Success Factors in Reward based and Equity based Crowdfunding in Finland

Master’s Thesis 
78 
crowdfunders are dependent on social dynamics more than professional investors – as 
professional investors are interested in financial data, and crowdfunders in stories. 
Geography was found to not be a barrier or hindrance to crowdfunding. This affirms 
research on the topic (Agrawal et al., 2015; Frydrych et al., 2014). However, since 
most of the projects got a large majority of their funding domestically, it is difficult to 
determine if geography would prove a challenge for more internationally positioned 
projects. One of the interviewed projects was highly international and did not experi-
ence challenges with geography related matters, which would concur with earlier re-
search. 
Legal regulation was of little worry for most interviewees. 
As suggested by Lasrado 
and Lugmayr (2013) being informed about Finland’s legislation made the crowdfund-
ing process easier for entrepreneurs. One interviewee was highly concerned with the 
ambiguity of legislation. It is possible that since this interviewee had considered initi-
ating the crowdfunding project abroad, he was more aware of the legislative opportu-
nities in other countries. As the other projects were more geographically tied to Fin-
land, they might not have entertained this option. Thus, a country’s legal environment 
could seem more acceptable to the geographically tied projects than to those with op-
tions elsewhere. 
Other crowdfunding projects were not found to directly affect the success of a project. 
Entrepreneurs were influenced by the performance and presence of previous crowd-
funding projects, as claimed by 
Ward and Ramachandran (2010). However, this 
seemed to impact their confidence, not the funding directly. It could be that entrepre-
neurs feel approval for their project, when they observe approval for other similar 
projects. According to Gerber and Hui (2013) such approval boosts an entrepreneur’s 
perception of ability, thus resulting in better performance.