Introduction
The purpose of this article is to give you a high-level overview of SponsoredScholar.
SponsoredScholar is a community-based emergency funding software that helps more money get to students in need. The software removes barriers and cuts through complexity, enabling students to feel more secure in their financial and academic future.
The software is simple and guided. Every step is self-explanatory and navigates students from start to finish in a fundraising campaign within a matter of a few clicks. Students who follow the guided process are positioned for success.
SponsoredScholar 101
At a high level, the students go through a two-step onboarding experience to launch and promote their sponsorship page. In the first onboarding wizard, the student goes through answering a few questions about themself, adds in a profile image and selects their preferred fundraising layout, adds in their campaign goal, writes their fundraising story, reviews all of their work, and then launches their campaign. This process is designed to be simple and easy for the student to navigate.
After the first step of onboarding, the student has an option to start fundraising immediately. A campaign page with no traffic won't result in success so we help students send people to their page. In this second phase of onboarding, we show the student how to use the most effective fundraising channel/method: the two channels are text and email and the method is a 1:1 personal message. So, to begin, the student is guided to enter in their five closest contacts, which includes their name, email and/or phone, and their relationship. On the next screen, we have a pre-drafted message for the student to send through their selected channel(s). This message is designed to convert.
To note, after a student sends the first message, the system will automatically nudge the prospective sponsors to remind and encourage them to give. If a prospective sponsor makes a gift, these automatic nudges will turn off.
Next, or if the student skips the second step of the wizard, the student goes to their main dashboard. Here, the student has everything they need to continue on the train to success. They can see their progress to goal, view their campaign, complete more fundraising actions, share on social, and review traffic and data around their campaign.
On their left-hand navigation, the student can see their historical campaigns and their results. The student can also view all of their prospective sponsors, add more prospective sponsors, and send more messages.
All of this serves as a one-stop-shop to add more financial resources to their education. It's simple, straightforward, and fun! Well. It's hard work but teaches many lessons beyond fundraising - for example, learning how to tell your story, find out who should hear that story, and having the courage to share it. This is a very similar skillset to securing a job after graduation or starting a business.