Top 10 crowdfunding sites to success your dream ideas

Table of Contents

Everyone have a dream to work on their own ideas and try to make it a success.

Your Idea may be small like open a new shop to big one like Run a successful company. But idea and talent do not work until and unless you do not have enough money to work on idea.

When I talk about dream then it doesn’t mean you are taking eight hours sleeping.The Dream is actually defined by 11th President of India – Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam.

If you have such type of dream then you can approach to crowdfunding sites and take help to fulfill your dream.

What is crowdfunding?

Before knowing about top crowdfunding sites let’s first understand what actually crowdfunding is?
Wikipedia says “Crowdfunding is the practice of funding a project or venture by raising monetary contributions from a large number of people.”

In simple words crowdfunding is the practice of funding a project or cause by raising money from a large number of common people like you & me through internet.

Crowdfunding makes raising money much simpler. Now if you have big idea then you can hope to accomplish that idea. it was estimated that worldwide over US$34 billion was raised in 2015 and it is increasing every year.

You just need to follow very simple process – Post your project on crowdfunding sites then people who are interesting will fund your project with some money then you can run your project.
Crowdfunding sites charge some amount when your process of fundraising gets completed.

Types of crowdfunding

Types mainly depend on type of service you are offering and your goals for growth.

Donation-Based Crowdfunding- Means no financial return to any investor or contributor.
Rewards-Based Crowdfunding- Investor or contributor get some reward like product or service of your company.
Equity-Based Crowdfunding- Here contributor becomes part owner of your company. So everyone receive a share of the profit.

Now let’s see top 10 crowdfunding sites that could help you to make dream true.

Important – Different crowdfunding site could have different purpose and funding approach, they may have their specific focus on particular sector industry like IT industry, creative, artistic even more specifically like music related project.

Note- Before choosing any site please know about their process, Fees, and all the conditions.

1. Kickstarter

Purpose- for creative project(Reward-based crowdfunding)

The main aim of Kickstarter to helps artists, musicians, filmmakers, designer & other creators in their own fields.They help them with resources and make their ideas a reality.

Till now Kickstarter supported thousands of small and big projects trough their community. So if you are making anything creative like albums, writing books, artwork or crafting then you can collect funds from Kickstarter.

Note- Kickstarter Not allow projects to fundraise for charity or offer any financial incentives

Alexa rank– 524

What backers will get:

They may get variety of unique rewards offered by the project creator only. Rewards vary from project to project, like they may offer you a craft item, paintings or music album copy (CD,DVD) but ownership does not divide into shares.

Project creators keep 100% ownership of their work.You can read Top 10 highest funded by kickstarter

Fees- 5% fee to the funds collected for creators + 3-5% for payment processing
Note- More than 10 million people are working from different part of world to backed project so chance to get funded for your project is simple but make sure your project is creative.

[button link=”https://www.kickstarter.com/” size=”big” align=”center” target=”_blank” icon=”brankic-icon-pig”]Raise fund on kickstarter[/button]

2. Indiegogo –

Purpose – Used by artists, musicians, entrepreneurs and humanitarians to finance projects. (Equity-based crowdfunding)

You can raise money for your idea and if you are doing project in tech & innovation or community work or any creative work.

Indiegogo is equity-based crowdfunding so if you invest here then you become partner in project and make money on growth and development of project but Equity crowdfunding has risks of losing all money or a portion of your investment.

It’s like you are buying share of company and when they grow your share price would also grow.

Any individual can invest on interesting project as investment just starts at US$100 and by this ways they have raised over $1Billlion USD and nearly 250,000 people get investment to run their venture.

Fees: You need to pay 5% as platform fees and 3%+30c for third party credit card fees.
Geography: worldwide(220+ countries).

[button link=”https://www.indiegogo.com/” size=”big” align=”center” target=”_blank” icon=”brankic-icon-pig”]Raise fund on indiegogo[/button]

3. GoFundMe

Purpose- World’s largest social fundraising platform

Most of the people use this for the things like medical expenses, education costs, youth sports, funerals and memorials – volunteer programs, even animals and pets.

With the help of community of more than 25 million people worldwide Gofundme claims of raising more than $3 billion amount.

There is no time limit of raising fund and even chance to receive more than your target campaign. If you want to know more about GofundMe then read their guide.

Alexa- 1,268

Geography:- US, the UK, Australia, Canada and select European countries.

Fees: You need to pay 5% as platform fees and 3% as processing fees means approx. 7.9%+ $0.30 per donation.

Features

You can withdraw money anytime and it does not affect your campaign.
It’s very safe as use secure payment encryption technology.
You can raise fund for your friend and family also.
You have to share link of your campaign so your friends and family people can support.

