The two attempts at using Indiegogo.com that I have recently enthusiastically written about by PhrazzleMe and EOT seem to be stuck on 100 dollars out of 20,000 dollars and 100 dollars out of 30,000 dollars respectively, and that is by organisations that already have their own fanbase.
This post on what we can learn from that is certainly not given from a feeling of being smug and superior, as I’d love for someone to prove this can work and if I tried it I would be even more doomed to failure, as my first lesson point make absolutely clear…
If you want to make a successful attempt you will probably need to:
1. Cultivate the TEFL Twitterati well in advance – because Facebook isn’t much use because most people’s Facebook friends will have no interest at all in a TEFL-related meme, instead you need it to be passed on by people with a large TEFL-specific audience. Regular comments on people’s blogs and having your own also wouldn’t hurt, but Twitter is the key – and I say that as someone who will never ever ever tweet!
2. Prove how your campaign helps us too – e.g. by setting a precedent that will make employers, publishers, TEFL course providers etc treat us all with a bit more respect, or by telling us what you are going to do with any profits that will benefit all of us
OR
3. Have more of a connection to actual charities
4. Give more and more finely tuned evidence – of why it is a good idea and a better place to send our money than the many other candidates
5. Get your offline contacts to donate – to get a bit of momentum happening (assuming this is considered fair play)
6. Set a much more realistic target – so that people can feel they are contributing to something that is likely to be a success. For example, just put out a campaign for step one of a process, and when that is successful start another campaign for step two
7. Have a clearer plan on what will happen to the money if you don’t reach the target, preferably one meeting all the criteria above
Any more?
More on those two attempts here:
https://tefltastic.wordpress.com/2012/11/06/eot-against-oup/
https://tefltastic.wordpress.com/2012/11/04/using-crowdfunding-for-tefl-related-legal-action/
https://tefltastic.wordpress.com/2012/10/10/crowdfunding-in-tefl/
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