witted-roots

shanicejdouglas·Jan 04, 2021

Posted in:Advice Favors Bootstrapping Promos Fundraising Startups Vents

... and need some help with gaining traction.After years of building and creating without financial backing (not to mention the countless rejection for grants), I am looking to crowdfunding to help Witted Roots grow to its next phase.I am currently re-working my marketing plan, but I think I keep getting a bit stuck because there's this tiny thought at the very back of my mind saying "You don't know enough people. You don't have a large following. You've hardly been able to make sales or raise money in the past four years, why would this campaign be any different?".Honestly, everything in my gut is telling me that this is the right move, that it can + will work, and that 2021 will be the year that WR makes significant progress towards our greater goals to hold space for millennial women of color to thoughtfully address + proactively approach their mental health + emotional wellness. Our main aim for this campaign is to raise funds to build out our private membership community (thank you to all the people that commented on my post a few months ago when I was trying to decide on which platform to use. It was a massive help in my decision), which I think will have a major impact on the lives of the women we are building it for.I guess I have a couple of asks:- Please let me know if you have any experience successfully crowdfunding + if you're willing to share any tools/resources that could help us to start moving the needle.- Would you mind sharing our crowdfunding campaign (https://ifundwomen.com/projects/witted-roots) with your network?- Do you have any go-to tools/resources for building a private membership community (with a large focus on vulnerability and self-reflection) that you would be willing to share?Thank you so much for your insight and support in advance. This is both a nerve-wracking and extremely exciting time for me and I'm forever grateful that Elpha exists to help me through it.

teresaman·Jan 04, 2021

Congrats on launching the campaign Shanice!!With respect to the last point, have you heard of https://circle.so/ ? I haven't used it personally but have heard of it as a good platform for community members to engage with each other.

shanicejdouglas·Jan 04, 2021

Thank you @teresaman! Thanks for the suggestion on circle.so . I don't think I've heard of it before, but will definitely look into it. I've actually already started building on Mighty Networks and have been loving it. We have a small beta group that has been creating the foundation of the community for the past few months, and I've enjoyed putting it all together.I see that you have experience in managing communities. What is your one key tip for selecting moderators to keep the flow of the community?

teresaman·Jan 05, 2021

Great question! It's always wonderful to have moderators who are already engaged on the platforms and are active members because of how much the community resonates with them. They can be that much more attuned to members' needs as they participate in the interactions themselves!

shanicejdouglas·Jan 05, 2021

Thank you! That definitely aligns with my initial thoughts. Would you recommend finding funding to pay moderators from the very beginning? I hesitate to approach anyone about helping me in any way for free unless I feel like I can provide them with some insane for that effort.

teresaman·Jan 05, 2021

Compensation can definitely either be cash, equity, or in other forms (eg. mentorship, access to network, etc.) but I'd agree that generally it's best to avoid having people "work for free" such that they can be fairly compensated for their time!

shanicejdouglas·Jan 06, 2021

Thank you @teresaman!

jiwonmoon·Jan 05, 2021

Hey Shanice!First, congrats on launching. Doing the work for a crowdfunding campaign is a lot of work so you should really be proud!I'm head of community at Wefunder (also run an accelerator called XX). From my experience, founders who do best are people who have their network ready, even if small. Because if you have ~10 people invest in you, you can slowly build momentum for a wider audience on platforms like ifundwomen. On Wefunder, usually about half the investors come from your own community and the other half from the Wefunder investors. I've recently seen campaigns raise 80% from Wefunder investors too. For every investor, you can email them separately to thank them. Little acts go far. So if I were you, I'd focus on talking to users who love you and ask them to invest. It's better to get 10 people to love you and invest in your campaign first. Let me know if you have other questions! Would be happy to answer :) Oh - also make sure that with every goal hit (like a big milestone), you share that with your existing investors and they might invest even more after seeing the progress you're making.:) Good luck!

shanicejdouglas·Jan 06, 2021

@jiwonmoon - Thank you so much for the insight!Yes, I definitely agree with keeping backers updated, and I'll take your tip to reach out personally to our supporters to help get the momentum started.Also, I checked out Wefunder and will definitely spread the word of the great work you're doing to other. founders.