Before you launch your Kickstarter campaign, it is important to have an idea of the experience from the side of a backer.

Why you should back a Kickstarter project before you launch your own:

  1. You can get a sense of what draws you to a specific project and use what you learned in your campaign to draw in others.
  2. You can help trouble shoot problems or explain the process to your friends/family/fans that have questions for you.
  3.  Ensure your backers have the best experience possible.

How backing a Kickstarter project helped me

After failing my first Kickstarter campaign I waited 3.5 months before launching my next campaign.  The best thing I did during that time was back 3 other projects.  This was to learn the process of what others were doing and they were projects that I wanted to see created.

The biggest thing I learned was that the funding could be done through existing Amazon accounts and was really easy.  Before backing I did know Amazon did all the financial part of Kickstarter, but I thought Kickstarter had their own credit card payment page.  I found out people can pay using their existing account and this makes backing a project an easier sell to those who worry about sharing their credit card information online.

Emails backers get

Another thing I got to experience was the emails backers get from the process.

The emails backers receive are:

1) THANK YOU for the pledge (received when they initially back project)

Categories: KickStarter Personal Tags:
October 11, 2012 by Jason Love

When I got a backer through Kickstarter, I would receive an email that looks like this:

John Doe is your new backer!

Amount pledged: $10.00 to “MADMAN OF MAGIC: The Beginning of the End”
Reward: You will receive a physical copy of “MADMAN OF MAGIC: The Beginning of the End” signed by Leah and me mailed to your door + an EXCLUSIVE downloadable PDF copy + a hearty “Thank You!” on the inside back cover of the finished comic.
Estimated delivery: Dec 2012

$1,088.03 is currently pledged toward the $500.00 goal.

Visit your project’s dashboard:
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/madmanofmagic/madman-of-magic-the-beginning-of-the-end/

Tip! Keep your backers engaged by posting updates. Every time you post an update, your backers get notified by email.

During the first 2 weeks of the campaign, every time I got one of these emails I would go to my social media and thank the backer by first name.  I didn’t use their last name in case people would use that information to try and spam the person for their own project.  I stopped doing this towards the end only because I was busy trying to promote the project more.  Also, I lost track of who I had and hadn’t thanked.
Categories: KickStarter Personal Tags:
October 10, 2012 by Jason Love

I got this email from Kickstarter on completion of my successful Kickstarter campaign

Your project has been successfully funded! What now?

Congratulations! You have raised $1,088.03. Nicely done!

So, what now?

ACCESSING FUNDS

Amazon is now processing the transactions for your project; your funds will be available 14 days after the transactions are charged. At that point, you can request to withdraw the funds from your Amazon Payments account:

https://payments.amazon.com

FULFILLING REWARDS

Need info from your backers to fulfill rewards? No problem! When you’re ready to deliver rewards, you can easily request and track whatever info you need using Backer Reports. Select the reward tier you want to query, specify the info you need (address, T-shirt size,

Categories: Business KickStarter Personal Tags:
October 9, 2012 by Jason Love

We are at a total of 42 hours into working on this niche site with 14 hours coming from this week. This week we’ve been filling up the website with content and adjusting the code to look good. The process is simple: write the article, create or find images for the post, make changes to the “look” of the website, set up Google AdSense, and placing ads on the site.

Pages for the website

Since we spent the week working on the site, I thought you might find it helpful to know what the website is going look like in regards to number of pages and what they are for.

  1. Home: We are using this as the Welcome page.  It talks about the product (which is our Keyword), we make sure to give it a personal feel, and we mention the reader as much as possible.  Since our site is on pregnancy we congradulate them on their expected child or their loved one’s expected child, make sure they feel we care about them (which we do), and sell them on the idea of the product being important for their health and well being (which it is).
  2. Articles: This page is in a condensed blog format.  This page will have a list of around 5 articles talking about the product. Each will show a headline with a very brief description of the articles topic.  These 5 articles will be their own pages so I will not include them in this list as they are blog posts on the topic of the niche.
  3. Questions: This page is dedicated to quick questions and answers people have about the niche.  We currently have 5 questions, but hope to populate it from questions we get from our readers.
  4. About: The page that talks about why we created the website, the purpose of the site, and what’s unique about our site.
  5. Contact: We have a form on this page for people to fill out if they have any questions, concerns, or just want to drop us a line through a form.  We created the form using a plug-in. I will share which one in the next update (week 4).

Week #3 Results

Filling in the website with Content

Another 14 hours into the Niche Site Journal; this brings the total up to 42 hours of work into our niche site.  Our focus during week 3 was on filling up the website with content and adjusting the code to look good.  This entailed content creation, designing images, adjusting the look of the website, setting up the Google adsense banners, and placing the ads onto the site.

Pages for the website

Since we spent the week working on the site, I thought you might find it helpful to know what the website is going look like in regards to number of pages and what they are for.

  1. Home: We are using this as the Welcome page.  It talks about the product (which is our Keyword), we make sure to give it a personal feel, and we mention the reader as much as possible.  Since our site is on pregnancy we congradulate them on their expected child or their loved one’s expected child, make sure they feel we care about them (which we do), and sell them on the idea of the product being important for their health and well being (which it is).
  2. Articles: This page is in a condensed blog format.  This page will have a list of around 5 articles talking about the product. Each will show a headline with a very brief description of the articles topic.  These 5
Categories: Business Niche Site Duel niche site journal Niche Sites
October 8, 2012 by Jason Love

Brainstorm Mind Map image

Now that our Kickstarter campaign has been successful it is time to get into the writing process. When starting the campaign I already had a script for the first comic book, but I am considering doing a rewrite for a variety of reasons.  The main ones being:

1- I am considering not giving away the political elements of the story away in the beginning, but reveal them later.

2- Might want to introduce more secondary characters.

3- Could use more action scenes.

The problem now is that I have to create a script that makes the reader want more, yet feel like a full story in under 24 pages. I am finding the process difficult as I am juggling all the aspects of the main character with his environment and story in my head. I have 30 – 40 pages of notes scattered throughout my notebooks, evernote, and notepad files on my laptop.

Now that I need to get more organized, I have decided to use a technique utilized by several internet marketers; that is mind mapping.

What is a Brainstorm Mind Map?

I want to thank everyone for their support in backing this project, sharing it on social media, and getting the word out.  We made our extended goal of $1080 which means we have reached Kickstarter Success!

EXTENDED PROJECT:

Leah and Jason Love

click image for larger version

After we finish the comic book we will create a 15 page mini comic.  This mini comic book will be available through the Madman of Magic Website (www.madmanofmagic.com) for all to read.  You will receive an email through Kickstarter when this is available.  We are hoping to have it done before the end of the year.

EXTENDED REWARDS (MORE COOL STUFF!)

Categories: General Update Independent Artist KickStarter
October 3, 2012 by Jason Love