1. Crowdfunding Let’s Grow State Getting Started
Penn State Office of University Development
Division of Development & Alumni Relations
Contact information
Phone: ( )
This guide is meant to act as your resource for everything crowdfunding. Included are tips, tricks, facts, and best practices. Let’s get started.

2. Welcome! Before you get started
Crowdfunding engages a large group of supporters by harnessing the momentum of social networking for a specific fundraising objective. Successful crowdfunders use personal connections via and social media to spread their campaigns through their social networks. Unlike other crowdfunding platforms that charge up to 15% of funds raised, Penn State provides a free crowdfunding service for the use of students, alumni, faculty, staff, and friends looking to grow Penn State.
Before you get started
Crowdfunding is not right for every project, and the Office of University Development has established a process to help you decide what fundraising efforts will be most successful for your goals.
Contact information
Staff members within the Office of Annual Giving can speak to you about crowdfunding. Call our main office ( ) or us at
University statement on crowdfunding at Penn State
Any Penn State entity wishing to solicit gifts using crowdfunding should consult the Penn State Office of Annual Giving. The Office of Annual Giving currently provides a crowdfunding platform, Let’s Grow State, to host and support fundraising campaigns.  Anyone may submit an application at any time using the crowdfunding application found a grow.psu.edu. Upon receipt, staff in the Office of Annual Giving will review the application and arrange a consultation to discuss fundraising potential, timing, audience, and strategies. If approved, the requestor(s) will be responsible for preparing all materials and information related to their crowdfunding campaign. If an application is not approved by the Office of Annual Giving, but you still wish to conduct a crowdfunding campaign on any third-party platform, you may not do so in the name of Penn State. Penn State will not support crowdfunding efforts using any other platforms or mechanisms. The conduct of any such outside campaign is done at your sole risk, including any tax implications of raising funds on an individual basis.
While Penn State may occasionally include information about crowdfunding campaigns in its marketing and solicitation materials, all direct communications to potential donors will be conducted by the individuals or organization managing the crowdfunding campaign. The campaign team may, at no time, utilize donor, alumni, or patient lists controlled or owned by Penn State or obtained through any third-party service. All solicitations should adhere to the spirit of crowdfunding and be directed at personal contacts and networks of the campaign team.
University crowdfunding policy
If you’re going to run a crowdfunding campaign and in Penn State’s name, you must go through the office of Annual Giving and Let’s Grow State
Can’t go through outside platforms

3. Crowdfunding What is crowdfunding?
The practice of funding a project or venture by raising small amounts of money from a large number of people
Reality check
Crowdfunding campaigns take hard work, and finding real, supportive donors can require a lot of time, effort and planning. Keep the following potential challenges and best practices in mind as you build your donor network and plan your strategy for reaching your goal.
People over-promise
People will under deliver on what they say
Repeating the same message isn’t more effective
Consistency is crucial, but using the same photo with the same message every time loses it’s attention grabbing effect. Mix it up! Ask the same question in a different way.
Building a page doesn’t mean you’ll raise money
People aren’t waiting to give money so creating a crowdfunding page doesn’t mean you’ll receive donations. It’s up to you to put forth the effort of finding donors to come to your page. It’s hard work, but it’s worth it!
So what is crowdfunding? Crowdfunding is raising small gifts from a large network of people in order to support your project or cause and the reality of it is, running a crowdfunding campaign is hard work. Finding real and supportive donors can require a lot of time, effort, and planning.
A common challenge teams will sometimes face is that people will over-promise and under-deliver.
A potential donor says they’re going to give a significant amount to your campaign and then they don’t.
One of the people on your campaign may say they’re going to actively promote by posting on social and sending s every week, but then they get busy and don’t.
The reason I bring this up is we want you to try to counteract those under-deliveries by over preparing. That way, when your campaign is live, you will be more inclined to achieve your full goal.
You’ll also want to get into shape by preparing materials in advance. You’ll want to have s, social media posts, and any other communications created in advance. That way if you’re busy during the time of your campaign, you can quickly and effectively get your communications out by copy and pasting what you already have saved in preparation.