After deciding to launch your campaign, the first thing you need to do is build a Kickstarter marketing strategy. 

In this quick guide, I’ll be walking you through some of the basic steps you need to take to build your Kickstarter marketing strategy so your campaign can succeed. 

What is the Fundamental Goal of a Kickstarter Marketing Strategy? 

The power of Kickstarter and crowdfunding lies in the community – not the money. 

Many entrepreneurs make the mistake of assuming that crowdfunding is all about raising money, but essentially it’s about building a strong community of supporters to back your project. 

The fundamental goal of any Kickstarter marketing strategy, therefore, is to ensure that you’re getting a barrage of backers who are willing to support you despite not ever knowing you or using your product. 

What is the Biggest Challenge of a Kickstarter Marketing Strategy? 

Imagine being asked to invest or pay money for a product you’ve never seen or used before – not online nor in physical stores. 

There are no reviews, no user recommendations, no social proof. 

Would you easily spend your money? 

Probably not. 

This makes it significantly challenging to market Kickstarter projects. 

You’re asking people to pre-order a product they’ve never used before. The only thing they have to trust you with is a video of your product, the copy of your sales page, and the promise that you’ll deliver in due time. 

See how this isn’t like any other marketing strategy? 

This is why you need a very strategic approach with your sales copy, emails, ads, and how you want the public to perceive you. 

Marketing is the only way for your campaign to succeed so without a kickass marketing strategy, you may not be successful with your Kickstarter campaign. 

How to Create an Effective Kickstarter Marketing Strategy? 

Now that you know the main goal and challenge of a Kickstarter strategy, here are some things you can do to meet the goal and address the challenge. 

1. Run a Deep Competitor Analysis on Amazon & Kickstarter 

Competitor research is the starting point of your Kickstarter marketing strategy. 

And when I say competitor research, I don’t mean a bunch of Google results. 

Here’s what my team and I do for our clients with competitor/market research. 

Search Kickstarter for Similar Projects 

People often miss this part when they are doing market research. It’s important that you go through Kickstarter to identify similar projects. 

Make a list of the top ten competitors on Kickstarter who are in your industry or have similar products. 

In a sheet, note down: 

• Their funding goal and the total amount raised 
• Their pricing model and how that is justified 
• Their product positioning and messaging 
• What people are saying about them 

You can also use a tool like Kicktraq to get in-depth analytics on top-performing campaigns. 

Here’s how a report of iiRcade, one of our top-performing campaigns looks like: 

Search Amazon and Online Stores for Insights 

The ultimate goal of most product crowdfunding campaigns is e-commerce. 

So if you want to eventually want to move into an e-commerce model after a Kickstarter campaign, it’s good to do your research from now. 

Amazon is a treasure trove of insights. From customer reviews and queries to detailed product descriptions, to price points and discount ideas, you can get most of the information you need to position your product. 

Search Facebook Groups and Instagram Accounts 

Search for Facebook groups relevant to your niche product. For example, if you’re making a kids’ smartwatch, search for groups that the smartwatch brands have created. 

You can also search for relevant groups like teenage gadget groups etc to find out what people want in a smartwatch. 

Next, you can list the top ten Instagram accounts relevant to smartwatches for product photography inspiration. 

2. Creating an Irresistible Offer 

Here’s where crowdfunding for products gets interesting. 

You want to build a community that will become buyers. 

In order to get people to join your community, they need to have an incentive. 

And that incentive is an irresistible Early Bird or exclusive offer. 

So essentially, the people who are signing up to your community are people who will “back” your project by pre-ordering your product at a discounted price. 

An early bird offer or discount is usually 30 – 40% off your retail price. 

The offer will become the pledge amount on the campaign page as shown here.

3. Build a Community on Facebook 

The most important part of a crowdfunding campaign is in the community. 

Facebook provides this perfect opportunity to build a community around your product. 

You can grow the community with interesting content, help like-minded people connect and network. 

Facebook communities are central to crowdfunding success. 

So do make a content strategy plan just for your Facebook community. 

The strategy can include: 

a). Video content specifically product demos and tutorials. 

b). Competitions and quizzes to ignite interest and engagement. 

c). Informative news, guides, and insights relevant to the industry. 

d). Satisfied customer testimonials (when the product is delivered). 

The community will remain active even after you’re done with the campaign and as your supporters grow so will the community. 

When you launch on Amazon or have your own online store, this community will be your strongest asset. 

4. Use Paid Ads to Drive Traffic to Your Landing Page & Facebook Group 

As a rule of thumb, keep at least $5,000 handy just for ads. 

Without paid ads, you cannot drive traffic to your landing page or Kickstarter page. 

The funnel is simple: 

• Drive traffic to the landing page via ads 
• Convert traffic into leads via sign up forms 
• Convert leads into prospects via FB group 
• Convert prospects into customers at the time of launch. 

5. Develop FOMO-Based Email Drips 

Email marketing for crowdfunding is based on FOMO (Fear of missing out) techniques. 

You will need to send emails that drive people to your product page to sign up. 

Emails like limited time offers, exclusive early bird offers, buy before the campaign ends offers, etc are all examples of FOMO tactics that are used to drive urgency. 

At the time of launch, it is only your emails that can drive conversion (boosted by retargeting ads). 

So your emails have to be on-point with the kind of messaging that will drive people to back the project. 

Marketing for a Kickstarter campaign isn’t easy especially if you’re not well-versed in digital marketing. 

But because it’s so niche, not any marketing agency can help you out. 

6. Influencer Marketing for Kickstarter Campaigns

While influencer marketing works great for established brands and businesses (they got the money!), for crowdfunding campaigns, it may be a significant challenge if you’re short on a budget.

Ideally, you want to attract influencers with your product. For instance, one of our clients iiRcade had a product so good, they were endorsed by gaming and tech celebs which led to 7-figure funding in less than a week.

That said, sometimes, you just have to do it the old-fashioned way; that is, make a list of influencers in your industry, reach out to them with a clear goal, and negotiate a deal.

There are three types of influencers – the macro gods (100K followers and above), the semi-gods ( 10,000-100,000), and the newbies (less than 10K). The rule of thumb is to start with the newbies as they will have a bigger and more direct impact on their circle. These influencers are regular folks who have a close-knit community and directly influence with their endorsements. They are the best people you can reach out to for endorsements within a reasonable budget.

Here’s how you can get started:

1. Use a tool like SparkToro or BuzzSumo to find influencers in your niche
2. Make a list of influencers relevant to your niche
3. Set the goal for influencer marketing (signups, backers, awareness)
4. Set a goal of the number of influencers you want to have on board (2, 5, or just 1)
5. Set a budget for each influencer and what you expect from them within that budget
6. Write an influencer pitch that should include expectations
7. Make sure you have a great story to share (personalized stories rank better in convincing influencers to work with you)
8. Communication with the influencers must be organic, authentic and value-driven
9. Establish a one-on-one relationship with these influencers. You might be needing them post-campaign too
10. Reach out to influencers on the medium/channel that your audience are most likely to be found. For instance, if you’re making a video game, your influencer is on Twitter and not on Instagram.

