More than half of Kickstarter campaigns fail to reach their crowdfunding goal. The presentation examines the reasons for that and suggest the steps to be taken to improve your chances to succeed.

1. Elena Mikhaylova
Davinci Institute
September, 2014

2. Current Success Rate on Kickstarter
is below 44%.
For the majority of other platforms it is even lower.
Most campaigns fail
Even before they go live on a crowdfunding
platform
The main reason –
lack of preparation

3. How long does it take to get ready?

4. It Depends:
 On your funding goal
 On the size of your social network
 On your expertise
 On your resources (time, team, money)
Six weeks to six months

5. Why Crowdfund
 Marketing
 Beta-Testing, Crowdsourcing
 Pre-Sales, Customer Engagement
 Market Validation for the Next Funding Round

6. 4 Types of Crowdfunding
 Donations – money is provided for worthy causes, non-profits or people in need.
There is no expectation for return.
 Rewards – money is given in exchange for “perks”. The most popular one is the
copy of the product to be created as a result of the CF campaign.
 Equity - funds are invested in exchange for the company’s shares or participation in
the future profits.
 Debt (P2P and P2B) – funds are provided in return for interest payments.

8. Is your project a good match for rewards
crowdfunding?
 B2C
 Reasonably affordable for general public
 Easy to understand value for large groups of people
 Can create strong emotions/connection/”cool” image
 Can build a community around the project

9. Planning
What: how lucrative is your product/project?
When: season, how much time do you need to get
ready, how long is the live campaign?
Who: your target group/groups – demographics,
geography, lifestyle
How: marketing channels, influencers

10. these websites provide free or inexpensive solutions for independent
fundraisers:
SelfStarter – free open source software to build your own crowdfunding
website. The latest famous project, Tile, raised $2.6M in July from almost 50,000
backers,
CrowdHoster – an application hosted by CrowdTilt; currently. The most
famous success story – Soylent.me campaign which has raised over $1M,
CrowdfundingSite.net – license plans start from $129 or $328 per year,
IgnitionDeck –WordPress framework, starting from $79 for unlimited
websites,
Mimoona – Plug&Fund app, three monthly payment plans,
ITPrism.com – crowdfunding open source software for Joomla; free and PRO
versions
Celery – platform to accept and manage pre-orders on Wordpress, Tumbrl,
Shopify and other websites; 2% per transaction plus PayPal fees.
http://www.crowdfundproductions.com/kickstarter-alternatives/

11. Top Mistakes
 Not doing your homework: research other projects, their
perks, video, media, comments, etc.
 Not building your crowd in advance: nothing can be
more miserable than a creator launching the project and waiting for the
crowd to rush with the money. Fake fans/followers/pledges
 Not preparing your media outreach, spamming
your network
 Not having three plans
 Not making a budget and sticking to it. Decide if
your goal is mostly fundraising or marketing.
 Not getting feedback for your perks in advance

12. Planning - Perks
 Importance of small perks
 Most popular
 Depends on your target group - amount
 Depends on your target group – lifestyle
 Geography – shipping costs, taxes

13. Planning - Budget
 An Avg. Successful Project on Kickstarter – below
$10,000
 Necessary Minimum/Stages
 How much can you REALISTICALLY raise? - 30% Rule
 How much do you need to raise (on top of your project
costs): platform fee (4%-9%), payment processor fee (3.9% -5%),
cost of production, packaging and shipment for your perks,
marketing costs, canceled pledges, returns, taxes

14. Kickstarter
• Founded in 2009 in New York City
• Available for US, UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand
and Netherlands residents,
• Creative projects in 15 categories
• All-or-Nothing Funding
• Almost 7M Backers
• 80 projects – raised over $1,000,000
• Most successful project – Coolest Cooler– over $13M

15. Kickstarter (cont.)
• Approval process
• Projects only
• Prohibited uses (including causes or personal needs)
• Fees: 5% Kickstarter plus Amazon payments (US) or
Credit Card fees -3-5%. Zero, if the project failed.
• Must have rewards
• Donations between $1 and $10,000 (in the US)
• If a project succeeded, the money usually is available
in 2-3 weeks after the end of the campaign

17. Live Campaign:
Common Mistakes
 Video – too long, not to the point, doesn’t tell a story
 Description – too long, not enough visuals, doesn’t
create trust (timeline, budget)
 Talking about yourself instead of the benefits for
potential backers and partners
 No plan for stretch goals
 Lack of updates, communications with the backers
 No plan for keeping a momentum
 Spamming

18. What do you need to say?
• This is our product
• This is how you are going to benefit from it
• Call to action
• This is our story (how/why we came up with the idea)
• This is how it works
• This is how we are going to use the funds
• This is the timeline
• This is our team
http://www.crowdcrux.com/red-flags-to-avoid-crowdfunding-scams-and-con-artists/

19. Not monitoring and adjusting your action plan
Outsourcing, dropping off your communications
with the backers after the end of your campaign
Not understanding campaign dynamics. Strong start
by your own connections - the Kickstarter community -media
coverage - strangers. The more backers you bring – the stronger
will be support from the crowdfunding platform itself.

20. Money raised: strangers vs your own connections
More than 80% of all Kickstarter campaigns raise
below $10,000
The smaller the amount you are raising, the more you
depend on your own network
 Up to $5,000 – 80-90% from your connections
 $30,000-$50,000 – 20-40% from your connections
 $100,000+ - 10-15% from your own connections

21. Post Campaign
Campaign and Data Analysis
Communications with backers and media
Perks fulfillment
Your Campaign
Hasn’t Succeeded
Until You Deliver The Perks
To Every Backer

22. Contact me
Website: www.CrowdfundProductions.com
Email: info@crowdfundproductions.com
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/elenamikhaylova1/
Skype: Alive_Digital
Twitter: @Alive_Digital