Cheap Animator’s Create Your First Animated Video Ebook Announcement

Launching Kickstarter in 35 Days

I have been talking about creating an e-book version of my animation workshop for the past year. I’ve tweeted about it and people seem interested; I just can’t seem to get myself motivated to move forward.

Now that I am unemployed (I lost my job 2 month ago) I feel it is the best time to do something.

Kickstarter Experiment

In these posts my goal is to chronicle my experience as way for me to stay on track and for you to learn from. I will record such things as:

  • Experiments in using ads to my Kickstarter.
  • My steps to building buzz.
  • Data points such as visitors and income.
  • Mistakes I make.
  • Success I have.
  • And everything else.

I will be posting updates every Monday and Thursday.

Why Kickstarter

Kickstarter is the perfect place for me to pre-sell my ebook in a place that my customers can trust. Kickstarter also has an audience I can sell to. Plus they have easy ways for individuals to share the campaign.

All of these will make it easier for me to spread the word for my pre-sale.

Launch

Launch date is set for November 4, 2014 … Not sure time yet, but probably in the evening so it will end in the evening. That is how Kickstarter works when determining the end time.

Who Are My Target Customers

It is important to know who your selling to before developing a product. You need to figure out if they will buy what you want to sell, can you get them to where you are selling, will they buy, and how much will they pay.
My target customers are people who have always wanted to learn animation who don’t know where to start. This includes people who would like to animate with their kids or adults who have always wanted to give it a try.
Most of them already have ideas of what they want to animate but don’t know how to… YET!

Their Problem

You must have a good understanding of the target customers problems. You can get this from being a version of your customer either in the past or currently. It is also possible (and advised) to have connection with your target market to get feedback on what their problems include.
For my target customers they realize learning animation can be time consuming and expensive. They might have looked into courses or just used “google” to find online tutorials. With the cost of most animation software and the time it takes to learn my target customers think about animation but can’t afford or don’t have time to learn.

My Product’s Solution

My target customers realize with Adobe animation products they are looking to spend several hundred dollars and taking years to learn. There are many other alternative solutions; however, the way I teach most of the animation is done “in camera” making it possible to animate using software anyone can get access to for free (specifically Windows Movie Maker and iMovie).

For those worried about too much information, my ebook is a project based educational book that holds the reader’s hand through the process. The focus is on creating that first video and not on becoming the best animator.

Preparation

Survey Potential Customers

To prepare for my upcoming Kickstarter Campaign I surveyed potential customers. This was in June (2014) because I knew it was going to be important at some point.

I shared it on twitter, my Facebook Page, and on my wall. I also took the time to find a few related Facebook groups and shared there as well.

My survey was probably longer than needed but I knew my readers would be willing to finish. I am not a big fan of the survey directly embed on my site because it doesn’t look natural. However, I gave it a try as a way to let people see the survey before they clicked away.

Information I wanted to gain from the survey:

  • Interest in my product.
  • A good book title.
  • Are my customers already using Kickstarter.
  • What hesitations would they have to buy the product.
  • How much would they pay for the product.

I received 33 responses through Survey Monkey


Current Audience

Having an audience before launching a Kickstarter Campaign helps a lot.
Let me rephrase that…Having an audience before launching a Kickstarter Campaign help immensely!

I have a relatively small audience but at least some people who know who I am and enjoy my work.

To give you an idea I will share some of my website statistics.

I currently get around 1,000 visitors a month to my personal site and a few hundred have visits to my newest site which was launched a month ago. The problem is most of the visits to my personal blog are from being ranked highly in Google searches for a term that isn’t related to my animation or my audience.

Analytics for Jason Loves Life

This means I am starting with a small audience. However, I do have a lot of friends in the a variety of creative industries. Which should help when spreading the word of the Kickstarter campaign.


Next ACTION

I need to find people to interview who are members of my target market.


Steps & Schedule

10/1 – Write and post a new article for my blog.
10/1 – Go over my survey data for information.
10/1 – Determine what to ask potential customers.
10/1 – Ask around to find members of my target market to interview.

10/2 – Format and schedule 2 blog articles my wife wrote.
10/2 – Contact those individuals and set-up times to talk for Friday or Saturday.
10/2 – Determine what course I own that will help with my product launch (create list).
This would include Fizzle courses, Video Production Courses, and a few Udemy courses.

10/3 – Interviews individual audience members.
10/3 – Browse Courses for Deliverables and Milestones from completing them.

10/4 – Interviews individual audience members.
10/4 – Create a tentative timeline for what needs to be done when with milestones.

Updates

Categories: General Update KickStarter Tags:
September 30, 2014 by Jason Love
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