Identifying influencers is not a simple matter of getting a list off of Google. You need to really dig deeper into the type of influencers you want to work with, whether their values align with yours and whether their audience has the purchasing power you need.

Quick Recap

1. Your marketing goal for Kickstarter must tap into the power of the community.
2. You need a strategic approach with your sales copy, emails, ads, and how you want the public to perceive you because you’re asking people to back a project that is not yet in the market.
3. Always conduct an in-depth competitor research on Kickstarter, Indiegogo and Amazon to identify price & product positioning.
4. Create an irresistible offer to promote your product
5. Build a community on Facebook
6. Make sure you have a funnel that turns traffic into backers
7. Double down on your email marketing funnel
8. Reach out to influencers and establish a one-on-one relationship with them
9. Prepare well in advance of your launch date (we recommend 3 to 6 months prior)
10. Work with crowdfunding marketing experts who can help you with strategic marketing

Remember, your Kickstarter crowdfunding campaign can only succeed if you have a strong marketing + promotional plan set in place. Without marketing and promotion, you might fail to meet your goals and make no money at all (Especially if you’re using Kickstarter which operates on an All or Nothing model).

Want to talk to an expert to help you make sense of all this? Reach out to us for a free consultation call!

You May Also Like to Read:

How to Start and Launch a Kickstarter Campaign?

There are specific crowdfunding marketing agencies that are recognized by Indiegogo and Kickstarter to be your marketing partners. 

Check out the videos below for more.

The post How to Create a Kickstarter Marketing Strategy – A Quick Guide for Beginners. appeared first on samitpatel.

In this article, we’ll zero in on what was the most-funded Kickstarter project of all time and what makes a Kickstarter project successful.

We’ll also be answering additional questions as:

• What Products Do Well on Kickstarter
• What is the Most Popular Category on Kickstarter?
• What is the Success Rate of Kickstarter
• What Percentage of Kickstarter Campaigns Fail?
• How much does the Average Kickstarter Make?

Let’s dig in.

Pebble Time as the Most Funded Kickstarter Project

In the history of Kickstarter projects, Pebble Time holds the distinction of being the most funded Kickstarter project, raising a staggering $20 Million in just one month.

It was an extraordinary feat backed by 78,463 enthusiastic supporters, making it the fastest project ever to reach $1 million in a mind-blowing 49 minutes, surpassing its initial campaign goal of $100K by leaps and bounds.

Back in 2012, Pebble Time emerged as a second-generation smartwatch, boasting cutting-edge technology, including an e-paper screen with an impressive one-week battery life, all at an affordable price of $179.

Pebble Time’s tremendous success, however, faced stiff competition when industry giants like Fitbit and Apple released their own smartwatches in 2015. Despite its glorious start, Pebble eventually encountered challenges, leading to the company filing for insolvency in December 2016 and ultimately selling certain assets to Fitbit.

Despite these challenges, Pebble’s journey left behind a lasting legacy and a blueprint on how to cultivate a solid community of supporters. Even to this day, countless individuals continue to believe in Pebble’s exceptional design and groundbreaking technology.

Other Successful Kickstarter Projects by Funding Amount

Coolest Cooler – $13 Million

The cooler built for the 21^st century. It was a high-tech cooler with a built-in blender and tech features ahead of its time.

The campaign was a success with 60K backers, 50,000 of whom pledged more than $200 for the cooler.

As much as this was a stellar Kickstarter success, it was also a huge failure post-campaign. Coolest Cooler was never able to deliver the coolers on time and closed operations, citing ‘trade war’ as the reason for failure.

Frosthaven – $12.9 Million

Frosthaven, the sequel to Gloomhaven is one of the most successfully funded board games on Kickstarter. With 80K backers, the project was funded in just a few hours after the project went live. Frosthaven is expected to ship by 2022.

EcoFlow Delta Pro – 12.1M

The EcoFlow Delta Pro is a portable home battery that attempts to provide multiple days’ worth of backup energy for homes.

This project is an example of the diversity you can find on Kickstarter. From board games to home solutions, you can launch any kind of product on the platform – and if it meets people’s needs, you can quickly get funded by the community.

EcoFlow Delta Pro now successfully sells on Amazon.

Key Lessons to Learn from Top Kickstarter Projects

Regardless of their post-campaign failure, these top Kickstarter success stories had a brilliant mix of marketing + promotional strategies that are fundamental in making a Kickstarter campaign successful.

We’ve analyzed each of these campaigns from the perspective of a crowdfunding marketing agency and we believe here are some key things they did right to achieve the success they did.

If you can follow any of these lessons, you can be very successful with your Kickstarter campaign.

1. Be Sure the Market Has a Need for Your Product

Frosthaven was a sequel to Gloomhaven, an already very successful game. Why did the founder Isaac Childres launch Frosthaven, given that he has an established game company?

His response is a key learning lesson:

“We are a successful brand at this point, but I’m still not at all sure about how many copies of this sequel that I should print. We sold over 200,000 copies of Gloomhaven. Should I print that many? If only 10,000 people want the game and I print 200,000, that’s a disaster.”

Even if you’re an established organization, you have to KNOW if your product is even needed.

If you’re a new entrant, you can get market validation by running surveys and product validation ads on social media. You can also understand public sentiment by discussing your project on Reddit & Twitter.

2. Working with a Marketing Team

No matter how awesome your product, it cannot get to the first page of Kickstarter projects unless you promote the heck out of it.

This means you need a full-fledged marketing team. Or, a crowdfunding marketing agency.

Remember, regular digital marketing agencies are different from crowdfunding marketing agencies. You will need to hire a company that has success stories and case studies in product launches with crowdfunding.

You need to have a budget of at least $15,000 to inject into marketing and promotional costs.

A quick cost breakdown of a basic crowdfunding project:

Strategy + landing page + content = $3,000

Social media ads = $5,000

Product photography = $1,500

Commercial video = $3,000

PR & Promotions = $5,000

If you’re short on budget and cannot afford to hire a team or an agency, you can get freelance talents, however, you will need to give direction and do most of the homework.

All of these top funded Kickstarter success stories worked with crowdfunding marketing agencies to build campaign hype.

Want DIY crowdfunding? Enroll in this crowdfunding training course & learn how to carry out your own crowdfunding campaign.

