Reply To: What makes you fund a kickstarter?
Never say “includes all of the above levels.” Because you will add more levels later based on backer feedback, and one of them will be a special LE that isn’t going to be included with the rest. At least, if you’re paying attention to your backers, you will.
Credits. It’s such a small thing, but I will generally move up to a higher level partly because of getting credit somewhere. IMDB, geocache, game box, manual, backer card, website, post card – any or all of those can be easily incorporated into the plan. You may spend an extra $1 per backer, but I may move from $50 to $75 level. Or at least $1 to $5.
Limits. I understand the need for limited rewards – you don’t want to be flying all over the world hand-delivering the goods, even at $10K a pop. But keep the limits to those you really do need to limit. I greatly dislike time-based limits (which small limits on low-end pledges are). I may not see your project until the day before it ends. Do you really want me to not back because you’re out of the reward I want?
Reward Date. This is one of the things KS is known for – projects blow their reward ETC dates. By over a year in some cases. Look, get someone’s advice who has done something similar if you’re doing this for the first time. Look at similar projects and get an idea of how long it took them to get everything out the door. Be conservative. A recent example is a board game that ends in Nov is telling me I’m going to have it by Dec. There is no way that will happen. There’s a delay before the funds clear, you need to do final approval for manufacturing, and you may need to send it back for re-work a few times, someone key will get sick/hit by a bus, there will be a solar flare, etc. Or, in the best case, you have so many backers that the scale overwhelms the plans you had to get everything done.
Engage with people who might like your project. That means finding forums/sites where people discuss <thing> and telling them about your project – sometimes, in the case of BGG, you can get very helpful feedback before your project even goes up. Find online databases of <things> and add your project to them. Did you know you can show people your kickstarter page before it goes live? Make those people interested, perhaps your existing fans, even more excited by showing it to them in advance – and get their feedback first, so they are really engaged from day -1.
Update your FAQ. Too many projects have blank or nearly-blank FAQs or ones that were written by a marketing team. If you have backers asking you the same questions over and over, add them to the FAQ. Also, call them out in the main description and updates.
Your stretch goals should be at the basic level where you get the primary focus of your project. Which includes domestic shipping.
Exclusivity and price. I’ve gotten burned several times where I’ve backed something and then whatever it was ended up being cheaper, readily available, and before/on/near the time I got my backer reward.
End of campaign/success. I am more likely to back something near the end of the timeline if it is already successful. That means you should set your goal to a reasonable low amount that gets you only what you need to succeed after all the fees and such. After it succeeds, you will probably have more people joining in because it is already a sure thing.
Kicktraq. Use a Kicktraq to promote your project. It shows the details and auto-updates if you succeed, cancel, or fail.
Research. There are several articles on the Kickstarter blog, Kicktraq, and other places which give some advice. Why not follow it, or at least read up before you start?
Title and description – too many projects are vague. Ok, I see a project here called “Stone Circle” and the description is “A unique stone circle.” Um, ok, I’m not even going to click through to see what it is, I’m just going to skip it. If you say “Stone Circle – a Storytelling Board Game” with a description of “A storytelling co-op board game for 4-6 people that takes 56 minutes to play, suitable for ages 13+, based on the idea of the ancient practice of tell stories around a fire” then I’m going to click to see more about it. I generally look at “Ending Soon” or the categories I’m interested in – you need to be able to grab my attention with your image, name, and description among all those other projects. Don’t use “unique” or “one-of-a-kind” or any of those marketing words – describe what it is: book, movie, game, CD, gadget. And then tell me who you are or why I want it. Also, ALL CAPS is yelling and excessive punctuation is also annoying.