Crafting Your best Gitcoin Grant Proposal
Co-written by Marco Bear and Coleen Chase
Introduction to the Guide
Welcome to the world of Gitcoin Grants, where impactful projects come to life with the support of the community.
Whether you’re a seasoned grantee or just starting your journey on this new path, this guide is your roadmap to creating your best grant proposal.
Jump aboard as we explore the best practices and the key elements to craft your best grant version. Also, be sure to check out the section featuring resources and tools created by members of the grantee community!
Follow the best practices and you’ll not get lost…
These are general suggestions, based on our experience from participating in many rounds as grantees and round operators.
Formatting Your Grant: You will create a new grant proposal — or edit your existing grant proposal–in Builder which utilizes Markdown syntax for formatting. Here is a helpful Markdown Cheat Sheet.
Title: Write a clear title that includes the name of your organization and the purpose of your project. For example: The Solar Foundation: Funding clean energy for underserved communities in emerging markets. This is how people will find your grant and also, depending on what you write, donors will be attracted to read more about your project.
Banner: Upload an eye-catching banner that reflects your current Grant Proposal. This is similar to the previous point as it’s the first visual representation that donors we’ll see.
Logo: Choose a simple, recognizable logo, we recommend the one that you use on social media. This will help build awareness and make it easier and faster for your community members to find your grant.
Description: Start with a TL; DR, a short and simple description that’s quick to read and clearly articulates your organization’s mission and the purpose of the grant. Don’t overcomplicate it, this is what most of the donors will read. Start with a quick explanation that’s easy to understand and then be sure to include updates on your project since the past rounds. You will gain trust from including updates and what has been done so far.
Links: Be sure to include portal links to supporting information that can deepen the understanding of your grant proposal. Provide plenty of links for donors to delve into the realm of your project e.g., blogs, articles, impact reports, etc.
Pictures: Include a few low weight pictures that help illustrate your project. Don’t overload the page with too many graphics. Keep it simple and provide high quality pictures and graphics that provide context to the text.
Road map: Bonus points if you include a road map, or a link to your project’s road map. Everyone loves roadmaps! Include one to show the future objectives of your grant proposal.
Structure your grant, choose the best elements:
This part includes suggestions for how to organize your grant proposal including reading estimated times, to give you a better idea of the length of each part.
Simple introduction at the beginning to introduce readers to the purpose of the grant [reading time estimate: 10 sec].
What is the purpose of your project? Describe the projected impact of the tool or project that you want to develop, the Solar bike that you want to build, etc. [30 sec]
How will you use the funds? List what you are requesting the funds for. [30 sec]
Project update: List what your project has accomplished so far. For those who have received funds from a previous round, be sure to describe how you’ve utilized the funds. Include any delays or challenges you have faced. [30 sec]
Description of project team, founders and collaborators and what relevant expertise they bring that will help accomplish the project’s purpose. [10 sec]
If necessary, add more details and history of your project. [40 sec]
A final section that includes power links and any ways that people can get involved in your project besides donating (joining Discord, adding needed expertise, etc). [5 sec]
Resources & Tools Created by the Grantee Community:
This section includes a list of helpful tools that have been created and shared by our community members. If you have any additions to this section, please feel free to share with us on the Climate Coordination Network on Twitter (X): @climate_program
AI Proposal Co-Pilot created by Deeparocks: AI can write an amazing proposal for you! Provide all the details related to your project in brief. Don’t worry about the language or grammar feel free to just copy paste. The AI will help craft a compelling grant proposal.
Grants Scope created by Rohit Malekar: a series of early-stage experiments to use the power of AI to help donors discover grantees for public goods funding in web3. GrantsScope uses LLMs (Large Language Models) to improve the discoverability of projects and reduce information asymmetry for donors to make an informed choice.