3. Launching When the Time is Right

Launch time is one of the biggest factors that concerns Kickstarter campaigns. Launch at the wrong time and you could fail in meeting your goal. Launch at the right time and you could be a stellar hit – just like Coolest Cooler.

When it first launched in 2013, it failed to meet its $150,000 goal. The main reason is that November – December are the worst months for Kickstarter campaigns. With Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year, most people are generally out of budget.

Coolest Cooler founder Grepper decided to tweak the product and launch it in the summer! As Americans were gearing up for Independence Day and planning summer picnics, the Coolest Cooler was just what they needed! The campaign was so popular, that we’re still talking about it as one of the top-funded projects on Kickstarter ever, nearly 6 years later.

Here are some of the best times to launch on Kickstarter.

4. A Great Product is the First Success Factor of a Kickstarter Campaign

There’s a serious misconception that we as marketers HAVE to fix.

MARKETING CANNOT FIX A BAD PRODUCT.

There. Said it.

This is especially true if you’re trying to launch a campaign on Kickstarter.

The Pebble Time watch for instance, didn’t need any aggressive form of marketing.

In 2012, they had just the product people wanted. Simple yet exciting technology for nerds, kids, sports enthusiasts, literally anyone who wanted a ‘smart’ watch.

The product spoke for itself. With the right marketing strategy, it became legendary.

People often think it’s easy to succeed on Kickstarter if you just promote the heck out of your product.  What they don’t realize is that if your product is not something the audience wants or can relate to, your campaign won’t make it.

Before you spend tens of thousands on marketing & promotion, make sure your product is a good market fit and it’s something people want.

5. Prepare Well in Advance

The top Kickstarter campaigns were those that had already worked on their social and digital footprints way before launch.

Why? Because again, Kickstarter is all about bringing your community of supporters together to fund your project. The more supporters/followers you have, the easier it will be to reach out to them and get them to fund your project.

You have to:

1. Build an email list of up to at least 500 – 1,000 people
2. Develop relationships with tech journalists and PR professionals
3. Prepare your digital assets in advance (landing pages, website, email funnels etc).
4. Build your founder brand on social media sites
5. Show the actual work being done

There are countless Kickstarter campaigns that have failed without spending adequate time in preparing for launch. You don’t just crowdfund. You have to prepare your business and your brand way in advance before starting a campaign.

The campaign itself will last only for 30 days of which only the first and the last week is where the action lies.

Some Facts to Help You Determine if You Should Consider Kickstarter

We recommend you do a deep dive into top Kickstarter projects of your category and note down key metrics such as funding goal and funding raised, number of backers, and what were some things they did right.

Here’s some additional information to help you decide if you should consider Kickstarter.

What Products Do Well on Kickstarter

Products that people can afford to buy to make their daily activities better do extremely well on Kickstarter. Items like a smart wallet, smartwatch, board games, tech gadgets, are very popular.

High-end projects that come with a hefty price (anything above $200) seldom do well on Kickstarter unless you have very strong product positioning with an impressive digital footprint – much like we did for iiRcade, a high-end arcade gaming box that sold at $399/piece.

What is the Most Popular Category on Kickstarter?

Games! Board games and video games are the most popular categories on Kickstarter with some 1.6 billion U.S. dollars pledged. Two of the most highly funded game projects were Frosthaven & Exploding Kittens. Design, technology, film & video, and music were the next most funded categories.

What is the Success Rate of Kickstarter

As of 2021, Kickstarter has a success rate of 39.30%. This means, out of 542,921 projects launched, 212, 149 projects were successfully funded.

What Percentage of Kickstarter Campaigns Fail?

Of the 542,921 projects, 327, 656 projects were unsuccessfully funded.

How much does the Average Kickstarter Make?

Well, let’s say you have a 0.08% of making a million bucks!

Ok well, let’s be real.

1 out of 1,250 project hits the $1 million mark on Kickstarter – but we’re talking about projects in the games, design, and tech categories.

Now, before you get uber excited, here’s a reality check:

There have been 453,585 projects launched since Kickstarter was founded in 2009.

And only 369 have raised $1 million or more.

The average amount you can raise on Kickstarter is $23K.

Quick Recap

1. Pebble Time made the most Kickstarter money, i.e, $13 million
2. Prepare for your campaign well in advance
3. Keep a budget aside of at least $10,000 for marketing costs
4. Always make sure you do adequate market research before launch
5. Work with a crowdfunding marketing agency (like us!)
6. YOU HAVE A KICKASS PRODUCT TO KICKSTART YOUR CAMPAIGN!

Making money on Kickstarter is possible. If you need to talk to an expert, feel free to reach out to us for a free consultation call!

The post What Kickstarter Made the Most Money & what you can learn from them appeared first on samitpatel.

One does not just simply launch a crowdfunding campaign.

One has to research, perform competitive analysis, assess the success ratio of similar campaigns and then decide to take the plunge.

Here’s how we carry out product research for crowdfunding campaigns for our clients.

1. Kickstarting with a Research Sheet

Your research sheet is the foundation of everything.

The first step in your research for a crowdfunding campaign is to know how your product stands against other similar campaigns.

Your product may not necessarily be the world’s first – and if you want to make that claim, then you need to make sure there are no other products on Kickstarter offering the same.

For example, in this project, there are dozens of arcade game projects, but none of them holds 200+ licensed, retro games for home use.

This research sheet that consists of other similar campaigns on Kickstarter or Indiegogo helps give you insights into how a similar product fared, what strategy and processes were effective, and what funding realistic funding goals can you set.

It gives you the direction you need to plan your campaign.

What each tab means:

Raised: This is the amount that other competitors in your niche raised. This will help you set a benchmark for the backers and funding goal to expect.

Average Price: This tab is critical. It will help you determine your pricing & reward strategy. You’ll have to make a very strong justification of why people should back your project for that price vs others.

Social Media: These are great for ad or content inspiration that you’d need later to work on your page or group.

Check out this strategic post on how to create a Facebook group for your crowdfunding campaign.

Headlines: Your project headline is the most important magnet to get people’s attention. Check other projects to get inspiration for the headline of your campaign page and landing page.

You can also check Amazon to see how some products transitioned from crowdfunding to eCommerce.

2. Getting Your Audience Research Right

Unlike e-commerce where you’re targeting audiences willing to become buyers, in crowdfunding, you’re targeting audiences willing to become backers – that too on crowdfunding.

So one of the biggest challenges with crowdfunding is getting interested audiences to back a project which is why most crowdfund marketers target tech enthusiasts instead of regular folks.

We do it differently though.

We target audiences who have an interest in the product. If there’s a new baby feed product, we target moms. If there’s a new eco-friendly toothbrush, we target parents.

Most of our backers are people who back for the first time who love a product so much, they are ready to pre-book it.

