Sherwood Neiss

In your business plan and in your crowdfund investment campaign pitch, you told the crowd what you needed to do, when you needed to do it, and how you were going to do it. Those are your milestones. Summarize them into bullet points and put them on a piece of paper. In his book Mastering the Rockefeller Habits (Gazelles, Inc.

One of the most valuable networking tools you can use is an infographic. Kelly Hoey of WIM says she wouldn’t have been so successful without diverse relationships. The figure shows her infographic indicating the relationship to organizations and people critical for the success of her organization. Credit: Women Innovate Mobile network map 2012 You can use Post-it notes on the wall, a mind-mapping program, or a free infographic program, but get it down.

If you haven’t been scared you away from crowdfund investing yet, that means you probably have some tolerance for financial risk. How much tolerance? That’s a question only you can answer (ideally with guidance from a financial advisor). Creating an investment portfolio that meets your needs demands first assessing your level of risk tolerance.

Crowdfund investing is a new funding opportunity for small businesses and startups that holds tremendous potential, but it's not a free-for-all. Entrepreneurs, business owners, and investors alike should know the legislative boundaries set by the JOBS Act (which opened the door to this funding resource in 2012), the risks involved in this type of funding, and the potential rewards it offers both to companies and their supporters.

If you want to raise money via crowdfund investing, you must grasp the statutory requirements set forth in the JOBS Act. Here are the key provisions that affect how small businesses and entrepreneurs can use this funding opportunity: Funding is limited to $1 million per year. This limit for crowdfund investing allows for sufficient seed money or early-stage investment for most businesses, while avoiding the unintended consequence of having larger organizations use this asset class as an ATM.

There are many business beneficiaries of crowdfund investing. The obvious beneficiaries are the businesses receiving the capital, but equity- and debt-based crowdfund investing has created a brand-new industry, and many people will make a lot of money from it. The types of businesses most likely to benefit from crowdfund investing are startups, small businesses (including technology companies, bricks-and-mortar retail shops, and service companies), and anyone else who doesn’t easily qualify for traditional financing.

Crowdfund investing is an entirely new industry and an entirely new asset class for investors to evaluate. It represents the beginning of Web 3.0, where the social web (or Web 2.0) combines with businesses raising capital. It creates a new way for businesses to get seed funding or growth capital, and it will generate an entirely new ecosystem of businesses, business models, processes, and strategies that can be used in starting or growing a business.

When you meet your funding target, all your hard work finally translates into the dollars you need to turn your ideas into real products or services. But because you’re potentially receiving small dollar amounts from lots of different investors, how do you actually get the cash into your hands? The type of funding platform you use for your crowdfund investment campaign determines how you receive your money: Online funding portal: Most likely, you registered with an SEC-approved online funding portal that exclusively hosts crowdfund investment campaigns.

At some point after your initial crowdfund investing campaign has succeeded, you’ll likely find yourself thinking about tapping into this funding source again. You don’t want to do so too quickly; starting a new campaign a month after the first one ended demonstrates a serious lack of financial planning and likely won’t result in a repeat success.