Tim Ferriss, Alexis Ohanian, And Charles Best On Crowdfunding For Good
How do you harness the power of the crowd to make something positive happen? Join Fast Company editorial director Jill Bernstein for a live Q&A with Ferriss, Ohanian, and Best on Thursday, February 20th at noon (ET).
Photo: Joi Ito on Flickr
The conversation starts on Thursday, February 20th at noon (ET) -- but you can start submitting your questions using the "Make a comment" box above!
In our annual 50 Most Innovative Companies in Business issue, we profiled DonorsChoose, an education crowdfunding site that founder Charles Best launched back in 2000 while he was a teacher at a Bronx public school. His organization has raised an impressive $225 million -- more than 10 million students have benefited from DonorsChoose-funded projects. Now he's using his platform toward an even bigger goal: education reform.
All that fundraising did not, of course, come easy. So how did he do it—and what can your organization learn from his success? Join Best as he discusses crowdfunding for good with two industry all-stars:
- Investor, startup advisor, entrepreneur, and author Tim Ferriss
- Activist, author, entrepreneur, and reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian
-
Charles, Tim, and Alexis will be joining us in about two hours. In the meantime, be sure to read this month's cover story about DonorsChoose:
Beyond School Supplies: How DonorsChoose is Crowdsourcing Real Education Reform
Fast CompanyThe charity is using its networking strength to provide teachers with new kinds of resources, and its data to hold bureaucrats accountable. -
Charles recently spoke to Fast Company about the fine art of asking for money, as well:
DonorsChoose Founder Charles Best On The Art Of Asking For Money
Fast CompanyAsking for money doesn't have to be painful. Donors Choose founder Charles Best boils it down to three principles. -
Charles Best is the founder of DonorsChoose.org, the pioneer charity site that has raised $227 million to date and helped over 10 million students receive needed classroom materials. Last year alone the organization raised $58 million, a year-over-year jump of 25%. If he looks familiar, it’s because that’s his face on the cover of the current issue of Fast Company, which celebrates the 50 Most Innovative Companies in the world.
-
Tim Ferriss is an investor, entrepreneur, speaker, and author of three books, most notably 2007’s The 4-Hour Workweek. He’s written about “Hacking Kickstarter – How to Raise $100,000 in 10 Days” and is on the National Advisory Council of DonorsChoose, where he’s waged several creative funding initiatives, including dedicating his birthday to fundraising.
-
Alexis Ohanian is the cofounder of social news site reddit, which has raised millions of charitable dollars through various campaigns. He helped launch the travel search website Hipmunk along with Breadpig, which helps people self-publish or crowdfund projects (and gives much of its profits to charity). He is the author of Without Their Permission: How the 21st Century Will Be Made, Not Managed and is also an active and innovative member DonorsChoose’s National Advisory Council.
-
So….it’s safe to say that these guys know a thing or two about crowdfunding –what works, what doesn’t, and what’s particular about raising money for good. We’ve gotten a ton of great questions in from readers so far, and more are certainly on their way, so let’s jump right in and get started.
-
Ah, the early beginnings. I first met Charles in high school. Believe it or not, we were wrestling partners in the same weight class. He ALWAYS beat me by 1-2 points, which drove me nuts. We've known each other for a long time, and we've both been focused on education for ages.
-
Charles Best came into my life because I was in the right place at the right time. I'd heard about this magical non-profit getting funds directly to classrooms that sounded remarkably high-tech in an industry that was very not. It sounded too good to be true and then I met Charles and realized how it was all possible -- this dude started crowdfunding before it was cool. It always makes me giggle when I hear "DonorsChoose.org is the Kickstarter for classrooms" -- KICKSTARTER is the "DonorsChoose.org for creative projects."
-
Hey thanks, Alexis. It's true that when DonorsChoose.org was operating out of my classroom, "crowdfunding" was years away from becoming a word. But the awesome rise of Kickstarter has helped so many more people understand our model and support teachers' projects!
-
Tim and Alexis, you have both been involved in various fundraising stunts with DonorsChoose, such as reddit’s “donation strike” in 2010, to help get Stephen Colbert to do a mock rally in D.C., and Tim’s Tweet to Beat campaign and birthday fundraisers. What are the most important elements in staging a successful crowdfunding campaign?
-
Off the bat, here are some tips or best practices for successful crowdfunding/crowdraising. First, don't reinvent the wheel. Find case studies and study what's worked:
-
Look at the analytics of campaigns that have already surpassed their goal. Most people don't know they can do this on Kickstarter, and -- even if you're not on Kickstarter -- you can see where these campaigns got the majority of their traffic: which bloggers, which sites, which Twitter accounts, etc. It's a HUGE leg up.