And all of this is possible because we carefully create our audience persona and then perform various tests to measure their response.

Over the years, we’ve perfected this and know exactly what kind of content the audience responds to. Some key questions we ask include:

You can add as many questions to this list as needed to niche down on your audience research.

3. The Holy Grail of Research for Crowdfunding Campaign is the Product Identity Sheet  

Ahh. The product sheet.

It’s a 30-page long document that we send out to clients to fill up.

It has everything you’d need to design a campaign:

• Value proposition
• Features of the product
• What makes it unique
• Top competitors
• Top dream audience
• Pricing justification

…and a whole lot more.

Some key questions that the worksheet should answer:

Identity: Who Are You?

• How do you stand out? Describe yourself in 1-2 sentences.
• How do you use the product? (How does it work – step by step)
• What industry are you in?

Performance: What Value Does Your Product Provide?

• What are your product’s key features?
• What value does your product provide?
• What problem do you solve and how do you solve this problem?
• How is your product solving the problem better than the competition?
• Who are your competitors & what are their price points?
• How affordable is it compared to your competitors?

Imagery: What Imagery is Associated with Your Product?

• What are examples of visuals that could be used for creative inspiration (photos, videos, etc.)?

Judgements: What judgements may people have?

• What positive judgments will people have about your product?
• What negative judgements may people have about your product?
• What concerns, fears, or uncertainties may people have about you, the product, and/or the brand?
• Why should people trust you?

Feelings – What Feelings Do You Want to Convey?

• How do you want people to feel when experiencing your product?
• How do you not want people to feel when experiencing your product?
• What is the voice of your message? (As a friend, a teacher, a doctor, a professional, an expert — what type of language will we be using?)
• What is the tone of your message? (Funny, somber, optimistic, epic, intense, friendly, etc.)

Now whether it’s your staff, your contractors or even your agency managing your campaign, they’ll simply refer to this product sheet to stay grounded.

Remember, the more in-depth you can go with your research, the better you can target the right people to back your project.

The post Three Important Research Documents to Prepare Before Starting Your Campaign Strategy appeared first on samitpatel.

If your campaign funding goal is too less, you won’t be able to bring your project to life. If it’s too high, you might not be able to meet the goal when the project ends (Kickstarter won’t let you withdraw any amount raised if your campaign fails).

So how do you set a funding goal that you can meet?

Here’s everything you need to know.

1. Creating a Pricing Strategy

One of the first things to decide is whether the cost of your product is justified.

For example, if you’re launching an eco-friendly toothbrush that needs to be renewed every month at $30, people will steer clear of it.

Why? Because the market is already flooded with eco-friendly toothbrushes with bamboo toothbrushes being the most environment friendly as well as cheap.

No matter how grand your idea or how affordable the price may seem, if it’s already in the market, people won’t back it.

On the other hand, if there’s a product that’s unique and the price point can be justified, people will be willing to pay and wait for it – as we have seen with tech products like iiRcade, Octopus watch, and many more.

How do you set your price point for the crowdfunding audience then?

Make sure the following factors are considered.

• How are you different from other competitors in the market?
• How is your price point justified compared to them (this will also be your USP).
• What are the shipping costs of your product?
• What are the manufacturing costs of your product?
• How much of a discount can you really offer and if you do, how does that affect your overall pricing strategy.

So before setting your crowdfunding goal, you need to have a very strong pricing strategy. Remember when you’re open to the public, you’ll have to defend your price point and justify why your product costs this much if there are already other products of a similar nature available in the market.

Why would anyone pay you $10, $100, or $1,000 to support a product that seems fancy, but is not exactly innovative or necessary.

2. Calculating Marketing + Promotion Costs

Your crowdfunding campaign cannot succeed without significant marketing and promotion.

You will have to invest some funds yourself into the project.

You can launch a Kickstarter campaign without marketing spend, but that would not really be helpful.

If no one knows about your project, they won’t back you up – unless you already have this huge list of 500 – 1,000 people who are all highly qualified buyers.

Even then, without any marketing, you won’t be able to reach a broad audience.

Marketing and promotion costs that you should keep in mind are:

• Cost of creating a landing page:$27/month
• Cost of FB ads: $5000 – $7,000
• Cost of email marketing: $500
• Cost of retargeting/remarketing ads: $5000
• Cost of hiring an agency: $5,000

So, a total of around: $20,000 if you want to go big.  

If you’re short on budget and just have $5,000 – $7,000 handy, then you could spend time prepping yourself at least 6 months in advance before starting the campaign. In this case, you can add marketing costs to the overall crowdfunding goal so that later you can use that amount to promote your product.  

3.  Shipping Costs

Kickstarter funding goals usually include shipping costs.

Before setting your goal, factor in the shipping costs as well so you don’t have to deal with any bad surprises later.

If the shipping costs is too high, you can limit your reach to select countries instead of worldwide.

Lastly, consider logistic costs as well. If it’s a product that requires parts, then it must be added to your overall cost.

4. Crowdfunding Platform Fees

Both Indiegogo and Kickstarter change a 5% service fee from the total funding amount.

That is if you make $50,000 in crowdfunding goals, then Kickstarter and Indiegogo will charge $2,500 as a service fee.

So when you’re setting up crowdfunding goals, make sure you’re also calculating the crowdfunding platform fee cost.

Additionally, Stripe, the payment processing partner will also be charging a transaction fee of between 3 – 5% per transaction.

Keep in all these factors when you’re creating your crowdfunding campaign goal.

5. Crowdfunding Earning Taxes

There’s always a lot of speculation about this but crowdfunding earning is tax-deductible.

The money you earn from crowdfunding is considered as income, so you’ll have to pay taxes as per your country’s rules and regulations.

Again, do consider this when setting your goal.

You want to have enough leftover with all the deductions, taxes, fees, and costs to be able to create or manufacture your product.

Most crowdfunding project creators set a random goal or a goal that doesn’t really help them cover costs.

When you meet your goals but still don’t have enough to get the production rolling, you fail to meet deadlines…. And when that happens, your backers feel cheated, and you lose all credibility.

So it’s essential that you understand the overall costs of your project, how much money you want to raise to bring the product to life, and how much do you actually have in hand.

One thing for sure is you cannot crowdfund if you have $0 in hand.

Even though it’s supposedly ‘funding,’ it’s more like e-commerce where you’re asking people to pre-order/buy your product based on face value and wait for it to be delivered.

This is why you have to have some money to invest in marketing, creative production of assets like images and videos to even kickstart the project.

Many people falsely believe that they can just go on Kickstarter and get funded.

As easy as that sounds, it’s hardly the case.

Even for crowdfunding, you have to spend money in getting people to visit your campaign page, sign up, and back your product if they find that they trust you enough.

