There’s an article in the online Wall St. Journal that was replicated today in one of the online newspapers that I get , but most of the article was cut off.
American School of Entrepreneurship has a course in Alternative Funding, which I think is good (it’s one of my courses), but it does have one omission, which we are working on correcting: crowdfunding.
Crowdfunding is a sensational idea, but most of the sites aren’t business oriented. If you want to finance a film, Kickstarter is fine. Hyperlink.com may be fine, but it’s got a little $5k front fee for loans that might make the loans uneconomic, so posting there might not make sense. We’re waiting for Hyperfund to decide whether they want to modify their fee to say, a percentage of the proceeds, which is the way we do it out here in the Western US.
The other facet of crowdfunding that’s often overlooked is the requirements that, to stay legal, you really need to disclose where you’re going to use the funds, your plans for repaying it (unless you’re selling equity) and other business details
It helps to download our mini business plan from www.theasoe.com and use that for the crowdfunding site. You might want to get a non-disclosure form first from potential lenders or investors.
We welcome comments from business people, startups or established, about your experiences on crowdfunding.
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