the insider secrets of a successful $100,000 kickstarter campaign with manuel rappard
TRANSCRIPT
Editors NotesKickstarter is a more and more popular way of funding your own business.
$854 million total dollars were pledged to Kickstarter projects ?ll now, that
went to 50,994 successfully funded projects. This is impressive but there were
also 65,330 unsuccessful projects.
Scary, especially if like me you are working on a project and plan to raise
money through crowdfunding. To up my chances of success I decided to
interview a person behind a successful Kickstarter campaign. Somebody who
not only raised way beyond what they asked for but somebody with a project
that didn’t look like an obvious winner.
I came across RPMWEST and although I am not in the fashion industry, I got
intrigued. Selling jeans did not look like an inspiring Kickstarter campaign
project. Not un?l I started digging a bit deeper and discovered the magic and
momentum Manuel Rappard created around his project. Momentum that led
him to reach his campaign goal of $20,000 in under 24 hours and go on to
raise over $100,000!
Manuel shared his vision and demonstrated his strength as a leader, marketer
and a strategist in our conversa?on. Uncovered was his approach, strategies
and secrets behind his successful campaign. The real truth is that a successful
Kickstarter campaign is not a maQer of luck but of careful prepara?on and
execu?on of solid strategies before and during launch.
If you are considering Kickstarter campaign as a part of your project, then this
is a must read issue.
Hope you enjoy,
Agnieszka Nazaruk (aka Aga)
PS. Find more about me at sheisonfire.com
Our Hero Manuel Rappard (RPMWEST)I had a pleasure reaching out to Manuel Rappard, the visionary behind jeans
brand RPMWEST and its Kickstarter campaign. Manuel did something truly
incredible. He broke into the highly compe??ve market of jeans with a simple
vision “to sell the best jeans in the simplest way possible.” With this simple
vision he crowdfunded his Kickstarter goal of $20,000 in under 24 hours and
eventually raised over $100,000 from the campaign. How did he do it? Keep on
reading.
Manuel’s Story:
Originally from Germany, Manuel came to the United States when he was 18.
Being exposed to many different opportuni?es he quickly realised that he
wanted to build something meaningful. Thinking about what he really cared
about, he wrote down two things... Technology and Fashion.
Technology because of its ability to change everything. And fashion as
someone who cares deeply about quality -‐ especially in the essen?als.
Manuel’s first entrepreneurial experience was while he was s?ll at school. He
started a fashion social network for people to express their fashion interests.
Acer a couple of years with mediocre success, he decided to move on and
relocate to Silicon Valley.
In a short ?me Manuel found himself working for Google which he describes as
a phenomenal experience that opened up his eyes to different technologies
and work ethics.
Acer 2 years, he and another colleague at Google started working on an idea
they had back in school. Product Graph as they called it was supposed to put a
layer on google maps with product informa?on.
“Google Maps are great if you know where you are going, but you can’t really
put in a search query which says ‘give me a great pair of shoes.’” -‐ explained
Manuel.
Acer 12 months of building the product day and night they decided that it was
not meant to be and they needed to learn more. Manuel found himself back to
square one with two failed ideas but even more determina?on to make things
happen.
He also found himself asking the same ques?ons: What is it that I really want
to do? What is it that I care about?
For him it has always been the intersec?on of technology and fashion. With
not much direc?on and not sure what he was looking for, Manuel started
researching denim and making jeans for himself. San Francisco had a long
history of jeans making because of Levis Strauss. And soon he got introduced
to mul?ple people in the industry as someone passionate about crea?ng jeans.
Friends even started asking him to make jeans for them.
Coming from a technology background, he instantly started to think about how
to distribute them over the internet. Acer two failures that combined for more
than 3 years though. Manuel realised that he never wanted to build a product
that nobody wanted again and definitely didn’t want to waste years in the
process.
With that found apprecia?on of valida?ng an idea and seeing many successful ideas being launched into companies on Kickstarter. Manuel's vision would begin the next step of valida?on on Kickstarter too just to make sure his idea was a winner.
Ups and Downs
When asked about the biggest challenge in being an entrepreneur Manuel
explains that it’s understanding that entrepreneurship is a roller coaster. It’s a
journey constantly changes with ups and downs, failures and successes. Right
when you think you are at the peak of the mountain and you can relax, you are
being put right back into the valley where you need to climb up again.
Managing that knowledge in a conscious way... just being aware that you’re
not doing anything wrong and this is just the way it is and being okay with that
is probably the biggest challenge in star?ng and growing a business -‐ Manuel
explained.
Entrepreneurship -‐ A Tool To Make A Change In The World
I asked Manuel why he chose entrepreneurship? His reply was very
straighkorward. “I want to make a change in the world.” He cites Elon Musk as
his inspira?on. According to him entrepreneurship is about tackling big
problems in the world, it’s a journey of making an impact. He says that there
are a few people in the world who build a plakorm to bring change to the
world and Manuel wants to be one of them.
You might ask how selling jeans fits in, but Manuel is already thinking about
how to ?e his entrepreneurship to really impact the world in a posi?ve way.
Manuel is especially passionate about educa?on: “I think that I am privileged
that I can sit with you and talk -‐ and power of knowledge is something I
personally care about and I will be building a company towards it.”
How To Run A Successful Kickstarter
Campaign with Manuel RappardIs Your Project Right For Kickstarter? Before you jump on the Kickstarter bandwagon its very important that you
understand what kind of project is suitable for a crowdfunding campaign and
whether or not yours fits the criteria.
