Kickstarter Launch Formula

The Mogics Light Kickstarter campaign ended up raising a little over $60,000 from 2,000+ backers to create a revolutionary multi-functional light. The campaign showed more of a linear pledge growth model over the span of 60 days (talk about maintaining momentum!). When taking a look at this campaign, the first thing that you can do is use the website Kicktraq to gain some insight into their campaign’s analytics. (Location 570)

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Note: look at kicktan to assess profiles of other conpetitors

you’d like to get a quick snapshot of where backers came from for this campaign, you can also take a look at the Bitly analytics for the Kickstarter short link. Just click the Twitter share button on the project page, get the short link, and then add a “+” to the end, which yields “http://kck.st/1dJk91x+“. You’ll see data similar to the images below. (Location 593)

While researching a project, you should also look into the volume and type of PR attention that they received. You can simply use Google for this. By typing the title of the Kickstarter campaign into Google and filtering by content type and time, you can create a media list of all the websites that a campaign managed to get on. (Location 599)

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Note: research publications that anaolg was featured in

Another way is with the software tool Buzzsumo. Using Buzzsumo, you can input keywords, phrases, or terms, and discover content that is going viral on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Pinterest and Google+. You can then use that information to create a media list of the blogs and news sites that are writing about those key phrases. (Location 630)

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However, what happens if you hit your crowdfunding goal when there is still time left before your campaign ends? This is where stretch goals come in. To give you an example of what stretch goals are, I’ve included a screenshot below of the “Notion: Be home, even when you’re not” Kickstarter campaign. If the $250k stretch goal is reached for this campaign, then backers will have the ability to own a limited edition color version of Notion. As you can see, you can use stretch goals to motivate your audience to continue to spread the word about your campaign, even after you’ve hit your goal. Stretch goals will also incentivize new backers to join your project and encourage existing backers to up their contribution amount. (Location 894)

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Note: stretch goal should be free stickies

It’s no secret. Your Kickstarter pitch video is the most important component of your campaign. (Location 963)

Your email list is the Holy Grail of all of your marketing activity. Everything that I mention in this chapter should be used to build your email list leading up to the launch of your Kickstarter campaign. Why is email so important? According to Mckinsey & Company, “Email conversion rates are three times higher than social media, with a 17% higher value in the conversion.” (Location 1344)

There are many strategies that you can use to get more email subscribers. The first strategy that I’ll be discussing is the concept of a “lead magnet.” A lead magnet is something valuable that you can offer website visitors that will make them want to hand over their email address in exchange for access to the lead magnet. Think of it as a small bribe. Your website visitors should find this lead magnet to be useful, entertaining or valuable. Before giving them free access to this content or opportunity, you’ll be asking for their name and email address. This will allow you to market to them in the future. Essentially, they are opting in for more messages from your company.  For example, at the time of writing, KickstarterForum.org is a free lead magnet. In order to register for the forum, you must enter your name, email, and other details. When you register, you are then allowed to ask questions, interact with other users, and promote your Kickstarter campaign. You also get access to special promos and giveaways on the forum. (Location 1374)

There are two ways main to influence a journalist. You can either get their attention with a press release or direct outreach. Most beginning Kickstarter campaigners have never written a press release, so I’m first going to cover what to include in a press release and how to craft a compelling story. Then, I’ll talk about direct outreach and go through some of the techniques I’ve discovered to get the media to write about you. Finally, I’ll share a few press release tools out there that you can use to automate and simplify the entire process. (Location 1532)

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Note: create a press release

Fundraising Duration: Every Kickstarter campaign has a set fundraising duration, which will impact the amount of time that you have to take advantage of any PR attention or media hits. Therefore, you need to be super organized when drafting a PR outreach strategy. Some media publications will offer the “embargo” option if they like your project and want to write about it. Basically, this means that they will hold off on the publication of the article until a certain date. (Location 1539)

The other thing that I’ll say before I share how to go about contacting journalists is that you must appeal to multiple audiences. Is your Kickstarter campaign for a new tech product that will have a big impact on a particular industry? What organizations will benefit down the road if your campaign raises the needed funds? (Location 1585)

When is the best time to pitch a reporter? After conducting several informal interviews, PrDaily put together an awesome breakdown of the best time(s) to reach out to a journalist. Overwhelmingly, all of the reporters surveyed preferred to be pitched via email in the early morning. However, due to the large volume of weekend mail, the participants also suggested to wait until Tuesday, once the Monday rush was over and they had more time to look over each email. This information is corroborated by MarketConsensus, who also recommended sending pitch emails between 8 am – 11 am and to avoid Mondays. (Location 1604)

Press Release Websites: CrowdfundingPr.org PRLog (free) Free Press Release (free) 188PressRelease (free) 24-7 Press Release (free) Pr.com (free) i-NewsWire (paid) PrWeb (paid) PrNewswire (paid) (Location 1664)

Amazon: You can now sell your Kickstarted product on Amazon, as part of their new Kickstarter Collection section on Amazon Launchpad. It’s pretty cool to see some of these projects that were “Made on Kickstarter.” Scrolling down the list of these different products brings back a lot of memories. I’ve had several of the entrepreneurs behind these products on my podcast. It makes me smile to see how they’ve progressed. (Location 1993)