The post How to Calculate & Decide Your Campaign Funding Goal appeared first on samitpatel.

It has reportedly generated $5.95 B in pledges from over 19 million backers to fund 529,591 projects such as films, music, stage shows, comics, journalism, video game, technology, and food-related projects.

Entrepreneurs who want to use crowdfunding to launch their projects use Kickstarter to raise money.

In this quick guide, you’ll find a collection of blog articles and resources we’ve created to guide you through each step of your Kickstarter crowdfunding journey.

We’ll keep updating this guide so you get all the information you need in one place.

Chapter 1: Is Crowdfunding Right For You?

Not sure if crowdfunding is the right choice for you? Everything you need to know about launching a crowdfunding campaign is given in the articles below.

1. 5 Questions to Help You Decide if Crowdfunding is the Right Choice to Launch
2. What are the Different Types of Crowdfunding Models
3. Here are 5 Reasons Why Crowdfunding IS the Best Way to Raise Money
4. Key Benefits of Crowdfunding
5. What are the Top Crowdfunding Sites to Launch Your Campaign
6. How Crowdfunding is Changing the Way Companies Raise Money
7. 5 Key Challenges of Crowdfunding Campaigns to Know Before Starting

Chapter 2: Kickstarter vs Indiegogo – Choosing Between Two Platforms

Two of the world’s most popular crowdfunding platforms are Kickstarter and Indiegogo. Indiegogo is an American crowdfunding website founded in 2008.

Indiegogo has supposedly generated $1.6 B in pledges from 9 million backers to fund 800,000 campaigns from 235 countries.

Despite its impressive metrics, Indiegogo has an 18% success rate as compared to Kickstarter’s 34%.

So which of the two is best for you? Everything you need to know is given here:

1. Kickstarter vs Indiegogo – Which Platform Should You Choose for Campaign Launch
2. Kickstarter vs Indiegogo 2020 – Which Platform Did the Best?
3. Five Important Differences Between Kickstarter and Indiegogo
4. Kickstarter vs Indiegogo 2019 – Which Platform Did the Best
5. Indiegogo or Kickstarter for Games – Which is the Best?
6. How Much Does it Cost to Run a Crowdfunding Campaign on Kickstarter and Indiegogo?

Chapter 3: Getting Started on Kickstarter

So, you’ve chosen Kickstarter to launch your crowdfunding campaign. How do you go about it and what do you need to do to get ready?

Here’s everything you need to know.

1. How Does Kickstarter Funding Work? A Quick Guide
2. How to Start and Launch a Kickstarter Campaign?
3. Can Kickstarter Be Used to Start a Business? Here’s Everything You Need to Know.
4. How Does Kickstarter Work?
5. Kickstarter Fees and Additional Costs You Need to Know When Launching a Crowdfunding Campaign
6. Will my Kickstarter Succeed? 5 Things that Will Determine Your Success
7. What Happens When Kickstarter Campaign Fails?
8. What is the Most Funded Kickstarter Project?
9. What are Kickstarter Stretch Goals?
10. Can Kickstarter be Used to Start a Business?

Chapter 4: How to Start with Kickstarter Campaign Marketing & Promotion?

Now that you’ve got started on Kickstarter, what’s the best way to market and advertising your campaign to get a successful launch?

Here’s everything you need to know

1. How to Promote a Kickstarter Campaign. A Quick Guide
2. How to Use Influencer Marketing for Your Kickstarter Campaign
3. How to Get Engagement for Your Kickstarter Campaign
4. Guide to Build Your Landing Page for Your Kickstarter Campaign
5. How to Write an Attention-Grabbing Press Release for Kickstarter
6. How to Use Digital Marketing to Succeed with Kickstarter Campaign
7. Ultimate Marketing Strategies to Smash Your Kickstarter Campaign Goals

Chapter 5: Facebook Marketing for Your Kickstarter Campaign

Still the world’s most popular social media software, Facebook is an integral part of your Kickstarter marketing strategy. In fact, dare we say, you can’t have a successful Kickstarter campaign without a strong Facebook marketing campaign.

1. Facebook Ads for Crowdfunding
2. How to Build Up Facebook Likes for Your Crowdfunding Campaign
3. A Beginner’s Guide to Facebook Custom & Lookalike Audience Set
4. How Much Should I Spend on Facebook Ads? A Budget Guide.
5. Facebook VIP Group Advertising Strategy

Crowdfunding is a long journey that involves deep planning, crucial decisions to make, and very strategic marketing.

This page is your go-to guide for all things related to Kickstarter and Indiegogo crowdfunding. Bookmark it and visit it for any information you need to be successful with Kickstarter.

The post Kickstarter Crowdfunding Campaign – A Complete Step by Step Guide appeared first on samitpatel.

But with Facebook Fan Page posts receiving less reach than ever, companies are desperately looking for another Facebook channel to reach these people.

Facebook Groups give companies a place to share content that’s relevant to a specific audience. It lets you have one-on-one discussions with your audience which is way more effective than a page where the interaction is usually one-way.

If you use Facebook Groups for relationship building, you can drive a significant amount of traffic and sales from the connections you make.

With no cost to starting a Facebook Group to share content with an engaged community, it’s a no-brainer to include this strategy to boost your crowdfunding campaign.

Getting Started on Facebook Groups

1. Log in to your Facebook Profile and on the left bar, click on Groups.
   

2. Create a new group and name it after your product/brand.

Make sure you keep it private for now. However, keep the group as “visible” so anyone can find it but not anyone can join it unless they answer a few key questions. As for the group name, keep it after your product or brand name. So for example, if your product name is Occulus VR, then the group name should be the same.

3. Do remember to upload a relevant image for the group. Ideally, you should have an image that represents your product. Here’s an example from one of our clients Oak Journal.

4. Now that you’ve got the image, name, and group settings arranged, start inviting your firneds to join the group. Community building starts from home! Get your team to join the group and ask them to invite their friends and family too. This way when your actual target customers join, they won’t feel like it’s an empty page.

5. Membership questions are important to vet people before you accept them in the community. These questions will also help you identify your lead sources too. Some common questions you can ask are:

• We will be launching on Kickstarter, a crowdfunding platform to bring this porect to market. Do you understand Kcikstarter or crowdfunding (yes/no)
• How did you find this group?
• What excites you about this project?
• What’s the one thing about this product that made you sign up?
• Do you agree to meeting the terms and conditions of this community (i.e is no abusive language etc)

How to Engage with the Community

Your Facebook group can only grow if you’re able to keep your community engaged. 

This starts by connecting with your audience and understanding their pain points, their needs, and how your product helps them. 

Here’s a simple example of how a beard brand initiated a discussion about asking what the user’s problem with growing their beard was. This kind of question not only generates interaction but can also provide a business with customer insights & challenges that they never knew existed.