Why launch a Kickstarter campaign
Kickstarter can definitely be a great place to raise money for projects. For
Manuel though, Kickstarter was not only a place to raise money but also a way
to put his idea to the ul?mate test.
Does the market really want what I have? And how badly do they want it?
The money in this case is the indicator that can tell you these two things. But
being successful on Kickstarter also gives you something else, it enables you to
build a community of early adopters who are excited about your product and
can help you along the way. Two things startups need the most.
So if you are thinking about launching a Kickstarter campaign, think about it as
a test for idea valida?on, build a community and realise that if successful your
life may never be the same.
Before You Start...Before you even decide on running a crowdfunding campaign there are lots of
things you need to think about. Manuel cites four key components to
launching a successful campaign. These include:
• Great Idea
• Really Simple Message
• Execu?on, and
• Great Timing
Do You Have A Great Idea?Not every idea will be a success
Let’s get something clear. Not every idea can be a success on Kickstarter.
According to Manuel though, there is a specific type of idea that works best.
The Kickstarter audience is looking for ideas that inspire. They want to be part
of something different that challenges the status quo. When you look at the
most successful campaigns, these were the ones that inspired an army of
people and focused on changing something, disrup?ng something, or serving a
bigger purpose.
The Kickstarter audience don’t want to put up their money towards something
that is slightly beQer or different. They want to support people that need their
help to succeed. The Kickstarter audience needs to know that they are
suppor?ng this guy, girl or team! Thats why it is so important to show how you
are different to what already exists and how you are going to make a
difference. Your idea is the founda?on of your campaign.
What won’t work?
An example Manuel gives is something that isn’t for the general public. So if
you are in a medical field and you are building something for doctors,
Kickstarter isn’t for you. There is a very simple reason for it. The general public
would not buy this product and doctors are not on Kickstarter. Kickstarter is a
plakorm selling directly to early adopter consumers.
Is your idea a Kickstarter success?
To see if your idea has a chance of being a big success you should ask yourself:
• How is what I am doing changing the status quo? How is it different?
• What is the big vision behind my product? How will it change or improve
people’s lives?
• Is the idea that I have relevant to a specific audience on Kickstarter
(basically general public of early adopters)? Or is there an audience I can
tap into that will be willing to pledge for my idea?
Think about what you are doing, what the idea is, how it inspires people, and
then if there is an audience of consumers.
How to choose a plaUorm to launch your campaignWhen you know that your idea is suitable for crowdfunding your next step is to
determine which plakorm you will use to achieve your goal. There are plenty
of different plakorms you could poten?ally launch your campaign on. The two
biggest ones are Kickstarter and Indiegogo.
What do you need to consider when choosing your plaUorm?
Although it might sound simple, there is lots to think about when choosing a
plakorm to raise your money. Here are a few considera?ons to help you with
your decision.
1. All or Nothing / Keep it All funding
For the All or Nothing model you either raise your target from your backers
and you get access to the money OR you don’t and backers never get charged.
It’s straighkorward and easy. The tricky part is how much to ask for with this
model. This is where you need to put some thought in. It needs to be a
reasonable amount based on your project and expecta?ons of your audience
but big enough to actually finance your project.
With the Keep it All funding, you get to keep all the money raised minus fees.
This can make things a bit trickier and also increase the risk for both you and
your backers. Just imagine that you raised 20% of your costs. Most probably
you will have to fund the rest from your own pocket to fulfill your promises or
abandon the project. Will you have that money? There is also no guarantee for
your backers and that can also decreases the number of poten?al backers.
On the other hand, if your goal is $20,000 and you raise $18,000 on an All or
Nothing funding model, you will be disappointed to be so close and not receive
any funds. If your business or idea can be done without reaching its full goal,
then Keep it All funding might be a good op?on for you. In both cases be wary
though and explain the situa?on fully to your backers.
2. Assistance given
Different plakorms offer different levels of assistance. And although this is
more of a personal decision, it is important for your project. Some plakorms
offer comprehensive support system to help you create the best campaign
possible. In this case your project may go through mul?ple reviews and
changes before its even launched.
Other plakorms will leave you with tutorials and blog posts to help you make
the most of your campaign. To determine what is best for you, simply ask
yourself how confident you feel about puqng together your campaign. Also
review different op?ons of different plakorms and what types of projects best
fit their plakorm.
3. Your target group
In recent years we have seen lots of new plakorms popping up which are
focused on different niches. Here are a few according to the genre and
exper?se:
RockThePost is focused on entrepreneurs, startups and small businesses
CrowdSupply has been created for projects shipping physical products
Ar?stShare will fund music projects
Causes.com and Razoo are focusing more on causes than profitable projects
GreenUnite gathers projects around sustainability, focusing on crea?ng a
connec?on between conscious individuals and corpora?ons.
Why consider a niche plakorm over Kickstarter or Indiegogo? Simply because
they may have a very targeted consumer base built up for you. On a smaller
plakorm you could have a much easier ?me reaching this par?cular group of
people over trying to reach the same type of audience on a crowded plakorm
like Kickstarter.
Browse your opZons
To see the variety and look for the best plakorm for your needs you can use
Crowdsunite -‐ a great site enabling you to search for plakorms according to the
genre, type of funding you are acer and supported loca?ons.
4. Branding
Last but not least is branding. Branding is connected to the plakorm you
choose. If you put your project on GreenUnite, you are automa?cally puqng
yourself in this specific niche to indicate that your project is about
sustainability.
Why Manuel chose Kickstarter
Apart from Kickstarter being the biggest crowdfunding plakorm with the
highest amount of pledges, there was another factor which aQracted Manuel’s
aQen?on. It was branding.
