A follower is a person interested in your company and wants to follow your progress.
With a public company profile (what is a public company profile?), investors can start following you to get notifications when you share public updates. It is recommended to have a public company profile since this will make your company discoverable to new investors.
The public profile includes (for registered CrowdWorks members):
Profile information (profile tab)
Public updates (updates tab)
Team overview (team tab)
What do followers see?
Followers have a bit different access rights to shareholders to protect sensitive information.
View the company's public profile (profile and team tab)
View and comment on public updates
See and download documents that have been shared with the audience "Followers"
See your goals
Tip: use the "Viewing as" tool to preview how your profile looks to different users.
Followers are notified when you share a public update, helping them to stay up to date with your journey. They are not able to see shareholder information, KPIs or documents you have shared only with shareholders.
How to get followers?
Post public updates regularly
Keep your profile up to date (recently updated companies are ranked higher in the company listings)
Share your profile outside of CrowdWorks (LinkedIn, emails or your website)
You can gain followers from any community you are a member of or via your public profile preview either on CrowdWorks or online. We also automatically suggest your company to investors whose investment preferences match you. It is great news if you get a new follower because it means they deem your company interesting and want to keep up with your progress!
Community members can see your company's limited profile and follow you from there.
Unregistered investors can see your limited online preview and by registering a profile start to follow you.
Share a link to your public profile online or embed your company widget on your website to attract new followers!
With a public profile (read more about public profiles here), you can share the URL of your company profile easily online via email, social media, messages etc. When a person clicks on the link they will see the following:
As you see, they have the option to sign up and start following your company, making this a great way to recruit new connections!
There are multiple different sharing options available for companies, read more about them here.
What to do when you get a follower?
You will get an email notification and also see a notification on your dashboard about this
Check who started following your company
Send them a message! Get in touch with your followers and set up a meeting to get to know them better.
Note: You don't need to accept followers anymore with a public company profile.
You can also invite your followers to your company profile. When you invite followers to your profile before becoming actual investors, they can follow the company before the next funding round and investment decision.
How to invite followers:
Navigate to Settings > Connections and click "Invite your connections".
Choose the role from the drop-down menu
Add the email addresses of those you want to invite
Click "Invite" to send out the invitation.
Note: If the person who you are inviting already has a user account they will be notified that you have invited them to your company profile and can use their existing account to join.
How to leverage followers-feature
When you are between funding rounds but have gained the interest of potential investors, invite them to your company profile. This way, you can share exciting updates to prepare them to invest!
Private company profiles
If your company profile is private, there is an extra confirmation needed before your new followers can follow you. Private companies first receive a follower request, which you can either accept or decline.
You will get an email notification and also see a notification on your dashboard about this
Check who the person requesting to follow your company is
Approve (or decline) their request
Send them a message! Get in touch with your followers and set up a meeting to get to know them better!
With a private company profile, followers will have restricted access to your company profile. Followers gain access to
Updates which you have shared with "followers" as the audience
Profile information
Documents that have been shared with the audience "Followers"
Goals
Followers do not see your KPIs, private updates, documents or board room.