THE 3 SECOND RULE
A random person coming across your campaign page must be able to get a clear idea of what you are raising money for within 3 seconds of looking at it. We recommend to avoid names people do not recognize (even if it’s the name of your program) or words in other languages (like Hebrew) that not every visitor would understand. The combination of your title and your main image, along with the first 1-2 sentences in your description, should answer the question “What am I raising money for”.

WHO – WHAT – WHY – WHEN
Someone who spends more time on your campaign page should be able to get (fairly easy) the answers to the following questions:

• Who is behind this campaign?
• What are they raising money for? (see “The 3 Second Rule” above)
• Why is it important to do what they want to do with the funds they raise?
• Why is it important to do it now?

IT’S ALL ABOUT TRUST
You are asking people to give you hard-earned money. Make sure that you go above and beyond creating trust by:

• Fill out your profile and make it very clear, use a picture of yourself or your groups (better than a logo)
• Provide various ways to learn about you elsewhere (Facebook, Linkedin, etc.)
• Explain clearly what you plan to do with the funds you raise and why you are raising the amount you are. If you can, provide a timeline that shows when you would use the funds (that should go in the description).

SPEND MORE THAN 30 MIN ON YOUR PAGE
You can create a page on Jewcer in less than 30 minutes, but you shouldn’t. Unless you are a professional writer / campaign manager / graphic designer / video producer, building a good campaign page takes more time. Campaigns that are done very quickly do not instill trust in the visitors and thus do not raise as much money as they could have. We are happy to go over your campaign page and provide you with feedback on how to make it better.

USE A VIDEO PITCH
You do not have to use a video pitch, but campaigns that use a video pitch raise much more money than those that do not (more than double). You do not have to spend money on making one (though, if you can, please contact us and we can connect you with people that can help). A “homemade” video that shows your passion is much better than none. We also created a tutorial for you on what makes a good video pitch here.

IMAGES SHOW HOW SERIOUS YOU ARE
The images you pick should be part of the story you are telling in your campaign page. Make sure you follow the technical specifications of the platform. An image that is cropped in the wrong places makes you look unprofessional and makes the visitor lose trust. Your #1 image is very important in attracting people to your campaign and therefore, you should spend some time thinking which one to use.

KNOW YOUR AUDIENCE
Think about who the audience for your campaign is. Is it young people? Older people? Liberal? Conservative? Build a page that speaks to your audience. If you try to speak to everyone, you will speak to none.

PEOPLE ARE NOT HERE TO BUY STUFF
Crowdfunding is not about asking for money and not about selling stuff. Unless your campaign is about coffee mugs or T-shirts, do not provide them as part of your campaign. You have a much higher chance of getting people to support your cause if you give them an opportunity to be part of something amazing. When we say “part” here, we do not mean “support financially”. Giving people an opportunity to be part of something means to give them a part in the cause itself and what you do. If your cause was to build a house, giving someone an opportunity to be part of it would be to let them help you paint one of the walls or at least choose the color you would use to paint it. The contribution levels to your campaign should be the way you give people a way to feel some ownership over the effect of what you want to do.

MAKE IT ALL CONNECT
Your campaign page is telling a story. Make sure you are telling one clear story and that all the parts (title, images, video, descriptions, contribution levels, etc.) are all parts of the same story and often telling it from different angles or in different ways. One specific connection must be made between your cause and the amount of money you are looking to raise. For example, if you want to raise money to produce a music album, the goal amount should be somewhere between $12,000 and $18,000. If you say you want to raise $50,000 for a music album and do not explain why it is much higher than normal, people will lose trust in your cause and you will not raise as much as you could.

STAY AWAY FROM FACEBOOK / TWITTER WHEN YOU LAUNCH
This rule is not so much about your campaign page but is so important that we decided to put it as the last recommendation. Once you launch your campaign, at first, stay away from reaching out to people publicly on social networks or email blasts. Start your campaign by getting at least 50 people that you know personally and reach out to individually to donate (any amount). The harsh truth is that if you cannot get 50 people that you know to support your cause, your chances of raising money from strangers is very low. We created a manual on how to reach out to people once you launch to increase your chances of reaching your goal which you can read here.