Factors Affecting Crowdfunding Success: A Systematic Analysis of the Empirical Studies

Crowdfunding defined as collecting the capital from a vast crowd of individuals to realize a new business idea is a recent method that has attracted growing attention of fund seekers, supporters and researchers. Extensive studies have attempted to explore the factors that shape crowdfunding success. However, limited research synthesized and integrated the findings of these studies. This paper aimed to systematically analyze the existing empirical published articles on the factors affecting crowdfunding success. A total of 58 papers on crowdfunding success published in 29 scientific journals was selected and 31 papers were included in the final analysis. Four main crowdfunding success factors emerged from this study including the campaign characteristics, network management, traditional investment criteria, and contextual factors. This paper concludes with highlighting the implications of the findings for fund seekers, fund providers, campaign managers and researchers and suggesting future research directions.