CrowdPress Offers Crowdfunding Platform for Creatives

CrowdPress is developing a crowdfunding platform for artists, photographers, and designers worldwide who want a hassle-free way to deliver printed rewards to their backers. A public Beta version of the site was launched in March. A full version is coming later this year.

“Current DIY crowdfunding platforms do not provide the support artists need once their projects have been successfully funded,” said Aaron Corson, founder and CEO of CrowdPress. “After backing more than 50 creative projects, I have experienced firsthand the challenges artists encounter after their projects were funded. With CrowdPress, I wanted to design a site that enabled talented artists to focus on doing what they love — create amazing art — without the hassles of working with printers, managing logistics, or dealing directly with customers.”

CrowdPressBeta

After a creative project has been funded, CrowdPress manages the printing, packaging, and shipping of the rewards to the project backers.

Artists, photographers, and designers from anywhere in the world are encouraged to submit their projects to the CrowdPress Beta. During the Beta phase, only poster projects are available. In the future, CrowdPress will expand to other printable rewards such as T-shirts, calendars, comic books, playing cards, phone/table cases, and 3D-printed items.

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CrowdPress

Feed The Arts Launches Time-Funding Platform for Artists, Writers, Filmmakers

Feed The Arts is a new funding platform designed to change how visual artists, writers, filmmakers, and musicians raise money for specific goals and projects. The site’s innovative TimeFunding approach enables fans of the arts to donate “virtual cash” to artists simply by spending time interacting on FeedTheArts.com (taking surveys, watching videos, playing games, etc.).

FeedTheArtsLogoThe money that big corporations might have spent advertising on the site is paid out as “Arts Cash.” You can donate your “Art Cash” to artists who want to fund specific projects, such as writing a book, completing a painting, or recording a song. Or you can use your Arts Cash to buy merchandise that the artists have completed. such as books, CDs, or prints.

Artists who earn Arts Cash can trade for gift cards to one of the service providers who belong to Feed the Arts. Service providers are organizations that help artists produce, distribute, merchandise, or market their work such as recording studios, producers, sound stages and publishers.

From now until April 10, 2014, FeedTheArts.com is throwing an online launch party that features live events, contests, and giveaways of “Arts Cash.” Artists and art lovers are encouraged to join the fun, keeping in mind the common goal of funding creative projects at no cost to the artist or fan.

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Feed the Arts

Indiegogo Outpost Keeps Your Crowdfunding Campaign on Your Website

The Indiegogo crowdfunding platform has announced Indiegogo Outpost – an industry-leading capability that allows companies to embed Indiegogo campaigns on their own websites. Campaigners will still reap the benefits of Indiegogo’s broad network, marketing channels and analytics.

Indiegogo LogoBased on the same technology that has made Indiegogo a leader in crowdfunding, Indiegogo Outpost supports savvy crowdfunding campaigners and companies that have large online audiences and/or identifiable brands of their own – allowing them to customize campaigns with their own branding and keep traffic directed toward their own sites.

“Indiegogo is all about breaking down barriers to funding and we’re always looking for new ways to help Indiegogo campaigns directly engage with audiences that are likely to support them,” said Slava Rubin, Indiegogo co-founder and CEO.

Companies using Indiegogo Outpost will also be part of the Indiegogo ecosystem with mirrored campaigns on Indiegogo.com, giving them access to the nine million unique monthly visitors and an opportunity to be a part of Indiegogo’s marketing channels such as social media and email newsletters. Campaigners also have the option to take advantage of Indiegogo’s robust analytics dashboard, which provides insights to contributor behavior.

Additional support is provided by the company’s education center, Trust and Safety team, and Customer Happiness team.

Activating Indiegogo Outpost is simple and has no setup fees. Indiegogo uses the same HTML and JavaScript embedding technology that other products such as Google Maps, Facebook commenting and Google Analytics use to enhance external websites. Indiegogo Outpost users can also integrate their own preferred tools, including Google Analytics, KISSmetrics, Mixpanel, and Facebook retargeting.

Indiegogo will be officially launching Indiegogo Outpost in the first quarter of 2014,

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About Indiegogo

 

UmeNow Offers Crowdfunding for Indie Authors

The private, social-networking website UmeNow has revamped its features to allow crowdfunding for independent authors and other creative professionals. While many sites allow indie authors to start blogs to promote their work and connect with their readers, UmeNow has added the ability for anyone in the world to donate directly to the author.

“We offer independent authors the tools to attract funding from people who want to do more than just purchase one book,” explains UmeNow founder Evelyn Castillo-Bach.  “If someone wants to donate to a promising author so they can pursue other writing projects, UmeNow offers an easy way for this to happen.”

All funding goes directly to the author and donors are not required to have a UmeNow account. Donors are taken directly to the author’s Paypal account page.

The crowdfunding capability is available at no charge to all UmeNow members. The crowdfunding tool appears within the blog section of UmeNow. Whenever an author writes a blog, the donation button can appear on the blog itself, making the crowdfunding process very easy. The only requirement is that the blog must be posted so anyone in the world can see it. If an author selects privacy settings that allow only UmeNow members to view their blog, the author’s ability to raise funds will be limited to site members.

When a member creates a blog page, they can select to display a donation button that directly links to their personal Paypal account. And because tracking and ads are banned from the UmeNow network, authors can be sure that no one else profits by linking into their readers. Authors can also start groups and invite their readers into those groups, or fans can start groups to discuss their favorite books.

UmeNow’s Castillo-Bach understands the needs and interests of indie authors, because she recently published her first e-book, entitled “Champions, Inc.: Powerful Life Principles.”

About UmeNow

Launched in 2011, UmeNow is known for fiercely protecting the privacy rights of its members. All ads, third-party apps, and games are banned to safeguard members from back-door tracking and unauthorized information extraction.

UmeNow was founded on the premise that you should have the right to socialize and connect with your family, friends, and colleagues without giving up your right to privacy. Information you share online shouldn’t be tracked and monitored by advertisers or data collectors and data brokers who want to collect as much information as they can about you to sell or trade with banks, creditors, future employers, insurance companies and others.

The UmeNow network offers a two-tier membership structure. With a free membership, you can enjoy a full-featured, ad-free, social-networking experience, including blogging, a photo gallery, polling, and a personal profile and wall. The premium membership ($6.00 per month) lets you create private, protected group walls for family members or work groups.

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About UmeNow