{"id":7125,"date":"2016-12-13T08:09:44","date_gmt":"2016-12-13T08:09:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.frankfurt-school.de\/?p=7125"},"modified":"2019-02-20T15:17:08","modified_gmt":"2019-02-20T14:17:08","slug":"entrepreneurial-ways-finance-postgraduate-studies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.frankfurt-school.de\/de\/entrepreneurial-ways-finance-postgraduate-studies\/","title":{"rendered":"Entrepreneurial ways to finance your postgraduate studies"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>My desire to get a good quality education was almost shattered due to lack of funding institutions in my country, expensive tuition fees, not to mention the cost of living until I realize the possibilities of crowd-funding. In the world where Internet brought massive convenience in doing business online, it is very hard to ignore the opportunities crowd-funding platform brings to the table.\u00a0 So far, a large amount of crowd-funding is raised for business ventures and little for the education sector. Well, I strongly believe\u00a0there is a room of crowd-funding for education for those who put their minds into it. Here are some tips that included my experiences throughout my campaign for those who might plan to crowd-fund their studies<\/p>\n<h2>\u00a0<strong>Don\u2019t let financial barriers stop you from pursuing your dream!<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>I long for the day I come to Frankfurt School of Finance and Management to pursue a study in Master of International Business. The school made it possible by offering a partial scholarship for the tuition, but there is a catch. I had to provide sufficient amount that covers my living expenses for at least a year. According to the \u201cStudy in Germany\u201d website, a foreign student must proof of at least \u20ac8700 in a bank account to get a study visa.\u00a0 I did not let my financial barriers get to me; I decided to go ahead with the crowd-funding campaign. Though I managed to raise only 6000 via Indiegogo, I did not quite hit my target. I raised the remainder through multiplier effects.<\/p>\n<h2>\u00a0<strong>No story, no success<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>First and for most, prepare enough time to develop your story. The first question any potential donor asks is why do I want to contribute for you? My plan for funds was on the approach that I wanted to be involved in Africa&#8217;s development and help set up a platform to help others who wants to study but have difficulties to raise funds for their studies. Therefore, it is very crucial to take the time to prepare an appealing story.<\/p>\n<h2>\u00a0<strong>Seeing is believing<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>I never liked to see myself on camera until I realized the best way to reach a large audience is to support my cause with a video and photos. A campaign that misses videos and content won&#8217;t reach as many people as possible irrespective of how attractive the story might be.\u00a0 Therefore, one must support a story with videos and photos; prepare a script for the entire story. It helps if the video and photos are made professionally. It shows how serious one takes the causes. In addition, having a video and photo will help potential donors to see who you are. It obviously speaks louder than words.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/_umWtY6qgiU\" width=\"560\" height=\"314\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<h2>\u00a0<strong>Reach out<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>One must not just create a campaign page and wait for a miracle to happen. Hence use every social media to spread the word about your causes. Create Facebook page, Twitter account, if possible even a website for the campaign. Once the campaign is launched, one must keep on updating the campaign with facts, figures, and\u00a0progresses to keep up the momentum. No progress is\u00a0a progress!<\/p>\n<h2>\u00a0<strong>Reaching out to media outlets<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>As part of the marketing strategy, I contacted various media outlets. The Frankfurt Allgemeine Zeitungen (FAZ) newspaper picked up the story and one reader contributed 1,000 \u20ac the same day the article came out. The\u00a0success stories about the campaign are also available at Financial Times,\u00a0 Frankfurter Rundschau, and again on Financial Times. But best to approach media outlets once a decent amount of funds have been raised to attract the media.<\/p>\n<h2>\u00a0<strong>Engage your school<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>Obviously, a student who shows an ambition to crowd-fund a study receives a delightful support from a school.\u00a0 A campaigner would need all the supports required to meet the target.\u00a0 And reaching out to the school helps to tap into its resources and network. And yet again, it&#8217;s always best to reach out to the school once there is a decent amount of funds raised to show the success of the campaign.\u00a0 My school liked my initiation and helped me spread the word by posting my story on the school\u2019s resources such as a blog, Facebook, Twitter and notice boards. In addition, the school greatly supported my cause by putting out the words to their networks including many of its students who contributed to my campaign.<\/p>\n<h2>\u00a0<strong>Organize a fundraising event<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>It always helps to organize a fundraising event in the name of your campaign. A close friend of mine organized a fundraising party, \u201cAfrican Vibes&#8220; in Frankfurt where it raised 800\u20ac.\u00a0You will be surprised by the amount of people who would love to enjoy their time for a meaningful cause.<\/p>\n<h2>\u00a0<strong>No &#8218;I&#8216; but &#8218;WE&#8216;<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>There is no one-man show when it comes to crowd-funding campaign. One needs all the support and skills required from others to make a winning project. I worked with a very talented team who believed in me and dedicated their times, skills and resources for my campaign with no fee.<\/p>\n<h2>\u00a0<strong>The multiplier effect<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>Together with a partner of mine in this project, we created a \u201c3\u20ac challenge\u201d on Facebook with the idea to create a multiplier effect by asking people to contribute 3\u20ac and challenge 3 other friends to do the same; the challenge paid off! The multiplier effect is not just the 3\u20ac challenge but all the efforts one puts in to help create a multiplier effect by spreading the words to help multiply your cause and ultimately multiply the targeted amount required for a campaign.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>My desire to get a good quality education was almost shattered due to lack of funding institutions in my country, expensive tuition fees, not to mention the cost of living until I realize the possibilities of crowd-funding. In the world where Internet brought massive convenience in doing business online, it is very hard to ignore [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":61,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,53,60,39],"tags":[669,94,104,670,97],"class_list":["post-7125","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fslife","category-master","category-online-master","category-study","tag-crowdfunding","tag-diversity","tag-entrepreneurship","tag-financing","tag-international"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.frankfurt-school.de\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7125","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.frankfurt-school.de\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.frankfurt-school.de\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.frankfurt-school.de\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/61"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.frankfurt-school.de\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7125"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blog.frankfurt-school.de\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7125\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18169,"href":"https:\/\/blog.frankfurt-school.de\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7125\/revisions\/18169"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.frankfurt-school.de\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7125"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.frankfurt-school.de\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7125"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.frankfurt-school.de\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7125"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}