<p>Crowdfunding has emerged as an important alternative financing mechanism for Indian entrepreneurs, yet limited research examines how campaign communication strategies are interpreted by backers in culturally embedded and rapidly expanding digital ecosystems. This study investigates how multimodal campaign elements (text, images, and videos) and narrative framing strategies (emotional, logical, and social) shape the funding performance of 546 India-based Kickstarter campaigns. Drawing on signaling theory and framing theory, we adopt a mixed-methods approach that integrates quantitative modeling with qualitative content analysis. The findings show that emotionally framed narratives, clear and well-structured textual descriptions, and transparent risk-related signals are positively associated with campaign success. In contrast, commonly assumed success drivers such as video presence and extensive reward offerings exert weaker or even negative effects in the Indian context. These results suggest that Indian backers prioritize credibility, clarity, and narrative coherence over polished promotional content, highlighting how the effectiveness of established crowdfunding signals is contingent on cultural communication norms. By situating multimodal campaign communication within an emerging-market context, this study contextualizes and refines the application of signaling and framing theory in crowdfunding research, demonstrating the importance of culturally sensitive interpretations of entrepreneurial signals. The study offers implications for campaign creators, platform designers, and policymakers and outlines directions for future research on digital entrepreneurial finance in non-Western ecosystems.</p>