IgnitionDeck

Do you want to raise funds for a creative project, a charitable cause, or even a product launch?

At WPBeginner, we have years of experience helping people build all kinds of sites, so we know that it’s possible to turn WordPress into a successful crowdfunding platform. You just need the right plugin!

That’s where IgnitionDeck comes in.

IgnitionDeck promises to turn WordPress into a fundraising powerhouse, without the extra fees that come from using third-party sites such as KickStarter, GoFundMe, or Indiegogo.

That said, in this IgnitionDeck review we’ll put this plugin to the test to see whether it’s the right crowdfunding tool for you.

IgnitionDeck Review: Is It the Right Crowdfunding Plugin for You?

IgnitionDeck allows you to launch your own crowdfunding platform, just like Crowdfunder, Kickstarter, or StartEngine. Upon activation, you can create as many campaigns as you want and then manage them directly in the WordPress dashboard.

In this way, you can leverage your existing blog traffic and use this audience to help reach your fundraising goals. You also don’t need to set up a separate account or pay a third-party platform such as Kickstarter to host your campaign.

With IgnitionDeck, you can create multiple levels with different rewards for your supporters. For example, you might create exclusive pages and posts, or downloadable files such as supporter-only ebooks and videos.

If you want to offer physical rewards, then IgnitionDeck integrates with WooCommerce and can even collect the supporter’s postal address for you.

If you’re just getting started or have a limited budget, then you can download the lite version of IgnitionDeck from WordPress.org.

However, the premium plugin unlocks some additional modules. This allows you to create stretch goals that IgnitionDeck will reveal automatically once the project reaches various milestones.

You can also post product updates, which will keep your supporters engaged over the long term.

Do you want to accept user submissions? Then IgnitionDeck can add a submission form to your site, so visitors can post their fundraising projects to your WordPress website.

IgnitionDeck Review: The Right Crowdfunding Plugin for You?

Many people raise funds using a crowdfunding platform like Kickstarter. However, these third-party sites typically take a percentage of your donations, and may charge processing fees.

Fortunately, with the right plugin you can turn WordPress into a crowdfunding platform and get complete control over your campaigns.

With that said, let’s see if IgnitionDeck is the right crowdfunding plugin for you.

1. Easy to Setup

It’s easy to get started with IgnitionDeck. To begin, you can install and activate it just like any other WordPress plugin. With that done, the user-friendly wizard will guide you through the setup process, including installing the plugin’s dependencies.

It can also automatically generate all the pages you need to create your crowdfunding platform, including the checkout page, privacy policy, and the members dashboard.

In addition, the IgnitionDeck setup wizard will configure your site’s default settings and add your payment gateways.

Simply follow the onscreen instructions to set up your crowdfunding platform.

2. Compatible With Any WordPress Theme

IgnitionDeck works with all the most popular WordPress themes, so it should look great and function perfectly no matter which theme you’re using.

Do you want to change your WordPress theme? Then you’ll be happy to learn that IgnitionDeck comes with various crowdfunding themes that you can add to your site with just a few clicks.

In fact, IgnitionDeck’s setup wizard will display all the themes that are included in your license.

3. Supports Multiple Payment Gateways

IgnitionDeck supports multiple payment gateways including Stripe, PayPal, and Authorize.net.

If you use Stripe, then you can offer Apple Pay to people who visit your site using an iOS device. Similarly, IgnitionDeck supports Google Pay for anyone who visits your site with Google Pay enabled on their device.

4. Multiple Funding Types

IgnitionDeck supports multiple funding and donation types that you can use in your campaigns.

To start, some donation-based campaigns don’t rely on meeting a minimum donation threshold. In that case, IgnitionDeck can collect donations as soon as the user completes the checkout process. IgnitionDeck will then send these funds to the project owner.

Another option is the all-or-nothing model. Sometimes called 100% threshold, this is commonly used when projects require a minimum funding in order to proceed, such as a new side business or product launch.

With this funding type, IgnitionDeck uses a pre-authorization transaction where the supporter agrees to pay a certain amount if the project meets its minimum goal. IgnitionDeck will only collect these funds if the project reaches that goal.

Finally, IgnitionDeck can collect recurring payments from backers. This is a good option for projects that require an ongoing weekly, monthly, or annual investment.

5. Pay What You Want

IgnitionDeck supports the Pledge What You Want (PWYW) model, which allows supporters to change the payment amount at checkout.

