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Sixteen of the Top 100 Crowdfunding Websites Lose Traffic Due to Fierce Competition over the Past 12 Months

11 Jun

#1 Kickstarter Sees 25% Decline, #6 Indiegogo Falls 36%, #11 uInvest Loses 28%

By Robert Hoskins

Overall, the Top 100 Crowdfunding Sites worldwide saw a growth rate of 255%.  Not bad in a hyper-competitive market place. This demonstrates an impressive growth rate for the Crowdfunding industry, which is growing rapidly on a worldwide basis.   Click here to see the Top 100 Crowdfunding Sites and their growth rates over the past 12 months according to SimilarWeb Statistics.

Sixteen of Top 100 Crowdfunding Websites Lose Traffic Due to Fierce Competition

Sixteen of Top 100 Crowdfunding Websites Lose Traffic Due to Fierce Competition

And while most Crowdfunding sites grew, sixteen of top 100 crowdfunding sites saw significant website traffic decreases.   This is the result of fierce competition and shows how difficult it can be for the crowdfunding leaders such as Kickstarter and Indiegogo to maintain their growth due to the onslaught of new competitors.

The cool thing about the SimilarWeb statistics that were used to build this report was the competitive information they provide for each crowdfunding website such as the top referring sites, sites that viewers went to next and the amount of traffic being generated by direct traffic, referral partners, search, social media, email and display advertising.

Crowdfunding sites at the bottom of the Top 100 Crowdfunding List can use this information to improve their marketing program’s performance and try to work their way to the top of the list.

SimilarWeb Traffic Sources for Kickstarter

SimilarWeb Traffic Sources for Kickstarter

Top 10 Crowdfunding Sites that Experienced Decreasing Website Traffic over the Last 12 Months

Source:  April 2014 SimilarWeb Statistics

Rank Site Rank Link Growth
92 www.fundageek.com 2,376,689  (-3,636,206) -83.58%
80 www.solarmosaic.com 754,410  (-399,359) -52.94%
90 www.clickstartme.com 1,791,606  (-894,227) -49.91%
96 www.ipledg.com 2,841,472  (-1,375,367) -48.40%
100 www.getspringboarded.com 8,005,621  (-3,514,142) -43.90%
68 www.growvc.com 433,297  (-163,387) -37.71%
6 www.indiegogo.com 3,711  (-1,361) -36.67%
11 www.uinvest.com.ua 7,393  (-2,037) -27.55%
85 www.massivemov.com 1,119,512  (-295,027) -26.35%
1 www.kickstarter.com    964  (-244) -25.31%
76 www.appsfunder.com 570,311  (-105,800) -18.55%
97 www.dreambank.org 4,727,020  (-854,041) -18.07%
82 www.propellr.com 880,890  (-126,480) -14.36%
95 www.crowdfundingbank.com 2,735,695  (-343,103) -12.54%

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Front Page PR Offers Broker Dealers General Solicitation Campaigns to Market the Oncoming Wave of Equity Crowdfunding Investment Opportunities to the Next Generation of U.S. Accredited Investors

15 Jul

SEC legalizes Crowdfunding marketing, PR and social media campaigns to solicit investments from Reg. D accredited investors, which include, in general, people with a net worth (excluding their residence) of $1 million, income of $200,000 a year (or $300,000 with their spouse), officers and directors of the issuer and various institutions that have more than $5 million in assets

By Robert Hoskins, Front Page Public Relations

Front Page PR announced new turnkey Crowdfunding marketing programs for FINRA-registered broker dealers that want to begin planning advertising, marketing, media relations, PR and social media campaigns to reach a target audience of accredited investors that have remained allusive for the past 30 years due to securities laws.  On July 10, 2013, the Securities Exchange Commission (SEC) voted to lift rules that strictly prohibited the use of mass marketing strategies to promote investment opportunities to potential investors.

Beginning September 2013, leading broker dealers that want to make a big push into one of the most promising financial opportunities in the last eighty years can now begin working with Front Page PR’s team of marketing experts to start planning targeted marketing campaigns to reach this lucrative new audience of prospective accredited investors.


