
Welcome to this fundraising training. Do you know exactly how much money you need to raise? If you try to raise money and approach an investor, they will ask you how much money you are looking to raise. And you must know how to calculate that amount, and how to answer that question intelligently.
Most businesses don't end up raising money, and for that reason they must do something called bootstrapping. Bootstrapping is simply a way to start and grow your business by finding ways to do that without needing much money or any money. This is what most businesses must do when they start.
In this part of the fundraising course I give you ideas for how to raise money by getting loans, the difference between raising money from personal loans and business loans, and what options entrepreneurs typically have. It isn't easy to get a loan to start a business, but in some cases it makes sense and it is possible to get a small business loan.
Do you want to get a business grant? Many people ask about whether they can get a grant to start their business. It is more difficult to get a grant for businesses which have not started, but if you have started, there are a few grants available for small businesses. Check out this lecture to understand how to fund your business or project with a grant, or whether grants are not a good option for you. Grants are one of the common fundraising ideas, but they are not easy to get.
Extra resources and websites for getting grants for your business.
How to raise money by getting investors. There are many kinds of different investors. The different kinds of investors are angel investors, start-up incubators, seed investors, professional venture capitalists (VC) and investors who invest in specific kinds of businesses like maybe restaurants or real estate, or local businesses, or high growth start-up companies.
There are two ways to get donations for your business. There is the old fashioned way to get donations by reaching out do rich donors or philanthropists like many nonprofits do. And there is also a new way to get donations for your business called crowdfunding. You can raise donations for your business with crowdfunding by trying to raise money on KickStarter, IndieGoGo, or GoFundMe. It is now possible to get donations from the crowd online. It isn't easy to do crowdfunding, but it is possible.
One of the best ways to fund your business is by doing it through the revenue of your own company. Instead of waiting for money to come from a different course, why not just earn the money from your own customers. It is, in fact, what I did with my business, and what I recommend doing to other entrepreneurs. Long-term, you will have to get the money to grow your business from your customers anyway so you might as well start to focus on making money from your customers sooner than later.
Events are a great way to get clients, extra revenue, build extra awareness, and build loyal fans. Basically, events are a great marketing strategy for most kinds of businesses. Events can range from small meetups that drum up community to educational workshops to large conferences. It all depends on the kind of business you have, your event promotion abilities, and your ultimate business goals.
In this part of our fundraising course I explain an unusual fundraising idea which also works as lead generation to get actual customers for your business. In general, I prefer working on getting customers as early as possible in the lifecycle of your business. You will need to get customers eventually anyway, might as well learn how to raise money from your own revenue instead of waiting for a handout.
Gust.com is another website where you can find investors and raise money. Give it a try.
If you have a tech start-up, here is a list of tech start-up incubators to which you can apply to get a small investors, advisors, and support.
In this part of the fundraising training, I share my own experience of raising money. I actually talk about the merits of bootstrapping my business, and how I built my business without raising money. It is, of course, difficult to start a business without raising money, but I put a lot of hard work into it, and ended up being successful without having an investment or a donation or anything else. I worked, saved money, then used that money to give my business a runway, hustled, and ended up making it happen for myself. I advise that you try this too.
Use the sum of 10 fundraising strategies to raise more money and sooner!
WHY HAVING 10 FUNDRAISING STRATEGIES IS SO EFFECTIVE
When you focus on just one fundraising strategy, it might not work, take too long, or raise less money than you need.
Instead of putting all your eggs in one basket with one fundraising strategy, combine funds from 10 different fundraising strategies like getting some money from a business loan, maybe a personal loan, grants, crowdfunding, other donations, and then transitioning to many of the creative ways to raise money that I'll show you in this course.
When you raise a little bit of money from multiple sources, it's much easier to get to your ultimate fundraising goal.
Includes my 200-page business plan book, which is used by a number of universities.
UNDERSTAND THE A-Z OF THE FUNDRAISING PROCESS
If you are in the process of raising money for your business or wondering how to begin the fundraising process, this course will give you insights and the pros and cons for different fundraising strategies. That will help you maximize your chances of success in each!
WE'LL START BY EXPLORING THE OPTION OF A BUSINESS LOAN TO FUN A SMALL BUSINESS
Many people opt for business loans as their first option to raise money for their small business or a start-up. Loans feel like they might be a relatively easy option because banks and investors are more willing to offer loans than direct investments.
Small business loans turn out to be difficult to get because most bank have a requirement similar to this:
Your business must be operational for at least six months.
You must generate at least a few thousand dollars in revenue.
If you don't qualify for these common small business loan requirements, you still have a few options. You can go to local banks which sometimes have more lenient policies or you can explore the option of a personal loan to fund your small business.
RISK ASSOCIATED WITH SMALL BUSINESS LOANS OR PERSONAL LOANS
The challenge with getting a small business loan is that you have to pay it back. If your business does not succeed, you'll have an enormous amount of debt, which is a big thing to consider.