Supporters can use any value they want, as long as it meets the minimum amount for that level, as specified by the project creator.

6. Create Unlimited Projects

IgnitionDeck creates a new ‘Project’ custom post type in your WordPress installation. With that done, you can create as many projects as you want, directly in the WordPress dashboard.

In the Projects editor, you can give the campaign a title, add a fundraising goal, and set a start and end date. You can also add a description, create an FAQ, and even embed videos from platforms such as YouTube.

You can also create multiple levels for your backers, with unique rewards for each level.

Having completed those steps, you might limit how many people can sign up for each tier. For example, if you have 100 t-shirts to give away, then it’s typically a good idea to limit that supporter level to 100 backers.

7. Allow Users to Submit Campaigns

If you run a non-profit organization, then IgnitionDeck allows users to run peer-to-peer fundraising campaigns on your WordPress website. In this way, supporters can raise additional money for your organization by promoting their own fundraising activities.

Alternatively, you can turn your website into a crowdfunding platform. This allows users to create campaigns and raise funds for any third-party charity, product launch, or some other project they care about.

No matter what approach you take, IgnitionDeck will add a submission form to your website’s front-end. Users can simply complete this form to create a new campaign.

In addition, you can control exactly who has permission to submit crowdfunding projects to your WordPress blog or website. For example, you might limit the form to a specific supporter level.

By default, IgnitionDeck sets user-submitted campaigns to ‘pending’ and requires an admin’s approval before going live. However, you can publish user-submitted campaigns automatically, if you prefer.

Do you want to make money online? Then IgnitionDeck can also charge users a fee for submitting their project.

8. Organize Your Campaigns

Similar to the default WordPress categories, IgnitionDeck allows you to organize your campaigns into project categories.

With that done, you can use the built-in IgnitionDeck blocks to display multiple projects from the same category on your posts, pages, or widget-ready areas.

Visitors can see what each category has to offer, by visiting that category archive page. If you’re using a crowdfunding theme, then visitors can also filter projects based on category.

In addition to project categories, IgnitionDeck can create Child/Parent relationships between crowdfunding projects. In this setup, all the child-project’s funds count toward its parent-project’s fundraising goal, as well as its own.

9. Promote Your Fundraising Campaigns

Sometimes, you may want to highlight specific projects or project categories. For example, you might advertise your most popular fundraising campaigns on a landing page, or show related projects on a blog post.

In that case, IgnitionDeck has two blocks you can add to any page, post, or widget-ready area. To start, the Featured Project block allows you to embed a specific project.

After choosing an IgnitionDeck project, you can customize the block’s color scheme and change the alignment.

Do you want to advertise multiple projects instead? Then you can use the Project Grid block.

This block will display multiple projects from the same category. You can also filter the selection based on whether these projects have met their funding goal.

10. Membership Dashboard

When someone supports a project for the first time, IgnitionDeck will create an account for that person. After that, they can log into a member dashboard and see their contributions.

Here, the user can also manage or renew their contributions and access their rewards, such as digital products or exclusive pages.

This dashboard works out of the box, but you can customize it by changing the layout or using WordPress widgets to create announcements, CTA buttons, links, and more.

11. Offer Downloadable Rewards

By offering various rewards, you can encourage backers to support your campaign or even upgrade to a higher membership level.

Many campaign organizers offer their supporters digital perks such as downloadable artwork, audiobooks, videos, and other files. With IgnitionDeck, creators can easily upload these resources via their project dashboard, and then link them to a particular level.

With that done, backers can download these files by logging into their account and visiting their members dashboard.

12. Protect Your WordPress Content

Sometimes, you may want to restrict access to specific pages, posts, or even projects. For example, you might make a series of blog posts exclusive, supporter-only content. You might even create different levels of content that a backer can unlock, based on how much they donate to a project.

In that case, you can assign any page or post to a particular IgnitionDeck project, directly in the WordPress content editor.

Alternatively, you can protect entire IgnitionDeck projects in the plugin’s settings.

13. Add Orders and Donations Manually

Sometimes, people may support a project outside of the IgnitionDeck platform. For example, you might collect donations offline or promote your project on other platforms.

To help track this funding, you can register these extra supporters and donations in the IgnitionDeck dashboard. Simply create a new order and then add the information manually.

14. Customizable Email Templates

IgnitionDeck has a range of ready-made email templates that it will send in response to user actions, such as sending a custom welcome email to new users. It will also notify supporters about important updates in the projects they support.

