The Introduction of crowdfunding for academic research
Introduction
10 years have passed since academic crowdfunding initiatives began. Crowdfunding sites focused on academic research have now been set up in several countries, including the USA, the UK, Spain, Germany, India, Australia, and Japan.
In this article, we review the academic crowdfunding initiatives across the world and introduce the key points to succeed in crowdfunding, based on our experience of operating the Japanese academic crowdfunding platform “academist” for 8 years.
Crowdfunding platform for academic research
We here introduce academic crowdfunding platforms which are open to researchers in all disciplines.
🇺🇸 Experiment： Experiment is the pioneer of academic crowdfunding platforms in the world. In about 10 years, more than 1,000 research projects have been successfully supported by over 50,000 backers. The total amount of money raised is about $10 million (detail). In addition to the US, Experiment also accepts proposals from Canada, Australia, and the UK.
🇬🇧 CrowdScience, 🇩🇪 Sciencestarter, 🇪🇸 Precipita： Academic crowdfunding is also operated in Europe. On each platform, 1–2 projects are published per year. “Precipita” is a platform operated by the Spanish government that was accessible until recently.
🇮🇳 Research Funders： “Research Funders” launched in India raised 260 million Rupees (about $3.4 million) for 130 projects in just a few months, but the site has now closed down. The fact that such a large amount of money can be raised in a short period, however, demonstrates the high potential of research crowdfunding in India.
🇯🇵 academist： “academist” is the first academic crowdfunding platform in Japan. In 8 years, 15,000 people have supported 220 projects. The total amount raised through this platform is about $2 million. There are two funding types for the researchers: spot-support type (Example) or monthly-support type (Example). In the former type, the challenge period is relatively short (1-2 months) and the researchers receive support typically only once, whereas the latter type is typically a long term (1 year -) and the researchers receive support every month.
In addition to the above, there is also ” 🇬🇧 CANCER RESEARCH UK”, a website specializing in the medical field, and “🇺🇸 YU START”, a website originating from a university. The general crowdfunding site “🇦🇺 Pozible” has a research category, where research-related projects are listed.
As mentioned above, although there are some sites closing, academic crowdfunding is taking place in many countries around the world.
How to succeed in academic crowdfunding as a researcher
We here present the key points of crowdfunding for academic research, from project creation to successful funding. We organize this into two parts: creating a research introduction page (project page) and getting people to read the project page and support the research.
Create a project page
To raise research funds through crowdfunding, researchers need to create a project page to introduce their research. However, its format is much different from most of the research funding proposals. What’s the difference?
One might think that the “readers” of the application are different. The reason is that research grants are funded by specialists, while crowdfunding allows non-specialists to decide whether to support the research. But that is not at all. This is because specialists also read the project page and support the project in many cases.
We think the difference between them is to create a project page that readers want to support. So we suggest researchers write a “Vision” for their research. Vision is the ultimate goal to be revealed or the problem to be solved through the research. In addition, it is important to tell the researchers’ personalities. For example, “Why do you research this creature?” one might answer, “This creature is taxonomically important…” in a research grant, but on a crowdfunding project page, you can just say, “Because this organism looks cool! Its ecosystem is amazing…”.
We believe that organizing the Why, What, Who, and How around the Vision with the researchers’ personalities makes the project page more sympathetic to potential supporters.
Advertise project page
Perhaps you think that a simple summary of the Vision with the researchers’ personalities would not be sufficient for readers to support it. You are correct! Even if the project page is perfect, just publishing it on the site is not enough to succeed in the funding at all. We need to promote the project page to the potential supporters with passion and encourage them to support the project.
We suggest that researchers consider PR strategies based on the 1/3 rule. In the 1/3 rule, the support is spread out in the following order: 1st connection, community, new fans.
- 1st Connection： It is difficult to get someone who does not know you to become your initial supporter. The first step is to introduce the project to your closest acquaintances and raise 33% of their support. It is more important to build a support group by involving your close acquaintances than to advertise alone.
- Community： People who belong to the same community are more likely to support each other even if they do not have a personal connection (e.g. alumni and alumnae associations of club activities). Engage community managers and board members and aim for 33% support from the community.
- New Fans： When you gather more than 66% support, you are more likely to receive support from people who do not know you or your research. Use crowdfunding as an opportunity to let people know about your Vision, and raise support for the remaining 33%.
As a result of the promotion through a variety of methods, more than 85% of the crowdfunding projects reached the target amount on “academist”. (Since FY2021, all projects have reached the target amount!)
The significance of crowdfunding for academic research
The origin of the word crowdfunding means “to raise funds from the crowd,” but crowdfunding for academic research has many additional benefits beyond just raising funds.
For example, we heard from many researchers that crowdfunding led to unexpected effects that they did not expected at first, such as finding collaborators, unexpectedly high support, and media coverage. In addition, we often hear that visualization of the number of supporters makes researchers realize again that many people support their research, which quite motivates the researchers.
Academic crowdfunding is not just a “ fundraising” activity, but a way to have a place to promote their research activities to non-professionals and to increase the number of supporters of the research. The important thing is not only to explain scientific contents in an easy-to-understand manner, but also to clarify one’s position in the entire academic field, and ultimately in society, and to present the Vision for one’s research with passion. Ultimately, it is the passion that inspires people to change their minds and behavior.
Although “academist” is a service from Japan, we believe that academia has no borders. We hope to explore new ways of research together with platformers around the world who agree with the trend of democratization of research — “Open academia”.
Keep an eye on the Sysmex RDCE x academist Grant crowdfunding campaign starting on May 17!
Acknowledgment
I would like to thank Motoaki Bamba, Saki Iwata, Hirofumi Kobayashi, and anonymous commenters for their very helpful comments in writing this article.
