Would you give me some money? I’ll make my unicorn dance for you.

Almost two weeks ago we had an interesting panel discussion with two fundraising experts. My impression was (and may be more than just an impression) that one of them was there to embody the capitalist side, the banker, while his counterpart was the start upper, one of those went through the fundraising mechanism – crowdfunding, Angel investors, Venture capitalists etc. – happily surviving at the end. But still looking for £ 2,000,000 I’m afraid.

I have to say something strong: I hate money and talking about money. I’ve never been that good at maths – It could be related to that – , but I think that when money is involved everything become stricter and unclear. Everyone starts worrying about profits, deadlines and how to make the investors happy. There is no more space for Creativity and it’s easy for your Idea to get lost in the effort to make it come true.

Yes, in my dreamlike vision ideas are unicorns.

I may should have said that I hate the money environment as I experienced it, not the money itself. It pays for broadband internet and this Masters after all. And raising some money in a creative way it’s one of the better chance we have to pursue the career we dreamt about, to think about our job smiling.  As young entrepreneurs that dream could be manage our own successful business for the most of us.

In a seeding phase, when it’s too soon to take the risk and establish a company, the best way to gain some weight and confidence, without getting lost (or ruined) I believe it’s crowdfunding.

First of all because It’s about relationships (again) and real people. It’s not just about getting your idea out there and wait but introducing your self and your idea with a story – a good one – to the right community. Secondly, It helps to research your market and discover whether or not there is a consistent market for your product.

There are different types of crowdfunding:

– Reward: your are giving rewards (little object, wallpapers, handwritten cards etc) in exchange for small/medium amount of money, or even pre-sell your product.

– Donation: this works for no-profit and social cause only.

– Equity: you are giving away shares of your business.

– Crowdlending (peer-to-peer lending or debt crowdfunding): many people lending you some money. It’s like a loan that you’ll have to pay back to people that invested on your business.

You can find a detailed explanation on the UK CROWDFUNDING website.

Reward crowdfunding is my favourite for two reasons:  1) You can feel less pressure from the stakeholders and have more freedom; 2) People are investing in your idea because they really love it and because you convinced them with your passion. This is an investment that could last longer then money: it’s pure motivation that will fuel your business.

As regards crowdfunding platforms, we all know Kickstarter, but there are many others less popular but effective. Sometimes you have to think smaller, let’s say locally (you local virtual community) , to have a bigger impact. The are some of my favourite:

KAPIPAL (Capital + Pal)

This is one of my favourite: “You friends are your Capital”. You can raise money for basically everything, from birthday present to business projects. They are not charging anything for this service, you can keep whatever amount you’ll raise and you can even not give any reward. Sounds crazy? Just try.

CROWDFUNDER

This is based on rewards and it’s one of the most popular after Kickstarter. They explicitly wrote on the website that “Crowdfunder loves projects that benefit the community, not just yourself”, which I believe is truly creative-economy-oriented. They also have a well-written guide on ISSUU about how to create the perfect crowdfundable project. There is a 5%+VAT fee though, and they also have a small charge on transactions.

CROWDCUBE

It’s Crowfunder’s younger and – let’s say – more ambitious brother. Our guests mentioned it, Crowdcube it’s based on equity  and lending funding. You’ll have to measure carefully the value of your business to sell shares (has to be a running business or have a detailed business plan) which – in my opinion – is difficult in an early stage. I used EQUIDAM for this purpose sometimes, it’s nice to play with that.

Funding Tree

Pretty similar to Crowdcube. Did I mentioned that they both have a pretty nice blog and events section? If your business is listed on one of this websites book your place, grab a glass of wine and go to meet some investors.

FundedByMe

This is a swedish platform (I love swedish people, could you believe that?) that offers both reward, equity and loan funding models. They are incredibly transparent and you can find the explanation of nearly everything about how their service works and what crowdfunding is on the website.

Our Friday lecturers mentioned also Funding Circle as loan-based platform and, even though I don’t know much about their service and I’m pretty scared about loans and banking stuff in general, I couldn’t help myself from being moved by the first sentence on their website: “Funding Circle was created with a big idea: to revolutionise the outdated banking system and secure a better deal for everyone”.

All this makes me think that we may have a new era in front of us; talking about money could be more human… so, maybe I’ll keep gathering information and start a conversation instead of running away.

The Animal Instinct

I’ll start from the conclusion, just to turn things around: are we more animal / less civilised than we would like to admit?

I’ve been thinking about the last month, what I’ve learned and my feelings after the impact with the MACE, and the more I think the more I realise that it’s always and all about People and relationships.

My thoughts are used to dancing in circles, coming and going like people at an open party; therefore, I tried to hold them together mapping my reflections and, even though I’m sure it will look incredibly messy to most of you, it clarified a lot to me.

The Frieze Art Fair we visited a couple of weeks ago made me realise that the value was not in the Art works themselves but in the overall experience of the Fair as hub for cross-pollination.

As I wrote in my essay for Mapping the Creative Economy, it looked like a proper Ecosystem where people gravitating towards the world of the Art Industry – Critics, Curators, Artists, Galleries, Audience – cooperate in building an evolving meaning.

It’s a herd. We are influenced by the society we dive in, we feel the need to understand and to be understood, be part of something bigger, share rules and problems for many different reasons. The designer’s hand – from the first tool created by the first man –  is driven by people.

Prototyping, as a conversation between mind and hands, reminds us once more that we approach the world better when we have something tangible to gather around. It’s our fire; as pitching and storytelling it’s our way to share meaning though symbols.

We need to built friendships fostering trust and playfulness to collaborate to modify the world around us. It’s the only way to overcome the fear of judgment and discuss pre-existing patterns, as Tim Brown explain in his amazing performance at TED:

We need mentors as we needed leaders and guidance, it’s once again the need to share meaning and be encouraged (as Dr Sugata Mitra proved us) that can make the difference.

Moreover, after our panel discussion last Friday about funding and how to get the investors’ attention we realise that “People buy People”. Investors are looking for Good Teams rather then perfect products. Our speakers suggested to find a way to build a personal relationship attending networking events. Once again enter a community and share. It’s about trust and balance and passion, something far from the cold and inhuman world of banking and finance as we imagine.

It turned out that if your business fits your personality, if you do what you love following your ethics people around you can feel it and this makes a difference.

My opening question could has been a bit above the lines, I was trying to wind you up. I’ll be honest.

We look at ourselves as emancipated animals and indeed we are, but there is a huge share of instinct in our lives. We are fighting and embracing unconsciously and at the same time our being “animals” and I think this is exactly what makes us unique.

Thinking. Feeling. Doing. We can accomplish anything.