“For me the branding is the key. People need to feel inspired by branding, have
something they can iden?fy themselves with, the character they aspire to and
want to be associated with” says Manuel.
He applied the same reasoning to choosing a crowdfunding plakorm. The goal
was to be associated with the best plakorm to launch the best product. The
fact that Kickstarter has established a crowdfunding movement and 85% of all
transac?on in crowdfunding goes through it was enough for Manuel to know
that Kickstarter was a great fit for RPMWEST jeans.
Your Powerful MessageThis is cri?cal. You need to have a very simple yet powerful message.
Ask yourself... What is that one sentence that you can give to somebody that
they can tell their friends? That one sentence that you can post on Facebook
that will be reposted. The one sentence that will inspire but leave people with
the feeling that they want more. Find a hook that captures your idea, it doesn't
have to be comprehensive but it needs to aQract aQen?on and make people
ask ques?ons.
For RPMWEST that was “Perfect Jeans, Delivered.” It was enough to leave
people wondering, asking ques?ons and even inspiring.
Manuel points out that this part is extremely important, par?cularly in the age
of social media and very limited opportunity to grab someones aQen?on. So
you need find a hook for your audience. A simple message that can inspire
people. These liQle snippets and ideas that get aQached to people, products,
companies and brands are what we do naturally when given the chance. If we
give people a paragraph on the other hand, nobody will remember it. Having a
clear idea and very simple message is really key.
Along with a simple message, RPMWEST worked hard on its branding and
communica?on, crea?ng a special feel and touch around its product. The
teaser video, the landing page, the message, everything was aligned with its
main brand ideas of quality, raw denim and honesty.
How do you cra\ your message?
Be ready to spend lots of ?me on it. The RPMWEST tagline went through
tonnes of revisions and Manuel even involved a copywriter to make sure that
people are drawn to the language used. What he suggests is to have an ini?al
list of taglines and take it through a number of revisions. Get feedback from
people, ask experts, talk to marketers and of course ask friends what they
understand and feel acer reading your tagline. But he also suggests that you as
the entrepreneur and biggest believer in your brand must feel it, you must feel
that this is the right message that inspires and matches what you stand for.
Some good examples:
“A BeQer Way To Work.” -‐ 37signals
“Think Different” -‐ Apple
“Save Money. Live BeQer” -‐ Walmart
“Just Do It” -‐ Nike
“Eat Fresh” -‐ Subway
Execu?on BEFORE You LaunchAs Whit ScoQ covered in his post on RPMWEST, ‘Manuel’s execu?on on his
campaign was flawless. Clearly, an incredible amount of work went into its
launch.’ Making it clear that you need prepara?on well in advance to have a
chance of success. Manuel explained that he prepared 2.5 months before he
launched his Kickstarter.
Prepare for your success
Manuel explains “It’s a lot of hard work. I have seen some great ideas and
people behind Kickstarter campaigns launch too quickly. They basically took
their first video and first message, went with it and failed.”
That is why you need to make sure that your campaign is well thought out, so
everything will be as picture perfect as possible to allow your idea to succeed.
Of course you will s?ll run into challenges and things will not go according to
the plan, but by puqng in your 150% and focusing on prepara?on, you
increase your chances for success. So fully commit!
There are a few things which you will have to get done before your campaign
starts:
1. Video and Copy: RPMWEST ran its video and copy by a tonne of people and
had a huge amount of changes and itera?ons before they launched
2. Get the word out and start building community BEFORE the campaign (A
part which people really underes?mate that requires quite a large amount of
work)
“A lot of the ?me you think, oh I have a great idea, and great message. It’s
really not that easy” -‐ Manuels explains. Kickstarter will give you some tools to
gain trac?on but you really need to fight for every single one of your
supporters.
How To Prepare For A Successful Launch?
Step 1. AcZvate your personal connecZonsAround 6 weeks before the campaign Manuel exported all his contacts from
Gmail, Facebook, LinkedIn and any other place he could think. Then he
arranged them into three ?ers. He knew that from his list that about 50 people
will support him no maQer what but he could not rely on them alone.
He divided all his contacts into 3 ?ers:
First Zer -‐ Your closest friends. This bunch of people you may have known for a
long ?me and are in touch with on a regular basis and are ready to contact
about your idea as soon as possible.
Second Zer -‐ Your friends who you consider good friends but you are not in
touch regularly. You are probably friends on Facebook, have their email and
you follow roughly what has been happening with them but you may not have
talked to them for a few months.
Third Tier -‐ If you don’t have their email address already they’re probably third
?er. These are acquaintances who you have met at some point but have never
kept in touch. You might have their contact details on Facebook or Linkedin but
don’t know them well.
According to the categorisa?on Manuel would decide on an interac?on
strategy. In essence, how early to let them know about the campaign, what
message to ensure involvement at the right ?me and how to maximise sharing
within these groups. Each of these three group would receive a different
message from him to let them know about the Kickstarter for RPMWEST.
Turning your closest friends into your biggest advocates
By scanning his personal network, Manuel was also able to find people to help
execute with the campaign. Manuel found people to help create copy, an
amazing video and high quality photos for the Kickstarter. He involved quite a
few people and gained a tonne of value from their input in the development of
the campaign. These people became his biggest supporters and advocates as
they became part of the project.
So how can you do it?
To make sure that you turn your friends into raving supporters follow these ?ps
from Manuel:
• Give them everything they need to help you. That includes the one
simple message you craced and email templates, so its easy to share.
• Send regular updates on the project
• Ask for help and feedback (but don’t overwhelm them)
• Ask for shares every ?me
If you have a team or a bunch of close friends who are keen to be involved and
help to make your campaign a success, you can put together a simple guide for
them on how to share the message.
