LITT is a community-driven social media platform based in Perth, Australia, who, at the time of their ECF campaign, were seeking funds to support their expansion throughout the rest of the country.
Their platform offers users – both businesses and consumers – the opportunity to connect locally, effectively creating a mutually beneficial circular economy.
Having spent 3 years in development, LITT is far more than just another Facebook clone. Instead of the mindless swiping and data farming that keeps other platforms afloat, they incentivise users by providing genuine, tangible value – financial or otherwise.
By connecting local users with local businesses, encouraging new discoveries and experiences, and providing a seamless platform via which both parties can earn, LITT is striving to bring a stronger sense of community back into a fragmented digital space.
LITT combines elements of social media, AR advertising, e-commerce, and digital payments in a safe, trusted mobile environment. Unlike other platforms, we share our revenue with our members! Our mission? To digitally enable key stakeholders in local communities to benefit from and contribute positively to one another in a safe, entertaining and engaging environment.
As of the end of February 2021, LITT members totalled upwards of 17,000 users and over 400 local businesses. A timely product with a growing user base, their ambition to scale made this the perfect opportunity to launch a community driven Equity Crowdfunding campaign.
With a maximum target of $1.5m, Glide was enlisted to oversee the raise via Australian crowdfunding platform Birchal.
When LITT approached Glide, they were well beyond the post-concept, pre-product stage often inhabited by eager startups.
They had a tangible product, a proven concept, and perhaps most impressive of all, an already-growing list of active users, ambassadors and businesses.
17,000 active accounts meant much less work would be needed to convince potential investors of the product’s viability, and gave us a foothold on which we could form the basis of their ECF campaign.
However, we’d need a lot more than numbers to properly highlight the validity of their idea – of all the markets to crack, social media is undoubtedly one of the toughest.
Prone to rapid change, propelled solely by a dedicated user base, and at near-constant risk of collapsing via disinterest; social media is an industry-leviathan few can successfully conquer.
LITT’s true advantage lies in its offer of a community-driven, community-centric platform. By offering people a local platform with local benefits, they’d found something in high demand that the other platforms couldn’t provide, limited by their scale and lack of personalisation.
Armed with a proven concept, a tangible platform, a growing user base and a local opportunity prime for disruption, LITT were confident in their ability to capture the hearts and minds of Australian communities.
All we needed was to find investors who were confident of the same.
As with all ECF campaigns, the first phase to go through was the Expression of Interest (EOI) period.
The goal during this phase is to maximise the number of submissions from potential investors. In LITT’s case, we had 3 weeks to deliver as many as possible.
Delivering good results throughout this period is critical to the success of the raise, and without a clear, well-planned strategy, you may just be setting yourself up for failure.
A good outcome during the EOI phase is critical to the success of the overall campaign, and a positive outcome is dependent on several factors, primarily robust, creative messaging, accurate targeting, and standout creative.
Utilising experience from previous ECF campaigns, the first stage of our approach involved grouping, categorising and separating audiences into a mix of multiple groups. By honing in on key personas, interests and characteristics that would likely define potential investors, we were able to customise our messaging and tailor it to effectively suit each group.
This approach allowed us to offer each audience personalised copy paired with engaging creatives, which in turn provided us with a clear indication as to where LITT’s budget would be best spent throughout the EOI phase. Through testing various creative combinations, unique selling points, value propositions and audiences, we generated nearly 400 EOI’s during the 3 week period.
By capitalising on people’s innate desire for a greater sense of community in an otherwise fragmented digital world, we drew attention to the true potential of LITT’s platform, and their belief in the using the power of positivity to grow every community – the power of social good.
Our work during the EOI phase proved a resounding success, and thanks to an additional boost from national media attention, LITT closed their EOI round with a total of 1,100 submissions.
The end result? LITT ended up securing investments from 694 individuals, hitting their maximum raise of $1.5m in a staggering 3 days.
Watching $1.5 million appear in the space of 3 days is a reality seldom seen in the world of startups.
Now armed with their freshly acquired funds and even-more-rapidly growing user-base, LITT are primed and ready to go nationwide.
Happy to have helped yet another Australian startup achieve a successful raise, we can’t wait to see where they go from here.
It was an incredible journey to be a part of, and we hope it inspires other innovative businesses, ideas and visions to emerge from the shadows in future.
