What is the average amount that issuers spend on investor acquisition (for a Reg CF deal?)
This is a great question! @Brian Belley recently told me that the average investment via Reg CF is about $750. That suggests there is some room to budget for marketing. On the other hand, investors plopping down $100 leave very little room. I hear ranges of from 10 to 30% for marketing budgets. Using 20% against the average of $750 would suggest the cost of investor acquisition is $150--far more than a common $100 minimum investment. I hope Brian or others can add more color to this conversation.
In terms of an "average" spent on investor acquisition, I think you'll find that it really varies depending on a few things, such as:
1. What is the size and engagement of the existing community (if any)?
2. Is the product or service something that is easily understood (possibly even used by) your potential retail investors? Or something a bit more complex (whether it's the tech, business model, etc.)?
I've heard the full range of answers to this, literally ranging from "none" (for issuers who had huge, engaged communities that already wanted to invest) to sometimes 30-60% (or more) spent on marketing to drive investment.
If you're going the advertising route, look into some articles on ROAS (return on ad spend) for the investment crowdfunding industry.
Another way of looking at this is through partners - e.g. are you hiring IA firms, working with a broker-dealer, etc.?
One of the most helpful things may be to find a number of companies that are similar (in funding, stage, revenue, industry) to your own, and then see what the primary methods are that they used to drive investors. You can look up a historical database of all investment crowdfunding companies based on industry, valuation, and more on KingsCrowd here:
https://kingscrowd.com/companies/search/
It's also helpful to read how some of the most successful campaigns succeeded. There are several Medium posts written by different founders where they documented their whole fundraising process.
For some good resources written by other founders who have successfully raised capital (and sold out their offering at the max!) and various methods that worked for them, check these out:
1. How Christine Outram raised $1.29M for Everydae on Wefunder
2. Gumroad Raises $5M on Republic and the future of equity crowdfunding - TechCrunch interview
3. We raised a $2.4M crowdfunding round in 30 days from 767 investors. Here’s the full scoop