These templates work out-of-the-box, but you can also customize them with your own messaging and branding. For example, you might add your own color scheme or custom logo.

You can also use merge tags that IgnitionDeck will replace with real user information. In this way, you can send personalized emails to your audience.

15. Integrates With Mailchimp

IgnitionDeck supports some of the best email marketing services, including Mailchimp. Simply enter your Mailchimp API key and you’re ready to start collecting email addresses from your supporters and users.

IgnitionDeck also offers a set of powerful Mailchimp merge tags that you can use to segment your email lists.

16. Export Your User Data

Instead of sharing information with a third-party platform such as Kickstarter, IgnitionDeck gives you complete control over your data.

That said, you can export this information as a CSV file at any point, and then share it with other people who don’t have access to WordPress. You can even import the data into any other software you’re using, such as your Customer Relationship Management (CRM) app.

17. Built-In CRM

IgnitionDeck can collect a ton of information from project creators and backers. With that in mind, you’ll be happy to learn that IgnitionDeck stores all this information in a built-in CRM.

This can save you time and effort, since you don’t need to set up and manage third-party tools. It can also help you comply with important privacy laws such as GDPR, since you’re not sharing this data with other organizations.

18. Integrates With WooCommerce

If you upgrade to IgnitionDeck Echelon then you can build a self-hosted crowdfunding system on top of WooCommerce. This allows you to offer physical rewards for supporting a project.

To do this, simply set WooCommerce as your eCommerce platform in the IgnitionDeck settings.

With that done, you can create reward levels as variable WooCommerce products. You can then hide these products so they don’t appear to customers who are simply visiting your online store.

19. Collect Extra Donations and Fees

The Fee Mods module can extend and modify the way you collect payments and fees, by integrating with Stripe Connect.

Using this module, you can set a default fee that users will need to pay, in order to submit a project. You can also override this default amount on a per-project basis.

Another option is enabling donations at checkout. This allows you to collect additional tips from backers who want to support your crowdfunding platform.

Finally, this module gives supporters the option to cover any extra fees on behalf of the project creator. When active, backers can select a box at checkout, which automatically increases their pledge to cover all the project owner’s fees.

20. Accept Anonymous Donations and Comments

Some people may want to support a project anonymously. This might be because they’re concerned about privacy, or the charity has links to a specific political opinion or viewpoint.

With the Anonymous Checkout module, backers can donate without their information appearing on the public backer list.

Even if the backer chooses to checkout anonymously, they can still submit a comment, which will appear in the public backer list. This is similar to posting anonymous comments on your WordPress blog.

Behind the scenes, a user account is still associated with the supporter for the purpose of providing receipts. The project’s owner can also export the supporter’s information, for example if they need to provide them with a reward or send a thank you message.

21. Post FAQs and Newsletter Updates

With the FAQ + Updates extension, you can add an FAQ section to any project page. This is great way to give visitors and potential supporters more information about a crowdfunding project.

In addition, this add-on can post project updates. IgnitionDeck will display these updates as blog posts on the project’s page and also email them to the project’s backers.

22. Add Facebook Login and Social Sharing

Social logins allow visitors to register with your website using their existing social media accounts. This saves time and removes friction from the registration process, so it’s a great way to get more signups and collect more leads.

You can add Facebook login to your crowdfunding site using the IgnitionDeck Social module. This module also adds social sharing buttons to your projects, so supporters can easily share them with friends and family.

23. Protect Forms With reCAPTCHA

Spam registration is a big problem for all websites, including crowdfunding platforms. With that said, IgnitionDeck’s reCAPTCHA module can add Google’s reCAPTCHA verification to all your website’s forms, including the user login and registration forms.

In this way, you can prevent bots from creating spammy accounts on your WordPress website.

24. Create Stretch Goals

With the Stretch Goals add-on, you can create additional tiers for your crowdfunding projects. After configuring this module, you’ll see some extra fields in the project dashboard where you can add as many stretch goals as you want.

On your website, stretch goals will remain hidden until the previous goal has been met.

In this way, you can encourage backers to keep contributing in order to uncover the extra tiers.

25. Collect Post Addresses

Do you want to reward backers with physical products? In that case, you’ll need the backer’s shipping address.

Thankfully, the Address Fields on Checkout module allows you to collect this information at checkout. It will then automatically add the address to the user’s account, and use it to auto-fill forms in the future. This can improve the user experience and makes it easier for them to support more projects.