DIFFERENT KINDS OF LOANDS FROM SBA SMALL BUSINESS LOANS TO INTERNATIONAL MICROLOANS
You'll also learn about many different options for getting a small business loan to fund your company. I'll explain what SBA loans are. These are Small Business Assistance loans backed by the US government to help small businesses.
You will also learn how to use online lending companies like Lendio or Kiva to either get a small business loan or a business line or credit.
GETTING DONATIONS TO FUND YOUR BUSINESS VIA CROWDFUNDING
Crowdfunding can be a great option if you have an idea that gets people excited, inspired, and motivated. If so, you can use crowdfunding websites like GoFundMe or Kickstarter to raise money for your business. But keep in mind that those are marketplaces. That means that you can go viral and promoted on those websites, and have many people find your project to give you donations. But if your project doesn't get discovered on those websites, you'll have to do most of your own promotion, which can be difficult.
RAISING MONEY FROM GRANTS
There are many small business grants that are available, and I'll show you how to find them. The challenge with business grants is that it's time consuming to do grant writing and fill out the entire grant application. Plus, it can take a long time to get a reply after you submit your grant application.
CREATIVE FUNDRAISING STRATEGIES
If getting a small business loan, a personal loan, grant, or crowdfunding isn't an option for you, I'll also show you a number of creative and lesser-known techniques to raise money.
CALCULATE HOW MUCH MONEY YOU NEED TO RAISE
Before starting any process of raising money, you must understand how much money you need to raise. Usually the amount of money you aim to raise should get you closer to your next business milestone.
That milestone can be profitability, customer growth to reach a certain number of clients, or a number of other things.
This course will show you how to do the math to understand your fundraising needs so you can be more sophisticated when you try to raise money.
FOR WHOM THIS COURSE IS IDEAL
This course is ideal for people who have a business idea or an early-stage business, and need funding to get started or move forward.
HOW THIS FUNDRAISING COURSE WILL WORK
1) Learn how to calculate how much money you need.
2) Use a combination of over 10 ways to raise that money.
3) Learn to pitch investors.
WILL THESE STRATEGIES WORK FOR YOU?
Not all the fundraising strategies in this course will work for everyone. But since this course gives you a wide range of strategies to raise money, some of them will definitely work.
Plus, by combining multiple fundraising strategies, you should be able to reach the sum your situation requires.
LATEST COURSE UPDATE:
Fundraising websites that help you raise funds for your business
Extra resources for finding potential grants
More unusual ways to raise funds for your business
Most lectures updated to have improved audio and video quality
WHY IT IS IMPORTANT TO TAKE THIS COURSE
Don't focus on just one fundraising strategy like investors, loans or crowdfunding. Give yourself greater potential with a broad view of all the possible ways to raise money.
When you understand all your fundraising options, you will be more likely to choose the most effective strategies and implement them better and with more confidence.
INSTRUCTOR BACKGROUND
I've been an entrepreneur for 20+ years, coached 1,000+ entrepreneurs in person, taught 850,000+ students, impacted millions of entrepreneurs worldwide, some of whom created 6 and 7-figure businesses, and I would love to help you.
I understand how difficult, confusing and stressful it might be for you to go through a fundraising process and start a business with no money and no support.
SHORTEN YOUR STRUGGLE
A long time ago, I went through the same challenges of starting a business and raising money. I understand how stressful and challenging things are for you.
I made this course to help you to get through this challenging process in the easiest possible way, and to shorten the struggle.
STARTUP AND NONPROFIT FUNDRAISING USING ONLINE AND OFFLINE STRATEGIES
Since this course has a variety of unique fundraising strategies, any type of organization can use at least some of the strategies. Whether you are working on a technology startup or a nonprofit, you can use the fundraising strategies in this course to help you.
BONUSES INCLUDED
Lots of extra freebies, downloadable worksheets, and exercises to make the course more interactive and valuable
Personal invitation to my Facebook community after you complete the course
My list of 50 business-success skills after you complete the course
Be automatically entered to get chosen for my student of the month status and have your business featured
RESPONSIVE AND CARING INSTRUCTOR: WORLD-CLASS STUDENT SUPPORT
If you have questions, know that I am here to help! I answer 99% of student questions within 24 hours. Many students tell me that other instructors don't respond. Well, I do because
1) I care about my students.
2) I feel a responsibility to make sure that students get their money's worth from the course.
OFFICE HOURS: GET ONE-ON-ONE HELP FOR FREE OVER A CONVERSATION
I offer monthly office hours with students of this fundraising course, which is a group call over Zoom. On the call, you will be able to ask me questions about anything you are working on, and have an actual conversation about it.
The office hours are free. I don't sell anything on these calls. This is just something I do to go the extra mile to help students. So enroll in the course, start learning, and I hope to meet you in my office hours one day.
MONEY-BACK GUARANTEE
The fundraising course comes with an unconditional, Udemy-backed, 30-day money-back guarantee. This is not just a guarantee, it's my personal promise to you that I will go out of my way to help you succeed just like I've done for thousands of my other students.
Invest in your future! Enroll in this fundraising course now.