It is actually a strategy we used with my current project that helps you grow
real veggies inside your house from your smartphone! We used this strategy to
spread the message when we entered a compe??on called the Global Startup
BaQle.
The first stage of the compe??on involved public vo?ng, so we needed to
convince as many people as possible to vote for us. We had a team of 7 and
close friends who were keen to help us spread the word. So to maximise the
effect of sharing on personal networks, I put up a simple guide for our team to
spread the message. This guide included email templates, ?ps to share on
social networks and a summary of ac?ons to be performed, as well as an
explana?on of why some of them are cri?cal.
It made sharing and spreading the RIGHT message seamless for everybody
involved. As it made such a huge difference to help us get votes, I decided to
share it with you so you can save ?me and easily adjust it to your needs. Check
it out here.
Other advice from founders of successful Kickstarter projects include:
• Offer them “sneak peaks” that no one else gets eg. product renderings,
pictures and Kickstarter videos before they’re released.
• Throw a launch party. This is a very effec?ve way to engage with your
friends and make them a part of the project instead of trying to email or
call every single one of them. During the party, you can show them the
video and tell them why you need their help. The energy you can create
can really help your campaign to succeed.
Step 2. Set up goals to be achieved before the campaign startPre-‐campaign metrics and building a community before the campaign
Manuel knew that building a community before his campaign is what could
make or break him. It was very important to showcase backers that the idea
already had some trac?on, mostly to break the ini?al trust barrier. He did not
want the first few backers to feel like they were actually the first person,
instead he wanted to make them feel that they are part of something
meaningful with other people.
To achieve that he set up goals he needed to achieve before the start of the
Kickstarter campaign. These were:
• At least 1000 visitors to the site,
• 100 sign ups for a newsleQer, and
• 250 people on Facebook
Step 3. Develop a Strategy To Reach Your GoalsAccording to Manuel, it all comes down to having a strategy and knowing what
you need to achieve your goals. For Manuel the most important things to
determine success happen before the campaign.
He developed a comprehensive strategy that enabled him to not only reach a
significant number of people but also cleverly devised a plan to make the
RPMWEST campaign look much bigger than it was. He put a lot of effort into
understanding human psychology and the value of momentum. This enabled
him to turn the RPMWEST campaign into a well oiled “momentum building
machine.”
Manuel’s strategies to create a momentum building machine
Manuel is clear that building this community and reaching the pre-‐campaign
goals were not easy. As a founder you will have to go way beyond to come up
with ways to spread the message and aQract your backers. Here are some
unconven?onal strategies RMPWEST have used to aQract audience:
1. Teaser video
Way before the Kickstarter campaign started, RPMWEST released a teaser
video. A simple and short video, not introducing the product but instead the
idea behind reinven?ng jeans. You can see the video here .
This short video sparks curiosity and conveys the emo?ons Manuel wants
associated with his brand. The minimalis?c approach focused on one single
message leaves a viewer intrigued and wan?ng to learn more.
The video played an important role of geqng support from friends and family
and bringing them together under the same vision. It was also proof that the
campaign is real, professional and inspiring.
2. Landing Page.
The landing page is another piece that is an important part of the campaign.
You can put up a simple page using Launch Rock, build your own by buying a
Wordpress template or hire somebody on Freelancer.com. Whatever you do,
you need to make sure that your message is clear, inspiring and easily sharable.
The main thing is to include your video and a signup form to capture those
interested in your campaign.
3. Email outreach and social media.
When your landing page is in place you can email your first and second ?er
friends (with a personalised message) and ask them to share your landing page
by email, TwiQer and Facebook with people that would be interested. Make
sure you also leverage social media by engaging with key industry influencers
that would be interested.
Addi?onally be wary of the way you interact with your audience on your social
plakorms to maximise engagement. Here is a quick guide on what works best
on different plakorms: The Guide to Perfect Social Network Pos?ng
4. RemarkeZng
a. Cookies
Manuel wanted to have a way to track everybody who came to the RPMWEST
landing page. Understanding the psychology of human behaviour he wanted to
be able to reach out and remind poten?al backers about his campaign. To do
so he built a tool that would leave cookies on a browser of anybody who
visited the site, so he could touch base with them if they didn’t sign up.
To do the same for your campaign you do not need to build your own tool
(although you can build a simple html snippet if you are familiar with coding.
Following the instruc?on here) to be able to leave cookies. Companies that do
retarge?ng campaigns will be able to help you out with that.
b. Retargeted adverZsing
Acer leaving the cookies and having the ability to follow up with landing page
visitors, Manuel launched a hyper targeted adver?sing campaign. Using the
services of the company called Adroll he was able to show the adver?sing of
the RMPWEST launch campaign to people who already visited the site.
The effect was amazing. Those who visited the site would see the adver?sing
of the company all over the web. This tac?c accomplished a few goals:
• Helped visitors feel apart of something big and generate trust,
• Acted as a reminder that the campaign is on, and
• Established a strong brand image for RPMWEST with those who visited
the landing page.
Manuel recalls geqng mul?ple emails from friends and site visitors saying
“Man!! I’m seeing you guys everywhere. Amazing campaign!”
5. Email Follow Up
According to Manuel email marke?ng is underes?mated and should be used to
its full poten?al. Send frequent updates on the project and deliver content
your audience is interested in to build trust and connec?on. Those email
campaigns will also come in handy during the actual launch and play a very
important role in driving and maintaining the momentum explains Manuel. You
need to make sure that you have systems in place to follow up with your
audience. An email client will do a great job here. Whether Mailchimp or
Aweber or another, just make sure you are make the most out of it with great
communica?on with your audience.
