A Study on Online Platforms for Medical Donations
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International Journal of Mechanical and Production Engineering Research and Development (IJMPERD) ISSN (P): 2249–6890; ISSN (E): 2249–8001 Vol. 10, Issue 3, Jun 2020, 5323-5330 © TJPR Pvt. Ltd CROWDFUNDING- A STUDY ON ONLINE PLATFORMS FOR MEDICAL DONATIONS SAI VARUN S SIBM-Bengaluru, Symbiosis International (Deemed University) (SIU), Electronics City, Hosur Road, Bengaluru, Karnataka, India ABSTRACT Crowdfunding is a tool for businesses, entrepreneurs and organisations to raise money without opting for traditional sources of finance, required capital or funds are raised through the help of the society at large. Every individual is a potential donor who can contribute to the target amount and also bring in a number of other potential donors. Taking this concept and applying it to medical treatment is what gives rise to medical crowdfunding. A wonderful idea that has given birth to major crowdfunding platforms in India, which are getting together in making medical treatment more viable and less expensive. A network of patients, donors, doctors and hospitals are brought together to create a great synergy among the available medical resources. The perception of a financial donor was to be understood and I wanted to know how do they deem a cause Original Article appropriate enough to support it. A survey was conducted to understand their perception and the factors that influence them to donate. It was duly noted that individuals are willingly donating respectable amounts of money for the medical treatment of an individual they have never met or seen, but they want the cause to be genuine and their money to help the beneficiary. If it is so they are willingly making a difference in other’s lives. KEYWORDS: Crowdfunding, Medical Crowdfunding, Donation-Based, Medical Treatment & Online Crowdfunding Platforms Received: Jun 10, 2020; Accepted: Jun 30, 2020; Published: Jul 28, 2020; PaperId.: IJMPERDJUN2020506 INTRODUCTION Crowdfunding is about funding a cause or starting a business by raising the required capital from a significant number of individuals who each contribute a small amount, through the internet. The concept is very novel to a country like ours, but it's being employed by entrepreneurs and business organisations to establish, grow, and expand successfully. The evolution of crowdfunding can be illustrated in chronological order as follows: - The 1990s - Early 2000s The first online crowdfunding campaign was enabled with the help of the Internet. In early 2000, The first reward-based crowdfunding website [platform] for music which referred to as 'fund funding' for musicians arrived. In 2000, the emergence of new markets for giving with sites like JustGiving. 2000 – 2005 In the mid-2000s, microlending sites such as Kiva emerged for raising small amounts in support of projects. www.tjprc.org SCOPUS Indexed Journal [email protected] 5324 Sai Varun S In 2005, P2P lending between individuals in the UK and the US with Zopa. 2006 – Present The reward-based model of crowdfunding goes big. The crowdfunding expanded into the arts and creative industries with the help of sites such as Indiegogo and Kickstarter. Expanded to areas like start-ups, businesses, public and social projects with platforms like People fund.it, Buzzbnk and Solar Schools. There are 4 models of Crowdfunding: - Equity-based model Lending Based model Reward-Based model Donation-based model Donation-based funding marked the inception of crowdfunding, where funders donate via a collaborative effort in support of a social or medical cause. The more recent model is equity crowdfunding, where business ventures in need of seed capital and working capital sell away a certain percentage of their own as equity or debt. This model ensures that the investors get a suitable return on their investment. Lending based funding is an alternate channel to that represented by credit facilitators. It allows small businesses to be funded directly by a multitude of investors. Reward-based model is the most sought after means, the contributors are entitled to a reward which comes most likely in the form of the first version of a product given to them for use. The first notable instance of crowdfunding is when Marillon, a British rock band fundedtheir return back to the stage through online donations from their fans. Entrepreneur Michael Sullivan first coined the term ‘Crowdfunding’ in 2006, when he launched fundavlog (a failed attempt) intended to act as an incubator for Video Blogging start-ups. 'Filecoin' has been the most successful crowdfunding campaign as of 2019, with 257 million dollars being raised in the month of its operation. LITERATURE REVIEW Crowdfunding is beginning to take shape in India with many companies being set up with the help of crowdfunding, i.e. the provision of seed capital. Concepts like microfinance have been the inspiration for crowdfunding, the principle of crowdsourcing has been the base of crowdfunding since its inception. The power of the crowds is leveraged to raise money in huge amounts, which was once possible only through specialised channels (Jhaveri, Hetal&Choksi, Anjali. 