26. Remove the IgnitionDeck Branding

By default, this plugin adds the IgnitionDeck logo and credits to your WordPress website.

If you’re concerned about weakening your branding, then you can remove the IgnitionDeck logo simply by unchecking a box in the plugin settings.

If you’re using IgnitionDeck’s 500 Framework theme or one of its child themes, then you also hide the Theme 500 credit link by editing the footer.

27. Sync With Kickstarter

Already using Kickstarter? Then you can seamlessly transfer your Kickstarter campaign data into your new IgnitionDeck project and continue working on the campaign.

Alternatively, you can raise funds on both Kickstarter and IgnitionDeck at the same time. In that case, this module will pull the number of backers and the pledged amount from the live Kickstarter campaign, and update its totals once per hour.

28. Integrates With Mixpanel Analytics

Do you use Mixpanel?

Then you’ll be happy to learn that IgnitionDeck has a Mixpanel integration. Simply install this module and it’ll track all buy now button and selection clicks, plus purchase form instances.

It also tracks every sale and captures variables such as price, project name, level name, transaction id, and order status. If you want to go further, then you can set up manual tracking for specific items in the module’s settings.

29. Create a Self-Hosted Referral Program

Do you want to create referrals for crowdfunding projects?

AffiliateWP is a powerful affiliate tracking and management tool that allows you to start your own referral program. Even better, AffiliateWP integrates seamlessly with IgnitionDeck via the dedicated AffiliateWP module.  

This allows you to track and offer bonuses to third-parties who drive traffic to your crowdfunding campaigns. For more on this topic, please see our guide on how to create a referral program.

30. Shareasale Affiliate Management

Do you want to encourage third-parties to promote your affiliate links?

With the Shareasale Affiliate Management module, you can add this popular affiliate marketing network to your crowdfunding website. After setting up this extension, any purchases made via a Shareasale link will trigger Sharesale’s affiliate system. 

31. Community and Professional Support

IgnitionDeck has a user-friendly interface where all the settings are neatly organized into different tabs, menus, and screens. This makes it easy to find the features you need.

However, at some point you may need help to build a successful crowdfunding website.

To start, there’s a knowledge base that you can access 24/7. Here, you’ll find step-by-step guides on how to configure all the supported payment gateways including Authorize.net, CoinPayments, and PayPal. There’s also detailed tutorials on how to use all the premium modules.

Beyond that, there’s a blog where IgnitionDeck posts about a range of topics such as how to promote your campaigns using social media, email newsletters, and even online influencers.

If you’re using the free plugin, then you can post to the IgnitionDeck forum on WordPress.org, and get answers to basic questions.

When posting to public support forums, it’s always a good idea to include as much information as possible, so the experts can understand your problem fully and post a helpful response. For more on this topic, please see our guide on how to properly ask for WordPress support.

If you upgrade to the premium plugin, then you’ll also get access to email support. Simply submit a ticket and the IgnitionDeck team will aim to respond within 1 business day.  

IgnitionDeck Review: Pricing and Plans

If you’re just getting started, then you download the lite version of IgnitionDeck from WordPress.org. This free plugin has many essential features so you can set up a crowdfunding platform and accept payments using PayPal.

However, you’ll need to upgrade in order to use the premium modules.

• Echelon. For $149 per year, you’ll get access to the stretch goals and CAPTCHA add-ons. This plan also integrates with WooCommerce so it’s ideal if you want to build a self-hosted crowdfunding system on top of your existing online marketplace.
• Enterprise. Want to accept user-created campaigns? For $349, you can add a front-end submission form to your crowdfunding site. This allows you to turn WordPress into a crowdfunding platform and even charge a fee for hosting each campaign.

IgnitionDeck Review: he Right Crowdfunding Plugin for You?

To summarize this IgnitionDeck review, we’re confident that it’s a great crowdfunding plugin.

With the free version, you can create unlimited campaigns and then promote them on your site using the built-in Featured Project and Grid blocks. However, if you upgrade to the premium plugin then you’ll get access to a ton of extra modules.

These extensions can add social sharing buttons and reCAPTCHAs to your campaigns, and help to promote your campaigns with affiliate links.

You can also accept anonymous donations and comments, so you can get more traffic and engagement, even when visitors don’t want to publicly back a particular campaign.

We hope this IgnitionDeck review helped you decide whether it’s the right crowdfunding plugin for you. Next, you may want to see our guide on how to get a free SSL certificate, or check our expert pick of the best analytics solutions for WordPress users.

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