Better to Give Than to Receive: Impact of Adding a Donation Scheme to Reward-Based Crowdfunding Campaigns
成果类型：
Article
署名作者：
Chan, Jason; Huang, Zihong; Liu, De; Cai, Zhigang
署名单位：
University of Minnesota System; University of Minnesota Twin Cities; Texas Tech University System; Texas Tech University; Shanghai Jiao Tong University
刊物名称：
INFORMATION SYSTEMS RESEARCH
ISSN/ISSBN：
1047-7047
DOI：
10.1287/isre.2023.1224
发表日期：
2024
关键词：
Prosocial behavior
MARKETING CHANNELS
INTERACTION TERMS
incentives
investments
environment
contagion
networks
patterns
crowd
摘要：
Motivated by the adoption of donation schemes at some leading reward-based crowdfunding platforms, we examine the effect of adding a donation scheme to reward based crowdfunding and explore its underlying mechanisms. This work also helps to fill the knowledge gap on the role of funding schemes. Leveraging an unannounced site change at a leading crowdfunding platform, we estimated the impact of introducing the donation scheme by developing and applying a novel two-step matching and difference in-differences technique for cohorted quasi-experimental settings. We find that the introduction of the donation scheme increased the success rate of reward campaigns by 19%. The increased success occurred mainly in reward campaigns with prosocial causes. Further analyses of underlying mechanisms reveal that the increased campaign success came mainly from campaigns that received donations. The added donation channel not only had a primary effect, as evidenced by a third of campaigns attracting donations, but also a secondary crowd-in effect on the reward channel, as shown by a positive impact of early donations on subsequent contributions through the reward channel, beyond the known effects of early contributions. Our findings suggest that, for reward campaigns with prosocial causes, the addition of a donation channel not only provides a better fit for some backers of reward campaigns, but also inspires others to be more willing to contribute through the reward channel.