July 10, 2013 SEC Guidelines passed for Crowdfunding and Title II of the 2012 JOBS Act:


“Aggressive broker dealers are already partnering with popular equity crowdfunding sites such as Circleup.com and MicroVentures.com in order to begin marketing to investment early adopters who are joining popular crowdfunding sites in droves,” said Robert Hoskins, Front Page PR’s Director of Media Relations.  “Adding to the crowdfunding marketing opportunity is the pent-up demand that has been building over the past five years as entrepreneurs and small businesses that have been rejected over and over when seeking traditional bank and small business loans.”

“On the flip side of the crowdfunding market opportunity are millions of qualified investors in the U.S who meet the official SEC guidelines to become accredited investors, which can participate in new equity crowdfunding opportunities, but are unaware of their unique credentials,” Hoskins continued.  “These potential investors have large sums of money sitting in their bank accounts, savings plans and 401k retirement accounts because they simply cannot find attractive deals that will provide a decent return on their investment.”

On September 2, 2013, broker dealers will be able to put together marketing campaigns to educate new investors on the potential to invest in lucrative crowdfunding investment opportunities as well as the best strategies on how to find and evaluate good deals that have serious potential as well as time proven strategies on how to identify red flags and eliminate deals that do not.

Front Page PR encourages broker dealers and equity crowdfunding platforms to contact the firm to begin planning marketing campaigns prior to September 2, 2013, the date when the race begins to build new relationships with millions of new accredited investors via mass marketing communication strategies.

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Crowdfunding Press Center Releases First Global 100 Crowdfunding Web Site Index

12 Jun

Global 100 Crowdfunding Index Provides Crowdfunding Investor / Crowdfunder Demographic  Information, Website Traffic Statistics, SEO Keyword Search Analytics, and Upstream/Downstream Histories

By Robert Hoskins

Austin, Texas – Despite the SEC’s attempt to slow the equity crowdfunding industry down, every other segment of the crowdfunding industry is breaking records worldwide as small businesses and entrepreneurs are raising billions of dollars to get their business ideas and creative projects off the ground.  If fact, by the time the SEC finally issues their formal guidelines, it may be too late to get small businesses interested in turning over any equity at all.  Why give up any control of your business, when you can successfully raise $10,000,000 through rewards-based, perks-based or donation-based crowdfunding campaigns? [Click to Tweet]

Click on the web site traffic links below to research potential crowdfunding websites and their ability to reach your crowdfunding PR campaigns desired target audience.

If your site is not listed, feel free to contact us and tell us why your site should be listed.  If you need help putting together a crowdfunding marketing campaign for your crowdfunding website or crowdfunding campaign, feel free to contact us.  We also maintain the world’s largest database of crowdfunding service providers.

Source: April 2014 SimilarWeb Website Statistics

[Click to Tweet]

