An article on 89-year old Pearl Malkin, famously known as ‘Grandma Pearl’, successfully raising USD 5,039 on Kickstarter for her start-up idea of happy ‘walking’ canes; and Inocente, the first crowd funded film to win an Oscar, throws light on the rising trend of ‘Crowd Funding’. If such is the potential of the platform, those days are not far when people would freely think of innovative businesses and creative ideas without really being restrained by the funding options available. Read on to know more.

What?

Crowd Funding is by definition, “the practice of funding a project or venture by raising many small amounts of money from a large number of people, typically via the Internet.”

Ideas are introduced typically by creating campaigns containing short videos, project introductions and images that elaborate and explain. All this is done to catch the attention of the members of a Crowd Sourcing platform.

Each campaign is set for a goal (funds to be raised), and is for a specified duration. Funds raised are displayed on the campaign page, which allows followers to track success.

Typically, most successful projects receive about 25-40% of their revenue from their first, second and third degree of connections. This could include friends, family, colleagues or other acquaintances. Once a campaign is able to raise initial funds on the platform, it starts attracting people from outside of the known circles as well.

How?

Entrepreneurs may leverage Crowd Funding platforms for:

• Equity: Here investors fund a business, and in return earn a share (equity) in the company.

• Interest: Through this, the investors don’t get a share of the company. Instead, they expect a return on their initial investment.

• Donations: This is the most common fundraising method within the creative industries, and investors provide donations to the business idea they believe in or feel passionate about.

Where?

Here is a list of some popular Crowd Sourcing Platforms:

Wishberry: This platform provides Crowd Funding for creative projects (movies, music projects, theater productions) and social projects (charity, NGO’s, etc.).

Pik A Venture: This portal supports creative minds, budding artists, entrepreneurs and innovators by providing a platform to raise funds and additional services like legal advice, company registration advice, campaign management services etc.

Ignite Intent: A Crowd Funding platform for startups and college projects, Ignite Intent allows people to create an online pitch for their ideas to receive funds from people in return for creative rewards.