6. ContacZng the Press
Press, bloggers, journalists are all cri?cal in geqng the word out but its much
harder than it looks. You will face lots of rejec?on and most will never respond.
Manuel reached out to a couple hundred outlets to gain their commitment to
write about RPMWEST on the day of launch. He eventually got commitment
from 10-‐12 outlets.
According to Manuel there’s no magic trick, it’s just lots of hard work and there
is no simple answer. It takes a lot of ?me to reach out to the press, write
personalised emails, research each one of them, find a personal touch and
make them feel that you care.
Geqng media coverage for your launch is both science and an art. Leo
Widrich, from Buffer in his blog post How To Get Media Coverage For Your
Startup: A Complete Guide gives some incredible advice. Check it out.
A few more things for thought...Timing
What day and what ?me is the best to send out the message? It will very much
depend on your audience and their loca?on but here is a great visual guide on
when you should be pos?ng from Buffer.
Manuel decided to launch strategically on a Tuesday. He considered Mondays
to be when people were just geqng into work mode acer the weekend and
geqng through tonnes of email. Acer that ini?al Monday email chaos, Tuesday
seemed perfect when combined with a launch ?me of 8am when everybody is
munching on their morning press.
Similarly, you have to be on the top of things by monitoring your men?ons on
blogs and in the media. You might not want to share that post immediately if
it’s in the middle of the night but rather schedule a tweet or Facebook post for
the morning for more exposure. For monitoring you can use plakorms like
men?on.net.
PercepZon
As covered in Whit ScoQ’s great post:
[...]Manuel suggests that you appear to be 90% done and only need the money
for the last 10%. This gives your donors the impression that you’re well put
together and this is going to happen for sure. PercepIon goes a very long way
in crowdfunding[...]
Reward Structure
From Manuel's experience the reward structure you put in place is a two sided
coin. What differen?ated the RPMWEST campaign among many other things
was the wide range of rewards prepared.
“I think we were successful because we had a lot of rewards and got people
really excited, but... its a real pain” -‐ he says. RPMWEST offered 16 levels of
rewards, offering everything from a denim swatch (fabric sample from the first
produc?on run), handcraced leather belts, premium T-‐shirts, and of course
different types of jeans (classic, slim, black denim and various limited edi?on).
They even offered a “Jeans for Life package”.
But the exci?ng structure came with pains when the RPMWEST campaign
turned out to be successful. If you are commiQed to too many special rewards
it can really hurt your opera?ons, so make sure you take that into
considera?on early. It’s just something to keep in mind at the end of the day,
you s?ll have to do whatever it takes to be a success explains Manuel.
So what works? Offer something of value
Your reward should be something special, a limited edi?on, a one-‐of-‐a-‐kind
experience or even personalised items. Something that brings pride and the
feeling of sa?sfac?on, yet be exci?ng and useful. For RPMWEST that was
personalisa?on like marking each pair of jeans with a produc?on date, and
unusual rewards like this one:
There is no magic bullet here, nor rules, so you can and should be crazy
crea?ve. Here are some ?ps to help you out:
• Have a brainstorming session with your friends, ask people on TwiQer,
and ask your community! You are guaranteed to get some good ideas.
• Put yourself in your backers shoes: ‘Would you drop the cash on your
rewards?’ The answer to that ques?on will tell you a lot about your
project’s poten?al.
• Keep it simple. According to quan?ta?ve research done by Craig Mod on
the most lucra?ve fundraising levels, $50 is the sweet spot.
• Factor in the cost of your reward when seqng the reward level; do not
promise something for $20 when it costs $15 to produce and deliver
each one!
Here is 10 of the Most Clever Kickstarter Rewards by Carol Pinchefsky for
inspira?on.
Step 4. Automate for hecZc Zmes during launch.Building your community before the launch is one thing, but developing a
strategy of what to do during launch is a totally different story. “We have heard
it from other people we talked to but I would never expect it to be as hec?c as
it was” -‐ explains Manuel.
During launch you will be consumed by tonnes of things you did not expect eg.
people asking you ques?ons you would never see coming, press contac?ng you
and interview requests. So before you know it, your day is full.
This is why you want to have a strategy in place to you know what you are
doing. Otherwise you might lose momentum, and momentum is something
you can’t afford to lose in any startup or Kickstarter campaign. Making people
feel that this thing is going crazy and actually taking advantage is one of your
most valuable early assets.
How to make sure you are completely ready and covered?
• Write all your email templates way before and set up everything in a way
that all you need is a push of a buQon,
• You will be contac?ng addi?onal press during the campaign -‐ so make
sure you are ready for that and not spending ?me looking for contact
details or researching bloggers, and
• Try to predict all the ques?ons people might ask about your product,
company and your vision.
4 hours to success -‐ another reason why preparaZon is everything
Researchers at the Swiss Federal Ins?tute of Technology in Lausanne can
predict the likelihood of your campaign success within 4 hours of its launch
with the accuracy higher than 76 percent.
The method takes into account detailed informa?on about backers as well as
TwiQer men?ons. By tracking these two variables along with more
conven?onal data, such as campaign dura?on.
Why is it important to you? Because according to this research, how your first
4 hours look will determine the rest of your campaign. In your prepara?on
stage you need to plan and get ready so those first four hours set you up for
success.