Here are some valuable engagement tactics to help grow your Facebook group. 

1. Welcome all your members by tagging them in the post

People like being acknowledged. When members join your group, give them a warm welcome by tagging them in a post. 

2. Use polls and surveys

Create polls, surveys and quizzes to keep the engagement level high. People love participating in quizzes or polls. You can even use these to create a contest and perhaps offer prizes or cool incentives. 

3. Ask people to share their thoughts and opinions (be sure you can moderate it)

People don’t want to just consume content all day long. They also want to share thoughts and opinions. They want to participate and talk about topics they are passionate about. User-generated content is a great way to build an authentic, enriching community. 

4. Questions that stir engagement

Ask debate-intensive questions relevant to your industry. So for example, if you’re a consumer product company, you could ask, ‘iPhone 11 or Note 10’? Although there is already significant debate out there, people seldom miss a chance to talk about their favorite device or brand. You can also ask list-based questions such as, ‘Who is your favorite influencer?’ or ‘Top Influencers to Follow……’ 

5. Post videos and quotes

Images and videos posted in a group have chances of higher engagement than being posted on the main page where people are more reluctant to engage. Your sole objective is to create content that generates interest, motivating people to engage with your business. You can also ask people to share their pictures and videos to earn a referral bonus or discount. 

Facebook groups have grown popular over the decade, however, they are only effective if you take out the time to create engaging content and also remain engaged with your audience through comments, responses, etc. 

With the combinative power of groups and pages, businesses can use Facebook to its full potential. 

How to Grow a Facebook VIP Group Community to 1k+ Members

There are no hacks to growing a community other than providing your members with quality content and keeping them engaged. That said, a product-focused community is very different from a cause-driven or business community. The more members you join, the higher your chances of raising money on your launch day.

1. Advertise your group on your Facebook page:

You can’t run ads directly to the group, but you can use your page to advertise the group. The fundamental difference between the group and the page is that the group is for private members only while the page is for public. So you could advertise your page, get people to like your page and then move them into joining the group.

2. Send out your group link in email communication:

If you’re sending out targeted emails to customers or leads, you can ask them to join your group to stay updated with exclusive information. Instead of asking people to like your page via email, you can instead ask them to join the group and receive exclusive VIP discounts. This is more effective than asking them to like or share a page.

3. Advertise the group on your website:

Want your website visitors to be part of the community? You can prompt them to join the group from the website. You can do this via pop-up forms, exit forms or on your thank you page – just like how we’ve done here.

Facebook Group Engagement Tips Summary : 

• Accompany every post with an image 
• Engage every day and post a variety of content 
• Plan a content calendar with a variation of posts 
• Dedicate a day for every type of post. For example, Mondays are for Updates only. 
• Share fun, engaging content
• Ask friends and family to chime in initially 
• Promote content from your website and other digital platforms to the group. 
• Create polls and ask for people’s opinions
• Share discounts and referral campaigns 

You May Also Like to Read:

How the New IOS 14 Update Affects Facebook ads for your IndieGoGo campaign & what you can do about it.

You have 60 days until the final launch to make the most out of your group. Remember, the group is a community of your target audience and it can easily grow into thousands of loyal members who will help you boost brand recognition as well as sales.

The post Facebook VIP Group for Crowdfunding Projects – How to Make it Work? appeared first on samitpatel.

There are many crowdsourcing platforms online, each with its own strengths and weaknesses. We reckon that you’re familiar with two of the most famous crowdfunding platforms – Kickstarter and GoFundMe. Do both of them do the same thing? The short answer is – yes and no.

Kickstarter is a crowdfunding platform that was designed for people who want to create creative products, for commercial purposes. In comparison, GoFundMe works on the principle of funding personal (and charitable) causes. These differences notwithstanding, there are some finer distinctions between the two platforms that you should be aware of.

Kickstarter and GoFundMe Services on Offer

If you’ve ever wondered, “Does GoFundMe take a percentage?” – the answer is yes. When it comes to fundraising on the GoFundMe platform, there are certain fees involved that campaign organizers and donors should be aware of. While GoFundMe provides an accessible and powerful platform to raise funds for personal causes, charitable initiatives, and various projects, it operates on a model where a percentage of the funds raised is taken as a platform fee.

Let’s take a look at how Kickstarter works.

Kickstarter is geared towards funding creative projects. It is the only thing allowed there. All campaigns are screened before they go online. Basically, Kickstarter campaigns are projects that should have tangible deliverables. These creations are shared with backers upon the successful conclusion of your projects.

Here’s how GoFundMe works.

GoFundMe is based on charitable crowdfunding. Though the platform does allow raising money for businesses, it does so if part of the proceeds are going towards helping people and/or charitable organizations. This can be either in the form of medical expenses, aid, poverty alleviation initiatives, therapy fees, etc.

Are these crowdfunding platforms successful? Amidst many other crowdfunding sites, Kickstarter and GoFundMe have raised over $4 billion and 5 billion respectively!

Both platforms work by rewarding contributors, although Kickstarter makes it mandatory from the outset. With GoFundMe, gift-giving is optional.

How can your project qualify?

Before we get to what sort of campaigns you can crowdfund with these platforms, we need to take a look at what is not allowed. Anything illegal, be it hate speech, weapons, drugs, porn, fraud and crime-related is not tolerated in either platform.

Kickstarter has these strict rules for crowdfunding campaigns:

• Projects should be clearly presented and be honest in terms of what is deliverable.
• Projects should have elements that can be shared with others.
• No fundraising for charity.
• No equity should be offered to backers.
• No prohibited items should be allowed for projects.

In addition to all these rules, Kickstarter reserves the right to clear a crowdfunding campaign. This process takes as much as three days.

Things are not too strict with GoFundMe. Furthermore, they do not require any approval from the platform before they can be launched. However, if a campaigner indulges in any illegal activity, GoFundMe reserves the right to take down their project.

Both Kickstarter and GoFundMe have a straightforward application process. Campaigners can fill out details about yourself and the crowdfunding project, and submit it. Kickstarter takes some time to review your application. The platform estimates that about 80% of the projects they get are approved.

With GoFundMe, you need not wait. You can start your campaign immediately, provided you followed all their rules.

Sales and Support

Another thing that works for Kickstarter is that they only get their fees once a project is successfully executed. This detail fosters transparency in its sales practices. GoFundMe is also transparent about their sales process, and they keep you apprised of your campaign every step of the way.

As for customer support, Kickstarter falls short. Their support system fails for most campaigners, as many have complained they can’t seem to get connected with Kickstarter reps in time. As for GoFundMe, it fares better in customer service with its 5-minute support guarantee. They claim to respond to any message via their contact form under 5 minutes.

