Top 8 Fundraising Ideas for Small Businesses

There are millions of startup concepts floating around. However, small firms have tremendous challenges in terms of finance and execution. About one-third of them fail when they do not get the necessary startup capital or follow-on funds for their business. How then do startups raise funds?

Here, we have listed the top 8 fundraising ideas for small businesses. However, an effective business model is required to help them raise funds. Interested individuals and investors donate funds only if the business idea convinces them and they see a future in it.

Let’s get down to the top fundraising ideas one by one.

1. Peer-to-peer fundraising

Before inviting venture capitalists to fund your startup, try raising money by speaking to your family and friends. You can invite them to visit the site or office to tell them about your business, your vision, and the profit you intend to make through sales and services. The benefit of peer-to-peer fundraising is you get interest-free capital or at low interests.

2. Enter contests

If your business is unique and you feel it has the potential to succeed, we recommend looking for university grants as one of the top fundraising ideas. Do you know that the best universities around the world organize contests for startups and business ideas? The entries go through several rounds of presentation and tests before they are declared winners by an expert panel. The best among them attracts the attention of investors. You can also check for contests for your level of entrepreneurship at the local or national level.

3. Take the help of local media channels

Local media channels always highlight important issues in their community. They look for news with compelling content and try to raise awareness about new businesses in the locality. Newspapers, T.V channels, radio stations, reach out to them with your products or services and tell them to spread your story. We suggest this as one of the fundraising ideas for small businesses because if any of the visual content becomes viral, there are chances of your business attracting international attention.

4. Federal & state grants

Many of the states and provinces set aside grants for small businesses and startups. They have an established startup ecosystem to help entrepreneurs run the business through financial and technical help. Many even lend money at low interest especially for women entrepreneurs and for businesses in rural areas or that employees rural artisans. Get in touch with this ecosystem and see if funds can be arranged for your startup.

5. Host an event

Dinner, party, and game events are top fundraising ideas that are proven to give you desired results. Invite friends, locals, and extended family members to attend the event. Allow businesses to act as sponsors. Promote the event in the local media with a press release explaining the cause of the event to raise money for your business. You can even donate a part of the raised funds to a charity or a cause that’s important.

6. Crowdfunding

Register your business on a trusted fundraising platform to start a fundraising campaign. You can rake in funding with a brief description of your business and a compelling video. Add incremental goals with rewards for donors willing to donate to the business. The fundraising platform makes it easy for you to create a campaign. You can generate a shareable link or QR code to the campaign page. You can also set up multiple payment modes to make it easy for investors. Even if your fundraising campaign does not reach the goal, you will have garnered the attention of the public and it may help you in sales and profits.

7. Social media platforms

You can leverage the popularity of social media platforms such as Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook to get the attention of a wider audience. Share the link of the campaign created in the fundraising platform on your social media account. It is a great place to start searching for a source of money. Create your business account and get the good word out about your business needs. Put your heart into your sales pitch on social media to gain widespread consideration among audiences and potential investors.

8. Share your fundraising campaign

Once you’ve implemented the fundraising campaign for your business, it’s time to share them with your supporters so that they pass it on to their supporters and so on. There are a number of ways to do it.

Social media- Share the link to the fundraising campaign on all popular social media accounts and appeal to your supporters to share the link.

Emails- Send out personalized emails to a list of potential donors telling them about the USP of your business.

Blogs- You can write guest posts on popular startup business ideas websites about why you need funds for your business.

Flyers- Print out flyers with the fundraising campaign QR code and link. Distribute these at local events and business conferences.    

Bottom line

If raising funds for your business is the main goal, see to it that it is preceded by a well-planned campaign. Any of your top fundraising ideas for small businesses will not work if you do not put your heart and soul into it.

givingx is a reputable online fundraising platform that assists small businesses in launching successful campaigns. We support businesses with crowdfunding and peer-to-peer fundraising so that you may receive financial aid within a few days, as opposed to weeks and months for the approval of grants and loans. If you haven’t started already, sign up on givingx today and start a fundraiser for your small business today.