Does Gender Really Matter in Crowdfunding Campaigns?

Abstract

The research aims to understand whether gender can or not influence the success of crowdfunding (CF) campaigns. To attain this objective, entrepreneurs that launch a CF campaign in the PPL platform are surveyed in order to examine if gender influences the characteristics of the projects, the motivations and satisfaction with the campaigns, and the use of social media. The paper uses a quantitative approach, based on an online survey sent to the entrepreneurs who have used the Portuguese CF platform (PPL) for funding. The results indicate that there are no major significant gender differences in the use of CF through the Portuguese platform, the motivations for using CF or the success achieved. In both cases, social media play an essential role in CF campaigns. Only culture-related projects exhibit an association with gender. The results show that CF is a tool that can contribute to reducing the gender gap in entrepreneurship. The design of CF operations and capacity building programs for women could either be improved in accordance with the new insights of the study.