Crowdfunding fulfillment refers to delivering rewards or products to your campaign’s supporters. It is a critical phase in crowdfunding, and your campaign isn’t truly over until after your orders are fulfilled. We designed this toolkit and accompanying workbook to thoroughly examine all fulfillment actions to ensure you don’t miss anything and keep your supporters happy.
- Fulfillment Schedule
- Fulfillment Partners
- Inventory Management
- Supporter Information Management
- Shipping Management
- QA/QC
- Communication
- Returns/Exchanges/Contingency Plans
- Fulfillment Workbook
Crowdfunding Fulfillment Schedule
Workbook Activity
The first thing to determine is your schedule. You’ll find a timetable template in the workbook at the bottom of this page to write out key dates. We recommend writing or printing this out and pinning it up somewhere you’ll see it often.
Things happen, and you may fall behind on your schedule. That’s okay! With this toolkit, we’ll help mitigate the many scenarios that may drive you off course. But by always knowing where you are in the process, you’ll be less likely to fall too far behind, and your supporters will appreciate the transparency and communication.
Key dates for your schedule:
- Crowdfunding campaign launch date
- Campaign end date
- Deadline for orders to reach printer/manufacturer (if applicable)
- Expected day for creator to receive products from printer/manufacturer or complete themselves
- Expected day to ship all orders
- Approximate delivery date for:
- Your state/province
- Other states/provinces
- International destinations
- Follow-up/feedback email #1
- Follow-up/feedback email #2 (for those who have not replied yet)
- Date for final campaign update/thank you
Crowdfunding Fulfillment Partners
This toolkit is designed to help creators handle fulfillment on their own. However, if it’s in your budget, a variety of partner companies specialize in crowdfunding fulfillment.
We’ll list those companies that integrate with and are vetted by Crowdfundr or our users. Feel free to research further organizations.
Note: As Crowdfundr began in the comics and TTRPG/board game spaces, our current vetted partners center around those industries. We’ll add more as we grow, so check our partner page often. Otherwise, do an internet search for pledge management companies in your creative genre to see who might be the best partner for you.
Pledge Management
Pledge management companies offer tools and services to streamline the process of collecting information from supporters, managing reward fulfilment, and handling other logistical aspects of delivering the promised items. These services may include surveys, backer data collection, shipping coordination, and communication tools to inform supporters about the project’s progress.
By outsourcing pledge management to a specialized company, project creators can focus on the core aspects of their project, such as development and production, while the pledge management company takes care of the administrative tasks associated with fulfilling rewards. This can be particularly helpful for projects with many supporters or complex reward structures.
Printers/Publishers/Manufacturers, Distribution and Fulfillment
In the crowdfunding space, depending on the project, companies offer assistance with either part of the printing/publishing/manufacturing, distribution, and fulfillment processes or support you with all of them.
Either way, you’ll likely need a printer, publisher, or manufacturer to mass-produce your rewards. Suppose you don’t plan to collect all products in your space and ship them to supporters yourself. In that case, you may use a fulfillment and distribution company to assist with storage, order processing, inventory management, and shipping.
- Fulfillrite – order fulfillment, kitting & packaging, shipping
- Comix Well Spring – printing, distribution, and fulfillment (comics)
- GlobalComix – multi-language publishing (comics)
- DriveThruRPG/DriveThruComics – digital download marketplaces focused on several publishing areas like roleplaying games, comic books, fiction, card games, and wargames.
- Indie Press Revolution – a creator-publisher network for story and tabletop RPGs
- Comic Printing UK – comic book printing
Inventory Management for Crowdfunding Fulfillment
Keep track of your product inventory, including all variants, to ensure you maintain supporter expectations and don’t overwhelm yourself, allowing for smooth crowdfunding fulfillment.
You may use your Fulfillment summary to view orders already placed by your supporters; however, we suggest creating another spreadsheet containing further details on your inventory. Detailed, organized information about your inventory is beneficial to any staff or volunteers helping manage your campaign and fulfilment or if you utilize fulfilment centers or a drop-ship vendor.
Here is a spreadsheet you may use either as-is or modified to fit your needs: Fulfillment Toolkit_Inventory Management
Crowdfunding Fulfillment – Supporter Information Management
Find supporter information in your campaign’s Transaction report, whether they claim a reward or simply contribute to your crowdfunding campaign.
Crowdfundr asks for name, email, and (if the campaign contains shippable rewards) shipping and billing addresses. Depending on your situation, you may ask for anything else from your supporters – download a list of options here:
Campaign Transaction Report Fields
Your transaction details are updated with each new contribution/reward claim. Ensure your whole team has access to obtain a supporter’s information quickly when handling supporter questions and concerns.
Shipping Management for Crowdfunding Fulfillment
Shipping information here refers to everything involved: shipping costs, carriers, timelines, and packaging. There are three parts to this section:
1. Shipping budgeting.
While you do NOT have to consider shipping in the reward price on Crowdfundr (shipping is not included in campaign goals), you still need to know the cost of shipping your rewards, including packaging. Don’t forget to consider single-shipping and add-on shipping prices, if applicable.
International Shipping
Each country has its regulations around international shipping, and you must consider proper declaration/customs forms, import taxes, and duties for all countries you plan on shipping to. Fees may fall on you or your supporter – and proper communication (and good customer service!) entails letting your supporters know of these fees so they aren’t blindsided.
We here at Crowdfundr are not shipping logistics experts, so you must do the research necessary. However, we’ve gathered some links we hope will help! Please ensure the information you gather from these links is up-to-date:
- EasyShip country information – you must register with an email to obtain this information.