Global Rank 2014 Top Crowdfunding Sites Web Traffic Rank
1 www.kickstarter.com    964  (-244)
2 www.gofundme.com 1,245  (+4,481)
3 www.angel.co 1,274  (+9,683)
4 www.lendingclub.com 2,561  (+11,280)
5 www.fundingcircle.com 3,597  (+69,986)
6 www.indiegogo.com 3,711  (-1,361)
7 www.quirky.com 4,661  (+10,336)
8 www.youcaring.com 5,022  (+29,979)
9 www.justgiving.com 6,109  (+5,016)
10 www.giveforward.com 6,370  (+22,619)
11 www.uinvest.com.ua 7,393  (-2,037)
12 www.kiva.org 7,715  (+4,039)
13 www.crowdrise.com 8,311  (+35,678)
14 www.razoo.com 8,995  (+40,736)
15 www.donorschoose.org 9,383  (+55,327)
16 www.fundly.com 9,915  (+59,157)
17 www.pledgemusic.com 11,853  (+35,156)
18 www.crowdtilt.com 13,903  (+76,675)
19 www.firstgiving.com 14,757  (+37,294)
20 www.fundrazr.com 19,265  (+36,105)
21 www.magcloud.com 23,576  (+23,576)
22 www.realtymogul.com 25,956  (+25,956)
23 www.ulule.com 26,412  (+26,412)
24 www.rockethub.com 27,902  (+44,588)
25 www.fundable.com 28,615  (+56,490)
26 www.crowdfunder.com 32,601  (+95,725)
27 www.circleup.com 33,099  (+190,056)
28 www.fundanything.com 35,349  (+71,742)
29 www.fundrise.com 36,797  (+36,979)
30 www.seedinvest.com 41,715  (+430,930)
31 www.rockthepost.com 42,885  (+219,756)
32 www.offbeatr.com 43,967  (+43,967)
33 www.wefunder.com 47,489  (+123,062)
34 www.equitynet.com 48,247  (+587,067)
35 www.gogetfunding.com 61,405  (+78,842)
36 www.pozible.com 62,443  (+2,369)
37 www.slated.com 66,677  (+66,677)
38 www.crowdcube.com 67,493  (+18,583)
39 www.assetavenue.com 68,249  (+68,249)
40 www.fundraise.com 75,650  (+122,645)
41 www.opportunity.org 75,718  (+393,422)
42 www.assob.com.au 77,558  (+386,646)
43 www.givezooks.com 80,405  (+299,806)
44 www.pave.com 81,226  (+444,764)
45 www.peerform.com 83,521  (+994,913)
46 www.ourcrowd.com 88,850  (+308,003)
47 www.pubslush.com 95,418  (+95,418)
48 www.dragoninnovation.com 98,127  (+98,127)
49 www.appbackr.com 100,023  (+105,911)
50 www.crowdemand.com 115,618  (+115,618)
51 www.microgiving.com 115,267  (+585,065)
52 www.wazoku.com 115,402  (+115,402)
New www.flashfunders.com 133,637  (new)
53 www.give2gether.com 128,130  (+655,961)
54 www.seedandspark.com 132,384  (+435,961)
55 www.fundedbyme.com 157,351  (+22,468)
56 www.sterlingfunder.com 162,355  (+2,810,783)
57 www.piggybackr.com 167,853  (+423,875)
58 www.pledgie.com 176,929  (+47,337)
New www.zeczec.com 190,148  (+190,148)
59 www.launcht.com 196,394  (+230,943)
60 www.bolstr.com 235,082  (+805,974)
61 www.geldvoorelkaar.nl 239,031  (+238,031)
62 www.ppl.com.pt 285,111  (+285,111)
63 www.icrowd.com 295,421  (+292,145)
64 www.peerbackers.com 312,398  (+253,364)
65 www.banktothefuture.com 312,498  (+548,122)
66 www.invested.in 344,449  (+253,364)
67 www.symbid.com 386,296  (+22,212)
68 www.growvc.com 433,297  (-163,387)
69 www.somolend.com 433,891  (+408,760)
70 www.faithlauncher.com 447,005  (+438,283)
71 www.crowdit.com 480,625  (+194,246)
73 www.crowdvalley.com 527,534 (+116,320)
74 www.givetobenefit.com 532,139  (+233,567)
75 www.pledgecents.com 540,265  (+3,168,277)
76 www.appsfunder.com 570,311  (-105,800)
77 www.artistshare.com 622,060  (+622,060)
78 www.cMEcompete.com 678,296  (+4,130,838)
79 www.foodstart.com 692,712  (+29,824)
80 www.solarmosaic.com 754,410  (-399,359)
81 www.alumnifinder.com 876,496  (-966,058)
82 www.propellr.com 880,890  (-126,480)
83 www.fundafeast.com 992,504  (+992,504)
84 www.funderhut.com 1,106,925  (+775,099)
85 www.massivemov.com 1,119,512  (-295,027)
86 www.jumpstartcity.com 1,127,431  (+399,385)
87 www.sprigster.com 1,113,545  (+3,001,889)
88 www.crowdhelps.com 1,518,364  (+2,519,368)
New www.crowdfundingpays.com 1,612,636  new
89 www.venturehealth.com 1,743,989  (+15,277,419)
90 www.clickstartme.com 1,791,606  (-894,227)
91 www.techmoola.com 2,000,288  (+848,486)
92 www.fundageek.com 2,376,689  (-4,678,913)
93 www.fansnextdoor.com 2,587,922  (+35,789)
94 www.ArtSpire.org 2,614,373  (+2,682,752)
95 www.crowdfundingbank.com 2,735,695  (-343,103)
96 www.ipledg.com 2,841,472  (-1,375,367)
97 www.dreambank.org 4,727,020  (-854,041)
98 www.startacure.com 3,462,978  (+5,050,952)
99 www.crowdequity.com 4,853,323  (+5,513,168)
100 www.getspringboarded.com 8,005,621  (-3,514,142)

Many readers first visit the Crowdfunding Press Center to learn more about the booming crowdfunding industry and try to get a handle on how to select the best crowdfunding  website to launch a fundraising campaign and learn what it takes to plan a successful crowdfunding campaign.

