Skip to main content

Wattpad Expands Into Crowd-Funding

wattpad_logoThe only writing community Wattpad has just announced a new crowd-funding platform.

It’s called Fan Funding, and it offers writers and readers a chance to connect in a way that is less social and more directly financial. With luck it will enable authors to leverage their fanbase and generate new income.

This is Wattpad’s first venture into earning revenue but according to their blog post it won’t be their last. The 9-year-old has grown to be the largest online community for readers and writers with nearly 16 million page views per month, all while avoiding charging their members for  services.

Fan funding is about bringing stories to life in a myriad of ways and giving writers the tools to engage with, acknowledge, thank and reward their loyal fans who have been there since the beginning. The millions of readers on Wattpad are fueling the next generation of writers, that’s always been the power of our community, so this program is also a unique way for readers to come along on the journey.

Wattpad will take a 5% commission on successfully funded projects. The payments processor Stripe takes a 2.9% fee (plus $0.30 per transaction for each pledge). The rest of the funds go to the writer.

The funds will only be collected if a project is fully funded. The projects run a standard 30 days, though they can end in a shorter period of time. One project has already been funded, though that did take nearly 2 months to reach the $5,000 goal set by the writer.

Once a project is fully funded the resulting story will be made available for free on the Wattpad website. This keeps the crowd-funding concept true to the spirit of Wattpad as a place for the sharing of free stories.

Wattpad is hoping that this platform will be used to fund more than just an author’s next story. “In our case, the product doesn’t necessarily have to be e-books or paper books that result,” said Allen Lau, founder and CEO. “It could be a movie script that you’re funding, and the end product could be a movie.”

There are 2 projects under weigh on the Fan Funding page. One has 6 days left to achieve the last third of the $7500 the writer is trying to raise, while the other project has only just been launched.

Techcrunch

Similar Articles


Comments


Greg Strandberg August 13, 2013 um 1:30 am

$5,000 from Wattpad? That sounds too good to be true. Expect more people to sign up pretty quickly.


Wattpad for Android, iPad, and iPhone Updated With New Ways to Get Content | The Digital Reader August 17, 2016 um 6:41 pm

[…] stories for their fans to read. A few weeks back Wattpad announced a new crowd funding platform, Fan Funding, further strengthening the ties between creator and […]


The Fourth Time is the Charm: Wattpad to Interrupt Stories With Adverts | The Digital Reader August 17, 2016 um 7:50 pm

[…] the past few years the social reading community has dabbled in several ways to generate revenue: crowd-funding, native advertising, and selling […]


Write a Comment