Too much hype? Montana State professor publishes research on best language to use for successful crowdfunding

BOZEMAN - Entrepreneurs use a variety of strategies to achieve their goals, sometimes turning to online crowdfunding campaigns to increase their reach and raise money. Yet the success of fundraising campaigns is often variable, driven by what's being asked and the language that people decide to use in their campaigns.

What makes some crowdfunding campaigns successful, and others not, is the focus of Agnieszka Kwapisz's recently published research. Kwapisz is a professor of management and entrepreneurship in Montana State University's Jake Jabs College of Business and Entrepreneurship, and her paper, "Framing novelty in crowdfunding: Which words win support, where, and at what stakes," was published in the Strategic Entrepreneurship Journal in March.

"The biggest takeaway from this research is that you really have to know who your audience is, who you are and what kind of project you're working on, and adjust the language based on that," Kwapisz said.

For the study, Kwapisz used a language analysis model to examine 635 Kickstarter.com campaigns from the U.S. posted online between 2010 and 2024. Kickstarter is a website where entrepreneurs can post their ideas and a time-limited fundraising goal, with funds dispersed only if the goal is reached. This setup allowed Kwapisz to objectively determine which campaigns were successes and which were failures.

Kwapisz grouped the campaigns into five categories based on topic: arts, design, technology, entertainment and consumer goods. Then, she used a text analysis tool to identify words that fit into three distinct categories of what she labeled "hype."

Capability/rigor "hype" language included words such as "tested," "scientific" and "sophisticated"; excellence/status language used words like "premier" and "renowned"; and attitude/affect language used descriptors including "incredible" and "epic."

Kwapisz's analysis found no link between campaign success and the aggregate amount of hype words - instead, the observed associations varied across sectors and the amount of money asked for. Simply put, hype is best used as a portfolio of strategies, rather than a single lever, she said.

Capability/rigor language was positively associated with success in technology campaigns, attitude/affect language was positively associated with success in entertainment, and excellence/status language was negatively associated with success in design.

Beyond the sector differences, the other clear pattern observed was that capability/rigor language became more positively associated with success as funding goals increased.

Kwapisz, whose other research endeavors look at the use of hype language across different technological industries and how gender influences effective language choice, said she didn't necessarily expect to see such clear patterns that resulted in practical implications for different stakeholders.

The findings provide important insight for entrepreneurs aiming to launch successful fundraisers, and also for the fundraising platforms themselves, Kwapisz said. The research is also relevant in the emerging age of generative artificial intelligence, as more people and businesses begin using AI tools to create online copy that generally has less structural and word choice variation compared to copy generated by human writers.

"The biggest takeaway from this research is that there is no one-size-fits-all approach for success," Kwapisz said. "So, if you're using AI to write something, don't always rely on the hype (language) it's using, because it may be wrong for your industry or the audience you're writing for."

Fundraising platforms such as Kickstarter can also use the results to better shape the AI tools now helping entrepreneurs write about their projects.

"Platforms could use this kind of evidence to give entrepreneurs more context-specific guidance," Kwapisz said. "The point is not to tell everyone to use the same words, but to help creators think about whether their language fits the project and the size of the ask."

She noted that in the future, the best wording strategies could also change as less variable AI-generated writing becomes more prolific online. That's an area she hopes her research can eventually dive into.

The study did have limitations. Because it used archival campaign data, it cannot prove that specific words caused campaigns to succeed, and success likely also depended on factors outside the Kickstarter campaign text, such as off-platform outreach, social media posts or existing supporter networks. Additionally, the paper noted it would be fruitful to survey the donors of Kickstarter campaigns about what they see as the most effective fundraising language to complement the language analysis model's findings.

But overall, Kwapisz's results contribute an important and new understanding to research about effective entrepreneurship, she said.

"The practical lesson is not to use more hype indiscriminately, but to calibrate novelty-framing language to the setting," Kwapisz concluded in the paper. "What appears compelling in one context may sound generic, inflated or weakly informative in another."

Brian Gillespie, dean of the business college, said MSU is proud to be a top producer of entrepreneurship research such as Kwapisz's.

"Dr. Kwapisz's paper provides a novel and meaningful contribution to the field of study on effective entrepreneurship," Gillespie said. "Jabs students are interested when Kwapisz discusses her research in class, and student entrepreneurs seeking support for their own businesses and ideas will directly benefit from her findings."

The paper can be accessed online for free at https://sms.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/sej.70022.