Launching a crowdfunding campaign is nothing more than a fancy way to describe a typical product/service marketing launch. The only real difference between a crowdfunding campaign and an old-fashioned product marketing/PR launch is the time period for collecting money.

In the past, companies have created new products, built company websites and used marketing, advertising, social networks and PR campaigns to raise awareness among the correct target audience to entice new/existing customers to buy their product or service.

eCommerce or the process of collecting money online is nothing new.  Collecting money or pre-selling a product/service, however, is a totally new concept and seems to be working very well.  Marketers love it because they can actually test demand for a product or service prior to investing a lot of time, effort and money to bring a product to market.

If a crowdfunding campaigns fails, entrepreneurs will actually save a lot of money that would have been invested in a new business that probably would have failed in a couple of years.  If the crowdfunding campaign is a successful and you raise several million dollars, you can bet that venture capitalists and angel investors will be very interested in buying equity stock the old fashioned way.

The one question that everyone wants to get answered is what is the best crowdfunding website to utilize when launching a fundraising campaign.  The answer is simple.  Like advertising or generating publicity in any communications medium, the most important question to answer is who is the desired target audience of donors and what kind of demographics/psychographics can be utilized to create effective marketing messages to convince the masses to donate money to your cause, creative project or new business idea.

Once the target audience has been identified it is easy to target media usage patterns to find the right mix of media outlets needed to achieve both reach and frequency to reach the correct target audience with the perfect message for the lowest cost -per-thousand (CPM). This is how marketeers have been conducting marketing campaigns for almost a century.

In today’s world, reach and frequency is tied directly to search engine optimization (SEO) and social networks along with traditional media outlets.

To help marketing/PR executives as well as crowdfunding campaign managers discover this type of information, we have analyzed what we consider to be the top 100 crowdfunding sites worldwide.  We ranked crowdfunding websites by their global website traffic as well as numerous other analytics including traffic stats, search analytics, audience readership, reviews, backlinks and upstream/downstream websites generating traffic.

It will not take long before media reps, media outlets and website auditing companies jump into crowdfunding market to start providing in-depth research reports, crowdfunding website audit statements and other readership studies that detail their website’s ability to reach the desired pool of investors/donors via their crowdfunding platform or website.

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Uinvest Partners with Investment Banking and Securities Brokerage Firm to Setup Ukraine Crowdfunding Platform

1 Apr

By Robert Hoskins

Uinvest announced a new consulting partnership with the investment banking firm WestPark Capital, Inc. to serve as the crowdfunding platform’s primary U.S.-based investment industry advisor.

Uinvest Partners with Investment Banking and Securities Brokerage Firm to Setup New Crowdfunding Platform

Uinvest Partners with Investment Banking and Securities Brokerage Firm to Setup Ukraine Crowdfunding Platform

“Crowdfunding – is the future of our globalized business world, it’s a logical evolution, and we are happy to find a partner across the ocean who shares these thoughts with us,” said Eugene Rubin, UInvest’s CEO.

According to the letter of intent signed by WPC and UInvest in March 2013, WPC, as a primary U.S. based broker dealer consultant, will help Uinvest on creating a funding portal, as officially recognized by U.S. government – crowdfunding platform. Moreover, WPC has become an advisory partner of our company at UInvest International Conference 2013 that will take place in April 29 – May 1 in Los Angeles, CA.

UInvest is an international investment management company that makes the business cooperation between private investors and small/ medium size businesses easy and efficient. It was founded in 2007 in Ukraine, Eastern Europe. For the past six years, Ulnvest has been connecting private investors with small and medium size businesses and facilitated investment transactions with over a hundred companies resulting in more than $220 million US dollars in successful investments. Ulnvest is also known to be a regional leader in financial planning, investment, and consulting.

Uinvest’s advisory partner, WestPark Capital, Inc. is a full service investment bank, which among other categories is focused on emerging growth sectors such as healthcare, software, technology, biotechnology, financial services, manufacturing, consumer products, media and telecom industries. WestPark provides a comprehensive range of corporate finance services, including initial public offerings, follow-on offerings, private placements and corporate finance advisory services. WestPark is committed to forging lasting partnerships with emerging growth companies and the investors who back them. It is a member of FINRA/SIPC.