2014). Crowdfunding consists of three parties to it: the project initiators who require funds, the backers who are ready to fund the project, and last of all the crowdfunding platforms which act as an intermediary in bringing them together. We also understand the mechanism of a crowdfunding platform, which does not pool, borrow and lend its own money but reduce the risk involved (Kunz, Michael &Bretschneider, Ulrich & Haas, Philipp &Blohm, Ivo &Leimeister, Jan Marco. 2015). Crowdfunding can be divided into direct and indirect means. The process of directly approaching donors/investors through fundraisers is known as direct crowdfunding. When an appeal is put forth through a platform seeking the assistance of the host to bring forth donors/investors it is known as indirect crowdfunding. Starting a fundraiser would Impact Factor (JCC): 8.8746 SCOPUS Indexed Journal NAAS Rating: 3.11 Crowdfunding- A Study on Online Platforms for Medical Donations 5325 involve applying to the platform on which the fundraiser would be hosted. After verification only, will the platform host the fundraiser (Bouncken, Ricarda&Komorek, Malvine& Kraus, Sascha. 2015). It is important that the creator and the project exhibit certain important characteristics. For the creator: affiliation, position, gender, region would define their campaigns. For the project: project objective, funding target, budget score, and risk factor are pivotal. The pledged funds are received only when the set target is met within the deadline, affiliating with educational institutions also increases the probability of raising the pre-defined target (Sauermann H, Franzoni C, Shafi K; 2019). Among crowdfunding campaign fundraisers there are many failures, but small successes are considered as they are still credible. The campaigns which fail, on average raise only about 10% of their intended target, only 3% of the failed campaigns can raise around 50% of the intended target. The campaign fundraiser must be attractive, but the underlying purpose is also very important (The dynamics of crowdfunding: An exploratory study by Ethan Mollick, 2014). Researchers have wanted to understand the psychology of those individuals who are motivated to donate and how can they pursue more individuals to come forth and donate. Sympathy, empathy, guilt, altruism, and happiness are the most important motivating factors. Also, research suggests that there must be an interpersonal connection between the initiator and the giver to raise more funds (Gerber, E. M., Hui, J. S., &Kuo, P. Y. 2012, February). Important values drive fundraisers like financial value, quality performance value, social value, and emotional value. Furthermore, the initial donors are very important for the campaign to start on the right note, the amount donated by the initial donors will significantly influence the trend to be followed (Harms, M. 2007. What drives motivation to participate financially in a crowdfunding community?) METHODOLOGY AND EXPERIMENTATION The purpose is to explore how successful is crowdfunding in India, its application and successful employment in entrepreneurial, medical, and cultural ventures showcases to us its potential. To understand the sentiment of individuals towards crowdfunding, I wanted to know how impactful is medical crowdfunding. Crowdfunding for a medical purpose is about donating for an immediate cause and supporting to save an individual's life. Collection of primary data was of utmost importance here, I decided to start a campaign for a daily wage labourer who needed money for his medical treatment. This daily wage labourer was diagnosed with a tumour in his head and he had to be treated immediately, we had to raise Rs 50,000 for all his initial scans and biopsy. The money was to be raised from individuals whom I knew. A questionnaire was designed to understand the individual's motivation to donate or not to donate. Along with the link to the campaign fundraiser where individuals could donate, I also sent them this questionnaire which they would have to fill up even if they didn't donate. PROCESS FOLLOWED The first step taken towards the achievement of my objective was to start a fundraiser of my own I created a campaign fundraiser on a crowdfunding platform known as Impact Guru with a target amount of Rs 50,000. The time limit set to achieve this was 7 days. The target amount had to be raised from the individual’s known contacts and through telemarketing or digital marketing. The campaign fundraiser link was shared with students of SIBM-B, residents of White House Society, colleagues, www.tjprc.org SCOPUS Indexed Journal [email protected] 5326 Sai Varun S and family members. Every individual was sent a personalised WhatsApp message and in total 100 individuals were personally called by me. The necessity to call was to let people know that I was genuinely working for a great cause and that it was completely transparent and I was completely accountable for every penny they contributed.