Are Kickstarter and GoFundMe 100% Good?

Users have often complained about both platforms. Kickstarter has been criticized by both campaigners and backers. Campaigners point to its less-than-timely record of responding to queries, whereas backers point out how some fraudulent companies back out of its commitments at Kickstarter i.e. by sending defective rewards or not even sending anything at all.

For GoFundMe, some users claim that they faced difficulty in collecting funds for their causes because ‘the platform did not trust them for one reason or another.’ Public outcry forced GoFundMe to forego its earlier practice of collecting 5% of the proceeds as platform fee. The fee was scrapped when, according to reports, 5% of all donations for victims of one shooting incident, were being pocketed by GoFundMe.

Despite of these issues, crowdfunding is still a very new industry. Both Kickstarter and GoFundMe continue to improve their process of helping legitimate businesses and charitable causes get the money they need. The likelihood of more successful projects in recent years has only served to highlight that user feedback is taken seriously.

Why Choose Kickstarter?

Go with Kickstarter if:

• Your project has commercial value,
• You are offering rewards to backers in exchange for their support,
• Your project is truly creative.

Why Choose GoFundMe?

Opt for GoFundMe if:

• You have a commercial project in mind but want to avoid the 5% platform fee,
• You want to raise money for your charitable initiative/business idea regardless of your campaign reaching its campaign goal,
• You want to help out a family member, friend, community by raising money for them in case of emergency/cause/tragedy.

While crowdfunding is not the be-all-end-all to raising money for projects, it is however quickly becoming a viable alternative for people who want to contribute to causes and projects they believe in. Let us harness the positive power of social media to help small businesses / personal causes with the tools and technology we have at our disposal. The choice is yours!

You May Also Like to Read:

Kickstarter vs Indiegogo: The Best Crowdfunding Platform in 2020

Want to know more about crowdfunding? Check out this detailed video!

The post Kickstarter or GoFundMe? Which Crowdfunding Platform Should You Choose to Crowdfund Your Project? appeared first on samitpatel.

What is Star Citizen?

Star Citizen is an in-development multiplayer video game developed and published by Cloud Imperium Games. A successor to Freelancer,  Star Citizen is the brainchild of director Chris Roberts. The game was announced in 2012 through a wildly successful Kickstarter campaign, drawing in $2million in its first funding round. Today, a decade later, it has amassed up to $275million from crowdfunding alone!

With additional investment, the game is expected to top $400 million by 2020. This is the only project in the history of crowdfunding breaking the records of the video game industry itself. The most expensive game of all time was GTA V with $265 million for a budget.

Image from Star Citizen Kickstarter Page

What’s will the team behind Star Citizen do with nearly $400 million?

On the Star Citizen blog, creator Chris Roberts promises to spend the money in “enriching the game’s vision.” The only problem?

People have been waiting for the game since 2013.

Game journalists and enthusiasts have penned countless articles criticizing the decade long development time. Some have even gone on to claim it as a possible scam, especially since after nearly a decade, there’s no sign of release. At least not any time soon.

How Did Star Citizen Manage to Keep People Hooked for So Long?

Regardless of the status of the game though, as marketers, we’re more interested in how Star Citizen was able to attract backers and become the highest funded game in the industry.

After analyzing the campaign, the press coverage, the opinions of gamers and an active Reddit channel, here are a few things we’ve uncovered.

1. Establish a Strong Market Presence

Chris Roberts is a British-American video game designer, known for the Wing Commander franchise. He was later also director of the Wing Commander movie and a producer for its sequel Wing Commander II.

By the time, Chris Roberts announced the launch of Star Citizen, he had a few games under his belt and a movie to boast about. In 2011, Roberts founded Cloud Imperium Games with his business partner. In October 2012, the company launched a crowdfunding campaign to create Star Citizen, a space simulation game.

In one month, the company earned $6 million in funding, breaking all crowdfunding records. By October 2013, the company earned over $23 million in crowdfunding.

Of course, not everyone can leverage a strong industry presence, but it’s clear that if you want to succeed on crowdfunding, you need to have some sort of industry presence to get support.

People aren’t just going to pour in support if they don’t already know who you are and what you do. Because crowdfunding is built on trust and reputation, it’s important to establish these before you launch a massive campaign.

2. Keep Adding New Features & Create Milestones for Each

One of the greatest pulls of Star Citizen is the new features that the company is constantly “talking” about adding to the game. Donating large sums of money gets you to access to loads of ships and resources and other digital assets in the Star Citizen universe, some of which are accessible now, while others are promised later.

Note: Star Citizen is still a big alpha test and not really a full-fledged game at this point.

A key thing to learn here is the addition of new features to keep the project alive. Many creators have found success with stretch goals that are designed just for this purpose – add new features, keep the excitement alive and add new funding goals.

We’ve covered Kickstarter stretch goals in complete detail here. Before you invest in Kickstarter stretch goals make sure you can deliver as promised. Stretch goals need a careful approach.

3. Work on Audience Psychology & Deliver Exactly What they Want

Star Citizen used the power of nostalgia to keep its audience invested. Even after a decade, people are still funding the game with the hope that it will be a revolutionary, immersive game like no other. Although it’s a video game designed just for Windows OS users, the mere concept has got millions of people invested in the game.

For crowdfunding to succeed, you really need to dig into to the psyche of your audience. What is it about your game or your project that will make them feel happy, excited, proud or willing to invest.

It is estimated that the average contribution to this game is around $100/contributor. This level of contribution is the result of an organization that understands exactly what its audience wants and is willing to wait a lifetime for.

4. Mobilize Support Outside of the Kickstarter Campaign

Chris Roberts garnered support even outside of Kickstarter. The game has a dedicated Reddit Channel with some 227K followers and press coverage from the gaming industry.

Despite the pandemic, the company saw a massive jump in crowdfunding. Combined with funding from private investors, as of now, the game has nearly $338 million to use. This is the equivalent of a massive political campaign.

The company has built so much momentum, created so much hype with its offers that every gaming enthusiast is hoping to get their hands on what may be the game of the century.

You May Also Like to Read:

How Does a Kickstarter Funding Work? A Quick Guide

Crowdfunding success depends on hype and media noise. The more you make, the higher your chances of succeeding.

5. Talk to Your Audience

Nothing beats a message, a blog post, or an email from the founder. Personalization is key. Chris Roberts has been keeping his audience hooked with his website and blog where he gives updates about new product features and funding goals.

Although the game is not yet officially released, new features are being added and reviewed by alpha test players.

If anything, crowdfunding can be a great platform to get your first batch of beta testers. It’s a great way to get reviews & opinions in, before launching for the world.

Conclusion – Learn How to Market from Star Citizen, but Make Sure You Don’t Take a Decade to Deliver!

