is also equity crowdfunding or P2P person to person lending platform, where you can launch an FCA-compliant crowdfunding platform.
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