During the campaign Launch...Manuel launched the campaign at midnight, a few hours before the official
launch ?me given to the press to give himself some ?me to adjust for any
errors that could happen. Within 3 minutes he had his first pledge, 25 minutes
in he reached $700 and by 8am (the official launch ?me) they had $35,000 in
pledges. “It showed me what is possible.“ -‐ Manuel
Your focus during the launch is to keep the momentum going. This might be
the only opportunity you will ever have to get so much 'easy' ongoing
aQen?on. Manuel shared some insights on how to achieve this.
How to keep the momentum goingBe super responsive
Manuel made sure that he was answering backers ques?ons within minutes.
To do so he downloaded the Kickstarter app and literally spent hours
responding to comments on the project page. It really paid off as people felt
that somebody cared, and they really valued the transparency from the
founder. Being there on Kickstarter for backers, following up, upda?ng,
engaging and keeping the conversa?on going is a major factor to keep the
momentum going.
In the same manner, Manuel advises that you follow up with press, blog
comments, Facebook men?ons and the Reddit community. There are a few
tools which can help you stay on the top of that. Two of my favourites are
Social Men?on (free) which scans and monitors 100+ social media proper?es
for your brand and Brand24 (paid with free trial) which scans not only on a
social landscape but the whole online environment.
Here is an example of a Reddit thread Manuel started when he launched his
campaign.
During the campaign itself Manuel also recorded a few videos like this one
answering various ques?ons people were asking, explaining the process and
asking them to share the message all over the place.
Keep hustling
To keep the momentum, you really need to keep on thinking about what
strategies that can help you achieve that. Acer the ini?al launch RPMWEST
introduced a special denim campaign and reached out to another few hundred
bloggers to tell his story.
They also ran an “Invite Your Friends” contest and selected the winners on
Facebook. To do so for your campaign, you can use Contest Domina?on which
is a simple contest socware that can help you create an online contest to
generate leads and reward people that help you out.
And they even created s?ckers to help spread the word among many other
things.
There is always more to do Manuel says and you need to keep on finding new
ways to tell your story while remembering that people really want to be a part
of something bigger than themselves.
The Days Acer Your Kickstarter Success.What if your Kickstarter goes absolutely nuts? What if you raise 1000% of the
money you thought you would? How will it change your world? To Manuel this
was so much more frightening than his campaign not working out. It’s
frightening because everything is changing so quickly, your life will change
forever, the way that you have to deal with the money, what kind of person
you will need to be with a team and even the way you talk to your suppliers.
RPMWEST outdid its produc?on facility in 2 days. “I had no clue where to go, I
drove down to LA and I met with produc?on facili?es and I didn’t expect to be
here” -‐ Manuel recalls. He encourages people to think about the huge upside;
what if this Kickstarter goes crazy!
If successfully funded, this is just a
beginning of your journey and now its the
?me to deliver on all the promises made
as a part of your campaign. Many of the
Kickstarters campaigns miss their delivery
deadlines, which can be fine but many
lose the trust of their backers due to lack
of communica?on. And the same power
and the momentum which generated you support when not handled acer the
end of your Kickstarter campaign can turn against you with press and whole
communi?es of people losing your trust and turning against you.
Although its okay if you have a slip on your deadline, you need to make sure
that you are transparent and communicate regularly with your backers. Ensure
that you update them frequently, send videos, pictures, tell them where are
you, be open about the challenges you face and even ask for help if you need
it. All the more, just treat them as your investors who you are accountable. If
you do that well, they will come back and support you more than ever before,
even if you do miss a deadline or two.
One last piece of advice
When asked to give just one last piece of advice, Manuel replied: “Do your
homework, do a lot of prepara?on, be pa?ent and most importantly show your
backers that you really care and you will be alright”
Your Ac?on Summary and Goals
Step 1. Determine whether your project is right for KickstarterNot every project will be successful on Kickstarter and you need to determine
whether crowdfunding is a good plakorm for you.
Ask yourself a few ques?ons before you jump into the Kickstarter madness:
• How is what I am doing changing the status quo? How is it different?
• What is the big vision behind the product? How will it change/improve
people’s lives?
• Is the idea that I have relevant for a specific audience? Either that
audience already exists on Kickstarter (general public of early adopters)?
Or is there an audience I can tap into easily that will pledge to my idea?
• Is your idea big enough to raise the amount of money you want?
Step 2. Create a strong inspiring iniZal message and video (consider
doing an extra teaser video too)As Manuel kept on emphasising this ini?al message is an extremely important
part of your campaign. It needs to be short and to the point and inspiring. Your
tagline can be the most important words you will create for your Kickstarter
campaign.
How do you do it?
Grab a pen and paper, sit down and follow the steps:
1. What is your value proposi?on, the benefits you are providing?
2. What is your bigger vision? what impact do we want to have in the
world?
3. What is your brand? (note down feelings and emo?ons you want people
to associate with it)
4. For 10 minutes brainstorm as many taglines as possible.
5. Choose 3 you like the most
6. Get feedback from friends, family and your community
Going through this process will help you to nail down a really good tagline.
Step 3. Recruit a team of supporters from your contactsPut all your contacts into a spreadsheet
Follow Manuel’s advice and extract all contact details of people you know from
any network you have. Put it into a spreadsheet and divide them into three
?ers.
First Zer -‐ Your closest friends. This bunch you may have known for a long ?me
and are in touch with on a regular basis.
From this ?er iden?fy friends who will be able to help with puqng together a
campaign (video, copywriters, marke?ng guys, PR, designers, coders). Put them
in a separate document.
Second Zer -‐ As stated before these are those of your friends who you follow
roughly on Facebook but you have not talked to them for a few months, yet
you s?ll consider them good friends and you think may contribute.
Third Tier -‐ These are acquaintances who you have met at some point but have
never kept in touch.
