No Bull. Crowdsourcing Doesn’t Have to Suck.
Sheila here. Owner and Creative Director of The Bulls of Durham. I’m also the perpetual BULLholder of very expensive ideas. Like when I had the bright idea to write “The Bulls of Durham” living history book – a $104,000 bright idea right there.
I’m unfortunately not wildly rich beyond BULLief – yet. The day is young, and miracles happen. Fortunately, I’ve inherited my immigrant father’s work ethic and resourcefulness.
I’ve crowdsourced over $500K in my adult life for both other and my own endeavors. And those resources have been used for everything from saving puppies to getting a friend outta a domestic violence situation to buying the Tall Grass Food Box CSA team “the whole damn (refrigerated) truck to helping Jala get her pet care business up and running to making the aforementioned book project a printed reality.
That’s whole lotta money for a whole lotta different reasons.
I’ve learned through many successes and failures – including a very big and VERY public crowdsourcing failure – the ins and outs of crowdsourcing. I’ve got it down to art.
The most important thing I want people to know is that you can get the money to fund your dream. If your bakery needs a brick-and-mortar, if your food concept needs a food truck, if your business needs money to fill a revenue gap, if you need the money to make an idea a reality, whatever your THING is, the money is out there.
A wise friend and lowkey real estate mogul, Tiffany Elder, once told me, “Don’t ever let money be the reason you don’t do something. There’s plenty of money out there.“
I 100% agree.
There is plenty of money out there, AND to get it, you will need to get clear on what you’re doing, prepare well in advance, have a plan, and then work the plan.
You’re also going to need to ask for help – over and over- but I didn’t want to put that in bold and scare you off.
Here’s perhaps the biggest and most important thing to get down when it comes to crowdsourcing:
How much money do you need for what?
Okay. That may sound super simple because it is. AND it’s the one thing people trip over and fall on their faces.
Ambiguity kills more dreams than anything else.
Clarity is THE MAGIC that transforms everything.
Let’s say you need money to transform a historic space into a new, vibrant restaurant. Food inspectors play NO games. That build-out is gonna cost a WHOLE lotta time and money. And you’ve gotta cover a lot on the front end because traditional lends need to know you’ve got real equity into this project.
So… you need a large sum of money to do a whole lot of things, from hiring a professional cleaning crew to a demo crew to designing the space to supplies, labor, you name it.
In this case, you need to name it precisely.
If you start telling your audience the whole story, you’re gonna lose them before you launch your crowdsourcing effort.
Break it down.
What is the most vital thing or up to 4 things that you need the money for?
How much?
What will this thing do? Keep it simple and keep it real.
Building on this example, “We need $4300 to have historic renovation professionals come in and thoroughly clean the space before we begin construction.”
No further explanation is needed. No one wants to breathe mold while they eat or have historic rat scat in their food.
If you’re thinking about and/or have tried crowdsourcing and it didn’t go well, here’s what I want you to know:
- You can do it! The money IS out there. I BULLieve in you.
- The first step is to get clear on how much money you need for what.
- The 3 Biggest Mistakes In Crowdsourcing and How to Fix Them Fast. Handy dandy guide I made for you.
- We’re going to talk more about this real soon.
Alright, now I need for you to BULLieve in yourself and your idea as much as I do. Because whatever your THING is, the world really needs it.
Blog photo by Barrett Jorgensen.
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