Crowdfunding Options
What is Crowdfunding?
Crowdfunding is a method of raising funds through a collective effort of friends, family, your community, and social networks, etc. Crowdfunding is essentially a platform in which you can build, showcase and share your reason for raising funds. Most of the efforts are set forth through social media crowdfunding platforms which gives a great opportunity to reach different networks, and reach your fund raising goals
What are the pros and cons of Crowdfunding?
As with anything else crowdfunding has its upside and its downside. Below we address the pros and cons of crowdfunding:
Pros
- Fast, efficient, and effective
- Donation based
- Validates your cause
- Ability to reach out to more people
- Gives you a chance to explain your mission, need, or story
- Quick way to raise funds, usually without upfront fees
- Online payment system
Cons
- You need to actively promote your crowdfunding
- If you don’t meet your targeted goal, any funds pledged is usually returned to the investors
- Restrictions on how much can be raised at one time
- Fees and taxes on funds
How can I get started with Crowdfunding?
GiveForward
GiveForward is a place to turn when you or someone you love is facing a challenge. It’s the central rallying place for giving and receiving meaningful support. From sending a simple “Thinking of You” to raising money for out-of-pocket expenses, GiveForward empowers anyone to build a community and take action when it counts.
There is a 2.9% plus $0.30 per donation fee towards an online payment service provider (WePay). An additional 5% covers their overhead expenses such as their tech development teams. Uses the latest encryption technology to ensure privacy and security. They never give out your information or sell it to third parties.
GoFundMe
GoFundMe makes it incredibly easy to raise money online for the things that matter to you most. In less than a minute, you’ll be able to personalize your fundraising campaign and share it with the people in your life. With GoFundMe, the money you collect goes directly to you. There are no deadlines or limits – each donation you receive is yours to keep. They’re here to help. GoFundMe will respond to your emails within 5 minutes during the day.
While it’s free to create and share your online fundraising campaign, GoFundMe will deduct a 5% fee from each donation that you receive. Since our fee is deducted automatically, you’ll never need to worry about being billed or owing us any money. A small processing fee of about 3% plus an additional $0.30 will also be deducted from each donation.
YouCaring
YouCaring is a free online fundraising platform that pioneered Compassionate Crowdfunding™—empowering people worldwide to rally support for personal and charitable causes without the fundraising fees associated with other sites.
“YouCaring is dedicated to helping as many people as possible. This is why we will never charge anyone to raise money on our site. We rely on the generosity of our users to help us provide a free crowdfunding platform for those struggling with life’s challenges. All online fundraising requires a third-party credit card processor such as PayPal, WePay or Stripe. These processors allow money to be safely collected and transferred online, but they do charge small fees for this service. Each donation processor charges 2.9% plus $0.30 per transaction. This is not a YouCaring fee.”
CrowdRise
CrowdRise is the world’s #1 fundraising site for charitable and personal causes. CrowdRise is about giving back, raising lots of money for great causes and having the most fun in the world while doing it. There are no deadlines so keep the money you raise whether you beat your goal or not.
There is a 3% fee, meaning $97 out of every $100 goes directly to your cause, guaranteed, and that includes credit card fees.