People Power – Crowdfunding in igaming

Ahead of the GamCrowd Pitch ICE competition for start-ups at ICE next month we got to thinking about crowdfunding in igaming. 

Companies from the world of igaming such as Football Index and Premier Punt have run successful campaigns in the past year. In fact, both of these overfunded on Seedrs. With this avenue for generating capital becoming ever more popular across multiple industries there are now a number of companies offering advice and consultancy services about how best to go about it.

Nathan Rose is the Director at Assemble Advisory, a company which specialises in helping start-ups and companies with their equity crowdfunding campaigns. He’s also the author of Equity Crowdfunding.

When asked what advice he’d give a company considering going down this route, Rose told SBC: “A company looking to launch should firstly make sure crowdfunding is really the best option for them. Do you really need to raise money, and if you do, is crowdfunding really the best way to achieve that?

“If you decide to go ahead with crowdfunding, then the most important thing to secure before launching is momentum. If you just put your project up and wait for the internet to shower you with money, you will be disappointed. The campaigns which gain real traction and raise meaningful amounts of money have only been able to do so because of outreach to their crowd which is both well-planned and well-executed.”

He added: “Crowdfunding will continue to grow because it solves two of the most fundamental problems for young, growing businesses – namely, how to get funding and marketing at the same time. As the success stories begin to pile up, the awareness will continue to build that it’s not a gimmick – rather it’s a real alternative to banks and venture capital which is here to stay.”

Only one company can win Pitch ICE each year but with the range of talent on show the ‘losers’ tend to be far from unviable and unattractive business models. Some of these may well consider crowdfunding as a means to generate the revenue they need to make that next step or leap.

Adam Cole, CEO at Football Index, will be at ICE and is a firm support of this method. When asked why they chose this route for Football Index, ‘the world’s first stock market of footballers’ he commented: “We saw crowdfunding as opportunity to reach a committed audience and raise money at the same time. In the event we had over 500 investors, many of whom have become big advocates and users of the site as well as shareholders.”

They rose over £1.1m, which far exceeded their initial £800,000 target, and Cole noted that they’d be making a major push for further brand awareness this year. He said: “We will be advertising on TV as well as outdoors and on TalkSport in Q1 of 2017. So it’s a great time to get involved!”