Even if you do everything right, but don’t deliver, you’ll get refunds, bad reviews & bad press. You’ll probably have to spend more money keeping all this in check, so it’s better to deliver than to manage the costs of stalling.

The post What is The Most Funded Kickstarter Project? You’ve Probably Heard of this One! appeared first on samitpatel.

Without the right marketing and promotional strategy mix, it would be virtually impossible to attain your campaign goals. The reason?

Crowdfunding isn’t as simple as launching a campaign and waiting for people to automatically send you money. There is a lot that happens when you crowdfund a project. Firstly, you need to be a trustworthy brand for people to support you.

With the rise of crowdfunding scams from even the most well-known products, people are skeptical to donate even $1 to your campaign.

This means you have to spend a significant amount of time in building your brand image to reflect credibility and trustworthiness. The problem? You can’t do this alone. Not only will it cost you time, effort and money, but the results will also be unsatisfactory. 

This is why you need the help of a crowdfunding marketing agency. 

Why Should I Hire a Crowdfunding Marketing Agency?

Simple logic – a marketing agency specializing in crowdfunding will have the processes, the marketing experience that will guide your project to success. 

Moreover, a great crowdfunding marketing agency will also have the staff and the experts available to take on the nitty-gritty of marketing and promotional activities which you alone may not be able to do. 

For example, in-depth Facebook advertising, landing page setups, API setups, PR communications, etc are things you will need to deal with when you launch a crowdfunding campaign. It is definitely not an activity that you can do by yourself. 

If you’re still skeptical and are wondering whether it’s really worth it to hire a crowdfunding marketing agency, here are the top ten factors to consider. 

Reduce Operational Costs & Save Money

If you don’t hire a crowdfunding agency, you’ll be dolling out thousands of dollars in getting individual resources to work with you. The staff you’ll need for a crowdfunding campaign would be:

• A web designer/developer – at least a $1,000
• A content/copywriter – at least $20 – $30/hour for a medium level writer
• A Facebook ad specialist – at least $50/hour
• A PR specialist – at least a $100/hour
• A photographer – at least $1000 – $3000 for photography
• A video editor – at least $2000 for a video
• A graphic designer – at least $50/hour 

Very easily, you could end up spending thousands of dollars per month. Not to mention, the cost of your own time coordinating, managing and communicating between different resources. 

You can save money, time and effort by hiring one crowdfunding marketing agency for a fixed-price and have them do all the work.  You can just focus on your project, where it is needed the most. 

Raise More Money & Go Beyond Your Goal

The money you can raise on a crowdfunding platform, the better for you. An experienced crowdfunding agency can help you achieve a higher goal amount. 

Increase ROI, while saving and reducing costs. When you use a crowdfunding agency, you’ll get a dedicated crowdfunding manager who’ll take care of your campaign and ensure that you go beyond your initial goal. 

This is done by strategic advertising that uses crowdfunding data such as backer demographics, targeted Facebook ads, targeted lead conversions, data analytics and much more. 

All Your Digital Assets Created by Experts

When you’re running a crowdfunding campaign, you’ll need articles, blog posts, video content, images, PR articles, ad copy, website/landing page copy, and many other content assets. 

The agency creates all these assets for you, using a consistent style and messaging that is reflected across the board. More importantly, the messaging is not just random copywriting – it’s created with an essential purpose of getting you more backers, selling your brand and making your ads successful. 

When you hire a crowdfunding marketing agency, you’re basically investing in long-term success because crowdfunding doesn’t just end at the attainment of a goal. There is consistent post-campaign work that you need to keep at if you want your business to grow. 

You May Also Like to Read:

How to Select the Right Crowdfunding Marketing Agency for Your Campaign

Your goal is to ultimately become a brand your audience can connect with. Only a good crowdfunding marketing agency can do this for you!

Check out the videos below for more.

The post Top 3 Reasons to Hire a Crowdfunding Marketing Agency appeared first on samitpatel.

You’ll have to weed out the generic marketing agencies and look for agencies that specialize in your chosen crowdfunding platform. Some crowdfunding marketing agencies specialize in Kickstarter marketing while others specialize in Indiegogo. 

Once you’ve got a list of top ten crowdfunding marketing agencies, it’s time to run a comparative analysis and choose the one that you will want to work with. 

Some things to help you choose the right agency are: 

Their Experience with Crowdfunding

Most marketing agencies do not have extensive experience with crowdfunding. While they may have the tools and the strategy, they do not have the experience required to run a successful crowdfunding campaign. 

The reason? Crowdfunding is not like regular marketing. Only a crowdfunding marketing expert can show you how to find and build a backers’ list, how to create a product launch, how to drive traffic to the campaign etc. 

Most importantly, also figure out if they have experience managing a product or a service similar to yours. 

The Number of Successful Campaigns

A crowdfunding marketing agency’s success is defined by the number of successful campaigns they have run. Most agencies don’t take on projects that they don’t see success for, and when they do, they make sure that their strategies translate to critical success. 

You can measure their success by checking the initial funding goal and the eventual goal that was fulfilled. Another metric of success is evaluating the number of backers and the highest bracket of money backers were willing to spend. 

Understand their Process

Marketing for crowdfunding is a complex process. There is a lot of prep and back-end work involved in order to reach a successful goal. 

It’s important for any crowdfunding marketing agency to have a process in place that will cater to the different needs of your project. From data analysis to backers building strategy, to landing page and social media advertising strategy – there is a list of things that need to be done. 

You should be knowing what process the agency will use and the time it will take to make a successful launch. A great marketing agency will have a clearly defined process with measurable metrics against each process step or milestone. 

Ask Them About their Most Successful Project

What is the success bar that this company sets? In the crowdfunding world, success is measured in terms of the highest amount of money raised. 

If your goal is to raise more than $100K for your project, your chosen agency should have a successful project that has raised more than $100K. If an agency does not have experience raising this amount of money, you might want to reconsider. 

Their Online Reviews, Social Media Presence & Industry Connections

Before working with any marketing agency, it’s important to study online reviews about them and see what people say. You can also visit the companies that they have helped and find out if those are legit projects. 

Of course, a social media search for the agency will also be helpful. Evaluate their activity level on social media, notice how they interact with people and see if they have a great network. 

Finally, do they have a list of reporters, PR agents or connections that can help you with the publicity of your project? Press and promotions are an integral part of crowdfunding marketing; so do make sure your chosen agency can help you with promotion as well as building PR. 

As always, when choosing your agency, don’t be afraid to ask questions. Your agency will be your partner in a successful funding campaign, so make sure you know exactly how they will be helping you in achieving your goals. 

Check out the videos below.

The post How to Select the Right Crowdfunding Marketing Agency for Your Campaign appeared first on samitpatel.