09 Feb How to Get Engagement for Your Kickstarter Campaign

If you’re implementing a Kickstarter engagement strategy, ‘after’ the launch of a campaign, you’re going to fall far behind. The secret to a great Kickstarter campaign is to implement an engagement and marketing strategy before the launch of the campaign.

Attracting backers, convincing them to donate and getting media attention is NOT easy work. With Kickstarter crowdfunding becoming so popular, there are thousands of projects out there all competing to get maximum funding.

Here are some key strategies you can use to get engagement for your Kickstarter campaign.

Always Have a Landing Page Ready

This goes without saying – before you start your campaign, you must have all your web and marketing collaterals ready. One of the most important components is a landing page that you must have ready the day you decide to opt for crowdfunding.

You will be driving traffic to your landing page during the campaign’s lifespan so ideally, your page should be up and running at least three months before launching the campaign. That way as you promote your campaign, you can lead your visitors to your web page.

We do not recommend using DIY tools for making landing pages. Always hire a professional to create a robust and user-friendly landing page for your campaign. Your landing page will be the main tool in your engagement strategy, therefore it’s always advisable to hire a professional web designer and developer to create your most important asset. 

Capture Email Addresses

Email will be one of the best tools for Kickstarter campaign engagement – and your landing page will be instrumental in capturing emails. Incentivize visitors through free product offers, early-bird discounts or insider access and collect their emails. The more emails you collect, the higher your engagement and outreach on the day you launch the campaign.

Tapping into Communities

Communities are one of the most powerful platforms to bolster support – financial or promotional. Tap into communities relevant to your niche and start promoting or talking about your product. Here too, incentivize people into joining by sending their email addresses. Make them invested in your product and continue to remain engaged with them.

Moreover, tap into your Kickstarter community and get to know popular backers in the community. Create an active community presence in and outside of Kickstarter and make sure to engage people with regular updates.

You can also join popular forums like Reddit and Quora where you can provide people with answers about products or services relevant to your industry. While this may seem like a lot of extra work, in the long run, it helps significantly with brand activation and reputation building.

Social Media Power

Crowdfunding and social media go hand in hand. You can’t achieve success without working on your social media plan for a Kickstarter project. That said, you need to have a very specific social media strategy that is aligned with your target audience, your industry, and your product.

While Facebook is the most popular platform for targeting Kickstarter backers, Twitter and Instagram are equally important. If you’re running a campaign for a tech product, Twitter might prove to be more useful to your target audience as compared to Facebook.

Your social media strategy should include paid advertising, organic reach, community building, clever advertising all rolled into one.

Engage with influencers, tech editors, writers, product reviewers, Kickstarter backers on Twitter. Tweet, retweet, respond and build momentum with your target audience. Remember the fundamental engagement rule though – do not blatantly sell. Solve a problem, discuss a cause, show a solution, and connect all of this to your product. Do not attempt to bombard them with your page or campaign.

Media and Press

Part of your Kickstarter engagement plan must include media and press. Most campaigners make the mistake of sending out press releases in droves to multiple editors and publishers, only to end up disappointed.

An average media editor receives dozens of pitch emails a day, most of which they don’t even have the time to go through. If you’re going to wait until you launch your campaign and then send them a press release, it’s never going to work.

You need to invest time in finding media outlets, establishing a connection via LinkedIn or Twitter and then leverage on that connection for press coverage. Even to establish that connection though, you will have to create genuine interaction. If possible, also set up coffee meetings with journalists in your city to establish a real connection that does not just rely on digital communication.

Use Video Marketing

Videos are great digital tools to create engagement. With social media channels now promoting videos through Stories, you can use videos as a tool to generate interest. Hire a videographer to create compelling video content that hooks viewers. Your primary purpose is to tell and sell a great story.

Give yourself at least 6 months of dedicated efforts to marketing and engagement before launching the campaign. It takes a long time for any engagement strategy to show results, so it’s essential that you prepare in advance.

By the time you launch your campaign, you have your backers, your press, your social media everything ready. You will find it much easier to meet your campaign goal when your engagement is strong and value-oriented. Projects with the highest backers share a similar strategy – they all start with the buzz way before the actual launch. During this time, they also partner with key influencers, relevant brands and have established connections with media editors from several outlets.

You May Also Like to Read:

Using Influencer Marketing for Your Kickstarter Campaign? Here’s Everything You Need to Know
Press Release For Kickstarter | Pitch Press Release Without Being Ignored
How to Promote Kickstarter Campaign? A Quick Promotion Guide.

Remember, crowdfunding on Kickstarter is not a piece of cake. It requires hard work to convince someone to donate money! Don’t let all this intimidate you. Reach out to us and let us help you manage a successful crowdfunding campaign from pre-launch to post-launch and beyond.

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