[button link=”https://www.gofundme.com/” size=”big” align=”center” target=”_blank” icon=”brankic-icon-pig”]Raise fund on Gofundme[/button]
4.Youcaring

Purpose –Designed to fund personal expenses or charitable cause including adoption, medical bills, funeral expenses and tuition.

Youcaring is free crowd sourcing platform & more than 290000 fundraiser People had raised $500 Million till now and more in progress.
Fess- 0% process fees means free of cost process but need to pay 2.9% + $0.30 for credit card fees.

Alexa- 16,167

Feature

Funds directly deposited into the We Pay or PayPal account.
There is no specific time limit for fundraising.

[button link=”https://www.youcaring.com/” size=”big” align=”center” target=”_blank” icon=”brankic-icon-pig”]Raise fund on youcaring[/button]

5. Crowdrise

Purpose – The world’s largest community for raising money for great causes.

Crowdrise provides The easiest, most innovative, awesome ways to raise money for charitable causes only.

Alexa: 27,972

Fees: maximum 6% as processing fees & 2.9%+$0.30 for processing fees.
Feature:

You can raise 3x more money using campaign
No deadline – you can beat your goal and raise more.

[button link=”https://www.crowdrise.com/” size=”big” align=”center” target=”_blank” icon=”brankic-icon-pig”]Raise fund on Crowdrise[/button]

6. Donorschoose

Purpose – Support a classroom

If you are teacher and want money for your public school then Donerschoose is best option to raise fund. You can raise money for underfunded public schools.

Geography – USA only

Feature

More than 75% of public school in USA have posted a project on this site and raised more than $537 million USD.
Donerschoose have many big partner like Google.org,Bill & Melinda foundation,PNC foundation , Infosys and many more.

[button link=”https://www.donorschoose.org/” size=”big” align=”center” target=”_blank” icon=”brankic-icon-pig”]Raise fund on donorschoose[/button]

7. Patreon

Purpose – For Creators in field on music, writing, games,photography, education, dance & much more.

If you are creator in any part of world and want to fulfill your dream then you can join patreon and raise fund for your project.

Alexa rank – 675

Fees- 5% processing fees and very fewer fees for Payment processing.
Feature- Payout via PayPal, Stripe and Payoneer.

[button link=”https://www.patreon.com/” size=”big” align=”center” target=”_blank” icon=”brankic-icon-pig”]Raise fund on patreon[/button]

8. kiva

Purpose – Nonprofit organization that allows people to finance loans individually or in teams(It’s loan, not donation)

You can raise funds from Kiva for your agriculture, women development, retail business, education, single parents and even for all type of loan.

If you are funding for any cause then chance to get repayment back is almost 97% but still kiva not guarantee repayment for any loan.

This funding is only for cause so don’t assume to get any interest pay on your funding.
Once you raise fund then you can either repaid through kiva’s field partner or money transfer platform PayPal.

You can check Process of fundraising page of Kiva and know more about this crowdfunding site.

Facts of Kiva:

Borrower- 2.4 million
Countries- 83
Leander -1.6 million
Load funded-$973.1
Repayment rate-97.2%

Geography- more than 80 countries on 5 continents.

Feature

Your fundraising request translates to another language.
15% donation to Kiva is suggested but not fix some time even 0% too.
81% of Kiva borrower are women.
More than 6000 field partner and 110 employees.

[button link=”https://www.kiva.org/” size=”big” align=”center” target=”_blank” icon=”brankic-icon-pig”]Raise fund on Kiva[/button]

9. Crowdsupply

Purpose – funding for crafted product

Crowdsupply raises more than $63k average amount raised per successful project and launched more than 58% projects successfully funded.

If you are creative person and ready to make something amazing craft then you can raise funds from crowdsupply.

Fees: Varies according to plan from 5% to 15% excluding payment fees.

Alexa rank 198,207

[button link=”https://www.crowdsupply.com/” size=”big” align=”center” target=”_blank” icon=”brankic-icon-pig”]Raise fund on crowdsupply[/button]

10. PledgeMusic

Purpose – Music album

Pledge music is platform special build for music lover. This platform provide direct-to-fan facility and you can sell your music recordings, music videos, and concerts directly to fan base.

You can sell also t-shirts, signed CDs, New album, any instrument lesson and many another thing on pre-sell basis.

Feature

Special focus on raising funds for musicians.
Does not transfer fund until the funding target is reached

[button link=”https://www.pledgemusic.com/” size=”big” align=”center” target=”_blank” icon=”brankic-icon-pig”]Raise fund on pledgemusic[/button]

Other crowdfunding sites

Tilt.com – Help to raise Fund for social cause
Crowdfunder.com –Help startups at all stages raise money from Pre-Seed to Series A.
fundable.com – Help entrepreneurs raise capital to launch new businesses.
RocketHub.com–open to personal causes, social good projects, and businesses.
Chuffed.org –Only for social cause
Rangde.org – Micro loans to undeserved communities in India