- UPS International Shipping Guide – this is the US site; other countries can change their country in the upper right corner
- FedEx International Shipping Guide – choose your proper country
- DHL Express International Shipping Guide
- ShippingEasy International Shipping Guide
- Canada Post International Shipping
- USPS International Shipping (USA)
- Royal Mail Country Shipping Guides (UK)
- Australia Post Internation Post Guide
- Hong Kong Post International Mail
- Japan Post International Shipping Guide
- China Post International Shipping
*Check out this article on international shipping by our partner, Fulfillrite*
Note: If you’re concerned about shipping to multiple distant countries, you may choose which countries to ship to in the reward creation flow on Crowdfundr.
Workbook Activity
In the toolkit workbook, you’ll find a sheet to plan shipping for each reward. If a reward variant significantly impacts the size and weight (for example, softcover vs hardcover books), complete this table for each variant.
2. Organizing orders for shipping in crowdfunding fulfillment.
To determine which supporters ordered what, download your fulfillment details report and click ‘Separate by order’ to clump all orders by one person together.
Note: Your supporters might make more than one transaction, particularly if you added new rewards or stretch goals. This filter only groups by Transaction number, so to ensure you aren’t doubling up on shipping unnecessarily, we recommend downloading the report and then filtering by name, email, and shipping address to double-check for any multiple orders made by one user.
3. Organizing supporter shipping information.
If a supporter has questions or concerns regarding their order or delivery, all their information is in one place for quick and efficient customer support. Your workbook has a table to store supporter shipping information such as:
- Type (domestic or international)
- Carrier and contact details
- Shipping cost
- Tracking numbers
- Shipping label (image or link)
- Customs requirements (declaration forms, etc.)
Quality assurance/Quality control in Crowdfunding Fulfillment
Particularly if you have multiple people assisting with packaging and shipping out rewards, having a checklist for QA/QC ensures all supporters receive all items in their order and rewards free from defects.
The specific details to check during QA/QC will depend on the nature of the product or service you are dealing with. However, here are some common aspects and details that are important to check for QA/QC in various industries:
- Product specifications – verify the product meets the size, colour, material, and other features promised in your reward description.
- Visual inspection – for damage, discoloration, missing parts or pages, etc.
- Functionality – even books need to open properly! Check all components for proper operation.
- Packaging and labelling – examine packaging for damage to ensure it’ll transport your product safely and verify brand labels and correct delivery/return addresses.
- Legal and Regulatory compliance – primarily for creators with products containing specific components (edible or electrical, for example), ensure all products comply with applicable laws, regulations, and safety standards.
Communication During Crowdfunding Fulfillment
*Crowdfundr sends automatic emails after each transaction. View details, including preview examples, here. The workbook contains a snippet example of what you might write for the custom message.
Refunds, Exchanges, and Contingency Plans
Refunds and exchanges
As part of your campaign story, you should outline your refund and exchange policies:
- Are you allowing refunds and exchanges?
- If yes, determine the cost-effectiveness of returning products to your location from each state/province and country you’re delivering to. For example, it may be more cost-effective for a supporter to keep a damaged item and have you send a new one.
- Are refunds and exchanges allowed for specific reasons only?
If you allow refunds or exchanges, we recommend keeping track of all instances to better prepare for future campaigns. Your toolkit below contains a table to record all refunds and exchanges.
Contingency plans
Things happen! You can’t prevent all roadblocks between your campaign finishing and getting your products into supporters’ hands (pandemics, for example).
The two most essential pieces of your contingency plans are budgeting and communication.
Budgeting should have been completed before your campaign even launched. As part of your Campaign Strategy, we talked about building a buffer into your goal to account for funds lost due to:
- Refunds/exchanges
- Shipping delays
- Damaged products
- Going over budget on manufacturing/printing/operations/etc.
So, at this point, you want to focus on communication. No matter what occurs to put you behind on delivering your promised products within a given timeline, tell your supporters immediately. Quick and honest communication shows integrity and transparency, which supporters appreciate and are crucial to future campaign success.
You will not please everyone. Even if you do everything right, you may still receive backlash. Remember, people just want to be heard. Listen to your supporters’ concerns and tell them how you intend to make the situation right.
Feedback survey for your crowdfunding fulfillment
Gathering feedback allows you to gain valuable insights into what went well and what areas need improvement. This knowledge guides you in refining future campaigns and delivering even better rewards.
You’ll find an email outline for the Feedback/Survey email in your workbook below. Use an online survey program, such as Google Survey, SurveyMonkey, or SurveyPlanet and consider these questions:
General Information:
- What was your contribution level or the reward you selected?
- Which crowdfunding campaign did you support?
- When did you receive your reward?
Reward Quality:
- How satisfied are you with the quality of the reward you received?
- Were the rewards as you expected them to be?
- Please provide specific feedback on the quality and condition of the reward.
Delivery Experience:
- Were you satisfied with the delivery process (e.g., shipping time, packaging, tracking information)?
- Did your reward arrive in good condition?
- Were there any issues with the delivery of your reward?
Communication and Updates:
- How would you rate the communication from the campaign creators throughout the campaign and delivery process?
- Did you receive timely updates on the campaign’s progress and your reward status?
Campaign Experience:
- What motivated you to support this campaign?
- Were you satisfied with the campaign’s transparency and the information provided to backers?
- How likely are you to support future campaigns from the same creators?
Suggestions and Improvements: - Do you have any suggestions for how the campaign creators can improve their future campaigns or reward fulfillment process?
- Is there anything you’d like to see in future campaigns?
Additional Comments:
Is there anything else you’d like to share about your experience, positive or negative?
Crowdfunding Fulfillment Workbook
We’re here to help!
Our Discord channel is a place to connect with other creators and the Crowdfundr team to ask questions, seek advice, and share strategies. But if you don’t do Discord, or want to schedule a demo, feel free to email us at support@crowdfundr.com.