-
The reddit donation bomb happened because a bunch of people all over the world wanted to get Stephen Colbert's attention and 'convince' him to hold this Rally. They found out his favorite nonprofit was DonorsChoose.org (he's on the board) and they setup an EPIC money bomb. It worked wonders - it raised over half a MILLION dollars. Pretty awesome. And all grassroots.
http://www.donorschoose.org/truthiness
The thing is, it's hard to know what's gonna work. Be open to experimenting. Small experiments because it's all a numbers game. I never could've predicted it would have taken off, that's the magic of the connected web. Even from my seat, I can't see where it's all headed. -
Next, don't be shy about approaching killer non-profits or fundraisers for advice. Charles knows Scott Harrison of charity:water, for instance. They have built a great knowledge exchange. DonorsChoose.org has taught charity:water a ton about large corporate sponsorships (and gift cards), and charity:water has taught DC how they do their hugely successful birthday campaigns. Here's an example:
-
Following on Tim's blog post about Hacking Kickstarter, here is a teacher's great post on hacking DonorsChoose.org and ensuring that a classroom project gets funded:
Getting Your Project Funded on Donorschoose.org!
Mr. Andy's WebpageAs a pre-kindergarten teacher in his second year of teaching, I have been quite successful in utilizing donorschoose.org to help get materials and resources for my classroom. With 24 projects funded... -
First, I'll confirm the obstacle: only 20% of donors we acquire in a given year will give again in subsequent years. (Although that 20% tends to be the most generous donors, so we're retaining the right 20%.) I wish we were a subscription business! Now I'll get to some points about building community among donors...
-
I recently did another fundraiser for DonorsChoose.org, to raise 50K for every single STEM classroom project in my hometown of Brooklyn. I love BK and I know how important it will be for STEM education to reach every single one of us -- lest the gap in this country between haves and havenots grows even wider. I'm grateful there's such a great platform to get these funds where they need it most. Not everyone can do a prizeo campaign, but we all have followings online (even 10 Twitter followers!) it's not about how big, it's about how you use them. www.prizeo.com
-
Here's the NBC article on Colbert/Reddit efforts for DonorsChoose. -
-
@JillBernstein:
It's never been easier -- and harder -- to raise funds via crowdfunding. The technology platforms are SO much better than 3 years ago, it's not even worth a comparison.
The challenge is similar to self-publishing: it's never been easier to self-publish a book on Amazon (or put up a Kickstarter/DonorsChoose.org/Indiegogo campaign), but you now have 1,000x more noise and competition as a result.
This means that, while tech is no longer a barrier, marketing and PR is. You need to really study up on successful case studies and have a launch plan to get eyeballs to your campaign versus the sea of others. -
@AmyAlbo: It's happening right now! One of my faves is a YC alum:
This has only just begun. The results could mean a new perspective on publishing entirely, since these crowdfunded research projects tend to have OPEN publishing requirements instead of closed to journals. That means more data for the world, more scientific progress. -
@AmyAlbo: When it comes to scientific research, I should first mention all the awesome science projects on DonorsChoose.org, which attract support from a range of citizen donors and foundations focused on STEM education. The greatest of these is Chevron, our most generous corporate partner, which has brought thousands of science projects to life for nearly a million students.
But I imagine you're thinking of academic scientific research, and there are several crowdfunding platforms focused on that very field! I do worry that those focused on cute animals may draw the lion's share of scientific crowdfunding, and that research that doesn't lend itself to imagery will get short shrift, but maybe that would still be a net positive. -
@JillBernstein: We at breadpig have worked with artists+creatives to crowdfund a few million dollars over the last few years and it's definitely evolved. There's way more competition, but we've also seen some amazing campaigns (one of the ones I gush about all the time was our 600K campaign for a ChooseYourOwnAdventure version of Hamlet by Ryan North)
There are also new platforms emerging that take crowdfunding away from a project-by-project basis -- the one I backed and am most excited about is Patreon.com, which takes the old school model of patronage and blows it out to anyone with as little as a $1 to give every month. -
On scientific research:
Also, don't forget that not all studies need to consume a lot of capital, given new tech. Here is a collaboration between Lift.do (a start-up I advise), UC Berkeley, and 10 or so "influencers" who are leaders in the dietary world:Ten Popular Diets — Which Work and Which Are Hype?
100+ pounds lost on The Slow-Carb Diet®. If you want to lose fat in 2014, how about we do it together? -
@Pleaseanswermyquestion!: What a fun question! Most of all, we hope teachers will tell other teachers about DonorsChoose.org.
Some worry that if they spread word, there'll be less funding for their own projects, but we believe that the more teachers create projects, the more donors and $$ we'll be ably to rally. -
Thanks for the advice on building our board! Great Q&A so far...
We successfully completed a crowdfunding campaign on Indiegogo last year, which was a great experience. Looking into the future though, raising money via such platforms doesn’t seem like the most viable way to raise money on an annual basis (correct me if I’m wrong…). What would you suggest for approaching companies for sponsorships and donations? Ensuring alignment is obviously important, but what other advice would you have?
