Marketing Strategies in Equity Crowdfunding: A Comparative Study of Italian Platforms

This paper explores equity crowdfunding platforms from a marketing perspective. The present exploratory study attempts to make a double contribution to the current literature on equity crowdfunding. Firstly, it analyzes the marketing strategies of the platforms by focusing on the well-known 4Ps marketing mix framework, i.e. product, price, promotion and placement. Each dimension presents three types of categories. Second, the study investigates the marketing strategies of both large platforms and small platforms, then the differences between these two types of platforms are examined in terms of campaigns’ outcomes, i.e. funding collected (in %), funding amount (in €) and number of investors. Platforms adopt a standardization strategy for pricing and placement, while a differentiation strategy is mainly adopted for promotion and products. Large platforms offer a wider range of services (in particular ongoing campaign services and post-campaign services) and promotional activities (in particular leverage many communication channels). The analyses disclose significant statistically differences between these two types of platforms. Projects posted on large platforms are more likely to get higher campaigns’ outcomes. In literature, little is known about marketing strategies in equity crowdfunding platforms, thus this study tries to fill this gap. The paper is the first to analyze the 4Ps of platforms and to conduct a comparative empirical study to determine the differences of campaigns’ outcomes between large and small platforms. The Italian context represents a significant case of developed country in theme of equity crowdfunding. The results are useful for platform managers, entrepreneurs, investors and authorities.