What leads to value co-creation in reward-based crowdfunding? A person-environment fit perspective

Abstract With the dramatic growth of internet and platform economics, reward-based crowdfunding (RBC) has become prevalent, providing unprecedented opportunities to small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Nevertheless, crowdfunding projects can find it difficult to succeed. Fundraisers can hardly simultaneously obtain both financial and non-financial benefits. This paper aims to investigate value co-creation including investment and feedback in RBC. After using a focus group to explore the underlying mechanisms of value co-creation in RBC, this research draws from the person–environment fit (P–E fit) theory to develop the research model. We used an online scenario-based survey, 364 valid samples of which were collected. The empirical results show that attractiveness and the P–E fit, including need fulfillment (NF) and value congruence (VC), lead to backers’ intentions to co-create value. Moreover, attractiveness fully mediates the relationship between NF and feedback intention (FI). NF and VC exhibited significantly different effects on FI, in terms of the different product types, that is, entertainment and technology in this research.