Reach out strategy
The next step is to create a strategy to contact each ?er.
Start with ?er one, your closest friends and contact them as early as possible.
Present the idea and ask for feedback.
The Tier two and three contacts you will be contac?ng closer to the launch day,
you need to make sure that the no?ce is not too short and allows them to
share and contribute.
Step 4. Know your audienceYou are launching your own
business. Your success will
par?ally depend on how well you
know who your audience is and
where you can reach them easily.
Leave nothing to chance. Define
your ideal Kickstarter backer by
following Noah Kagan’s advice and answer these two most important
ques?ons:
1. Who is your ideal customer?
2. Where are they?
Step 5. Set Up Clear Pre-‐Campaign Goals Look carefully at the numbers you need to raise for your campaign to be
successful. Think about it as sales, how many people do you need to reach,
who would pay an average of eg $50 at a 5% conversion rate. That means that
if you need $20,000 divide this number by $50. That equals 400 backers at $50.
$20,000/$50 = 400 backers
Taking a 5% conversion rate, this means you would need to reach 8,000
people.
(100*400)/5 = 8,000 targeted people
So with those assump?ons your efforts need to make sure to reach at least
8,000 during your campaign to raise $20,000. And although its a rough number
it gives you a good idea of the scale of your efforts and will help you determine
your pre-‐campaign goals.
The pre-‐campaign goals enable you to plan for this outreach and do some of
the work before the campaign starts.
Your pre-‐campaign goals
Decide on your target:
-‐Number of email signups (email addresses you want to collect), and
-‐Social media metrics -‐TwiQer followers, Facebook likes (Depending where
your target audience is located)
So you need to determine what communi?es you want to reach and consider
how this may translate to backers. The ques?on you need to keep asking
yourself is how many of these people will become backers.
Step 6. Create the Strategy to Achieve Your Pre-‐Campaign Goalsa). Create a landing page.
This is important. As Manuel says, lots of people send their poten?al backers
straight to a Kickstarter page when they are not ready to back you up. You have
to build trust with these people first. To do so, send your poten?al backers to
your landing page even before you start your Kickstarter and capture their
email address to contact them. The landing page also serves as an opportunity
to do a retarge?ng campaign, track the number of visitors and also build trust.
You should use an email client (eg MailChimp -‐ it’s free for your first 2,000
subscribers) to be able to create and send follow up messages to your
audience. You can offer something for free in order to encourage people to
sign up to your list such as an ebook, exclusive offer or an auto-‐responder
series related to your product, whatever you can come up with which is
product related and provides value for your audience.
To set up a landing page simply go to LaunchRock (which is free) or use
Unbounce (paid) to put up your landing page. Second register for MailChimp
and integrate it with your landing page.
b). Email outreach
Email is your secret weapon. Use it well. When the landing page is ready, your
first step is to send an email out to all your personal contacts asking them to
check it out and share it with friends and family. To do this you are using the
list of contacts you have created in step three. Tell them about your project
and the site you have put up. Then ask them to do just one thing: Share that
page with anyone and everyone they think would be interested.
Your next step is to set up an email sequence for those who go to your landing
page and sign up. You need an email campaign that sends messages on a
regular schedule at ?med intervals to keep your product or service top-‐of-‐mind
and people interested.
Here is a fantas?c guide from the guys at Crazy Egg that walks you through
how to create an awesome email sequence.
Use your own judgement on what should be included in the emails to build
trust and interest, so when the ?mes comes your poten?al backers will take
ac?on. Addi?onally to your email sequence remember to send updates on
your project, ask for help and personal messages related to the project eg. You
can reveal some details about the project and drive your list to a separate
landing page and ask them to share the Kickstarter to unlock an extra level of
rewards.
c). Social Media
Here is an incredible resource from Hybrid Vigor Project team showing exactly
how the project got funded on a Kickstarter with most of their backers being
TwiQer followers! He covers everything from seqng up TwiQer account,
building your audience, engaging with followers to some advanced techniques
and strategies. Make sure you watch the video included on the page!
Determine which plaUorms you will be using to promote your campaign.
Where is your target audience? Are they on Facebook? TwiQer? Pinterest?
Where can you reach them?
Again keep in mind when you will be pos?ng and how. Determine the strategy
by using these two guides:
1. A great visual guide on when you should be pos?ng from Buffer.
2. The Guide to Perfect Social Network Pos?ng
d). Get CreaZve.
Gather your friends and brainstorm all kinds of crazy ideas . Not only they will
feel involved but this will also help you to execute on these ideas. Here is a
quick guide on how to run a brainstorming session.
Step 7. Reach Out to PressReaching out to press is an important part of your campaign. As Manuel
men?ons you want to do it well in advance, first to build a rela?onship with
them and second to lock in some of them to write about your launch day.
Saying that, there is probably hundreds of blogs and online magazines you
could poten?ally contact. Do not. To maximise your efforts use 80/20 rule
which teaches you that 20% of stories will yield 80% of your press results.
a). Make a List of the Biggest Influencers
Now what you need to do is to find and create a list of the biggest influencers
in your area. There are many ways to iden?fy influencers. Here is a few tools
you might want to use:
• FollowerWonk is a nicy program by Moz that quan?fies TwiQer influence
• Topsy is a search engine that ranks content based on social shares.
• Alltop to look for biggest venues in your niche.
• Klout Topics is a great place to find influencers on a specific topic. Here is
the instruc?on on How to Search Klout Influencers for Your Brand by
Topic
• Twellow is a TwiQer directory enabling you to add yourself in 3,000
categories and connect with people who are influen?al within these
categories.
• Google your main keywords and use SERPS Redux Bookmarklet to scrape
the urls into a spreadsheet
b). Determine which from the list are most valuable
Mike Del Ponte from Soma in his case study has a simple recipe for your media
outreach. Advising that you should focus on these 4 elements while doing your
outreach:
1. Relevance -‐ Is the audience of the blog you are trying to reach relevant?
Will the readers LOVE your project?
2. Readership -‐ How many unique visitors do they have monthly? (You can
use SEOMoz Toolbar to help you determine that)
3. Rela?onships -‐ Do you know anybody who can make an introduc?on?
Personal connec?ons have amazing power. Make sure to check for any
mutual friends.
4. Reach -‐ Will this blog promote your post on launch? Will they genuinely
get excited about your project? What is their Facebook and TwiQer
following? What about RSS? It’s not enough to get coverage. It’s about
how this coverage will be distributed.
When you have a list of your poten?al contacts rank them according to these 4
criteria. You can use a scale of 1-‐4 (1 being week, 4 being very strong). Your
excel sheet should give you a good list of blogs with the biggest poten?al that
you should contact at first.
Mike gives you an example how the spreadsheet will look like:
When the list is ready and sorted the last thing you need is the contact details
to reach out to a blogger or a journalist. If your list is big you can use Cita?on
Labs and their Contact Finder Tool. It’s paid but it can save you a lot of ?me.
c). Reach out
This is a tricky part as you do not want to out of the blue contac?ng them. The
first thing you need apart from your list is to make a detailed but short
research about the par?cular blogger and crac a personalised message.
If you have more ?me I highly suggest that you use the approach suggested by
Neil Patel in his Guide To Advanced Link Building a Chapter on Rela?onship Link
Building. You will find there, a step by step approach from geqng no?ced by a
blogger and providing a value to email templates, rela?onship management,
all the way to scoring a blog post. Neil explains it in the link building context
but the process outlines a way to build rela?onships and trust with people.
This can be magic when you are trying to get coverage at the right ?me.
If you are on a limited ?me and do not have weeks to build that rela?onship I
suggest checking out the guide from Leo Widrich, How To Get Media Coverage
For Your Startup: A Complete Guide to help you up the chances of geqng the
best PR coverage possible.
Step 8. Plan Your AcZons During the CampaignAs Manuel men?oned, when the campaign goes live, you will experience a
level of chaos you have never experienced. It’s important that you keep calm
and just push buQons to reap the benefits of months of prepara?on.
An incredibly useful tool which can turn your life around is Boomerang -‐ a
simple Gmail plugin which enables you to schedule emails. What you want to
do is drac and save all the emails, so on launch day you can just press a buQon
the minute you launch and focus on other areas.
An example of a first email you might want to send to your friends:
FINAL PHASE: Ac?onNow you know the secrets of a successful crowdfunding campaign, you too have the tools and strategies you can use to give yourself the best chance to succeed. Now its all about execu?on.
Go and crowdfund like your life depends on it!
Good Luck!
Tools and ResourcesLaunchRock -‐ simple landing pages
Klout -‐ measure online influence, you can use it to iden?fy the biggest
influencers in your network
Email MarkeZng
Boomerang -‐ A Gmail plugin that allows you to schedule emails. You can also
receive reminders to follow up on an email you sent if the other person does
not reply. (Free)
MailChimp -‐ A service to design and send mass emails. (Free if you have less
than 2,000 subscribers and send less than 12,000 emails per month)
How to create an awesome email sequence -‐ A guide from the guys at Crazy
Egg
Social Media MarkeZng
How to get your project funded with TwiQer followers is a resource from
Hybrid Vigor Project team
Contest Domina?on is a simple contest socware that can help you create
online contest to generate leads and reward influencers.
A great visual guide on when you should be pos?ng from Buffer.
The Guide to Perfect Social Network Pos?ng
IdenZfying Influencers
FollowerWonk is a nicy program by Moz that quan?fies TwiQer influence
Topsy which is is a search engine that ranks content based on social shares.
Alltop is a plakorm gathering all the top headlines from popular topics around
the web.
Twellow is a TwiQer directory enabling you to add yourself in 3,000 categories
and connect with people who are influen?al within these categories.
Klout Topics is a great place to find influencers in a specific topic. Here is the
instruc?on on How to Search Klout Influencers for Your Brand by Topic
SERPS Redux Bookmarklet scrapes the urls from the search into a spreadsheet
Media Outreach
Moz Toolbar
Neil Patel in his Guide To Advanced Link Building a Chapter on Rela?onship Link
Building
Contact Finder Tool for mass finding of contact details
Hacking Kickstarter: How to Raise $100,000 in 10 Days -‐ incredible ar?cle from
Mike Del Ponte, the person behind the successful Kickstarter Soma
How To Get Media Coverage For Your Startup: A Complete Guide by Leo
Widrich from Buffer
Managing Your Campaign
Custom Kickstarter dashboard -‐ This is an incredible liQle tool build by guys
who launched Soma on Kickstarter. It simply helps you to manage your
Kickstarter campaign by giving you real ?me insights into Facebook, TwiQer
and press metrics all in one place.
Thanks For ReadingPlease thank Manuel Rappard (@manuelrappard) and Agnieszka Nazaruk (@agaonfire) for such an in depth and valuable issue. Can’t wait to see the amazing projects you create.
Enjoy the hard work,
Jamie Cheng
PS. Know someone that will benefit from this issue? Please share it with them.
PPS. Go check out RPMWEST for perfect jeans, delivered and the brilliant job Manuel con?nues to do with branding.
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