Your First Kickstarter Campaign

This book is for Kickstarter newbies and first-time creators. It will teach and show you how to collect potential backers early, in advance, and how to plan a Kickstarter campaign from start to finish with the aim of ensuring that you get fully funded.

63% of Kickstarter campaigns fail. Do this one thing, and you'll be among the 37% who succeed. The one thing is pre-launch. Ask any crowdfunding creator, and they will confirm that it is the key to success. You will learn how to prepare for your first crowdfunding campaign and do pre-launch with a minimal budget by using personal efforts and delegating some work to others. This book is for Kickstarter newbies and first-time creators. It will teach and show you how to collect potential backers early, in advance, and how to plan a Kickstarter campaign from start to finish with the aim of ensuring that you get fully funded. You will understand the basics of crowdfunding, the main difference between the two most popular reward-based crowdfunding platforms: Kickstarter and Indiegogo, how to turn your idea, passion or skill into a product and how to evaluate if there's a market demand for it. The core part of this book is about preparation for the crowdfunding campaign: How to set crowdfunding goals and why it is important to set a low goal How to analyze similar campaigns How to define your target audience How to gather your crowd using free methods How to create a landing page that turns visitors into subscribers What are the best tools to build landing pages How to integrate your landing page with your mailing list How to "warm-up" leads with automated email sequence How to engage your audience How to run Facebook Ads to collect leads How to use "smoke testing" method to see if someone buys your product What is a pre-launch funnel and what stages it has Conversion rates that you can expect How to do media and influencer outreach How to submit your video to viral video publishers You will also learn and be exposed to best practices when it comes to selecting attractive project images, how to create a title that sells, how to build engaging project video and how to brainstorm ideas for your rewards. Finally, the book explains how to launch and manage a Kickstarter campaign, when it's live: Why project launch timing is important The steps you need to do during the launch day Prepare to refuse offers Communication with backers (project updates and direct messages) Stretch goals Get traffic from Kickstarter ("Projects we love," trending, popularity rankings) Last days of your project Wrap-up and action plan

Learn to use Kickstarter to make your great ideas a reality As a crowd-funding website for creative projects, Kickstarter has the power to make creative ideas come to life. This helpful guide walks you through the potential of this amazing tool, which has helped project creators successfully launch their projects since 2009. You'll learn how to create a Kickstarter account, set up your first project, and effectively use social media to bring awareness to your project and build up the community around it to hopefully reach the goal of 100 percent funding. Explains how to determine if you meet the requirements to create a project Gets you started with creating your first project, choosing a great project image, and write a compelling project title and description Helps you establish rewards for project backers Zeroes in on deciding a funding duration and funding goal Whether you have an idea for a movie, video game, gadget or anything in between, Kickstarter For Dummies is the fun and friendly guide to help you get the funds to make your idea happen!

What kind of scared are you? Find out in these fun horror stories for young readers based on a range of phobias from Arachnophobia to Zoophobia! These tales of fear, dread, risk, and doom contain all the classic elements of horror that young fans crave, without the gore. Features 26 terrifying short stories, each based on a different A-to-Z phobia and accompanied by a unique illustration. Also includes 11 bonus stories featuring art by Temmie Chang, Mariel Cartwright, and Ko Takeuchi, plus a section detailing the origins and developments of the stories and art.

The corporate market is now embracing free, "open source" software like never before, as evidenced by the recent success of the technologies underlying LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL, and PHP). Each is the result of a publicly collaborative process among numerous developers who volunteer their time and energy to create better software. The truth is, however, that the overwhelming majority of free software projects fail. To help you beat the odds, O'Reilly has put together Producing Open Source Software, a guide that recommends tried and true steps to help free software developers work together toward a common goal. Not just for developers who are considering starting their own free software project, this book will also help those who want to participate in the process at any level. The book tackles this very complex topic by distilling it down into easily understandable parts. Starting with the basics of project management, it details specific tools used in free software projects, including version control, IRC, bug tracking, and Wikis. Author Karl Fogel, known for his work on CVS and Subversion, offers practical advice on how to set up and use a range of tools in combination with open mailing lists and archives. He also provides several chapters on the essentials of recruiting and motivating developers, as well as how to gain much-needed publicity for your project. While managing a team of enthusiastic developers -- most of whom you've never even met -- can be challenging, it can also be fun. Producing Open Source Software takes this into account, too, as it speaks of the sheer pleasure to be had from working with a motivated team of free software developers.

More Than Money Jamey Stegmaier knows crowdfunding. He's a veteran of seven successful Kickstarter campaigns (and counting) that have raised over $3.2 million, and he's the proprietor of the widely read Kickstarter Lessons blog. In this book he offers a comprehensive guide to crowdfunding, demonstrating that it can be a powerful way for entrepreneurs to grow their businesses by building community and putting their customers first. This book includes over forty stories of inspiring successes and sobering disasters. Stegmaier uses these examples to demonstrate how to (and how not to) prepare for a campaign, grow a fan base, structure a pitch, find new backers, and execute many other crucially important “nuts and bolts” elements of a successful crowdfunding project. But Stegmaier emphasizes that the benefits of crowdfunding are much more about the “crowd” than the “funding.” He shows that if you treat your backers as people, not pocketbooks—communicate regularly and transparently with them, ask their opinions, attend to their needs—they'll become advocates as well as funders, exponentially increasing your project's chances of succeeding.

Want to know how to crowdfund projects that make hundreds of thousands of dollars? This is how. HOW THE HELL DO YOU CROWDFUND $100,000? HERE’S THE ULTIMATE HANDBOOK In this bold, irreverent, hilarious how-to guide, bestselling Kickstarter campaign manager Derek Miller takes his millions of dollars of Super Crowdfunding experience and delivers everything you need to know about being a modern entrepreneur in today’s global marketplace. In other words, this is not a cheesecake cookbook. Embrace community and learn how to maximize your MESSAGE, MECHANICS, and MARKETING so you can successfully: Get people to give a damn about you and your crazy idea so you can stand out from the noise. Avoid the mistakes the rest of us made. Discover your creative freedom and make that sweet, sweet cash. Accompanied by laugh-out-loud illustrations by cartoonist Joy Ho, enjoy an exhaustive look into what it takes to manage and execute a successful six-figure crowdfunding campaign with over $30 million worth of collective advice and pro-tips from the world class asskickers who brought you: Dude Bro Party Massacre 3 ($241,071) Augie and the Green Knight ($384,410) OrganATTACK! ($526,274) The Cyanide & Happiness Show ($770,309) Bunch of Balloons ($929,160) Superbook ($2,952,508) Joking Hazard ($3,246,588) G-RO ($3,307,773) Pillars of Eternity ($3,986,929) Bones I-IV ($12,380,214) DEREK MILLER is a crowdfunding consultant who helps craft rewards-based strategies for early-stage startup companies focused on raising capital without sacrificing equity. Since 2013, Derek has raised over $4.7 million through three Cyanide & Happiness Kickstarter campaigns, each of which launched a new, self-sustaining company. He’s been featured in Variety, PBS Rewire, USA Today’s Moonlighting, and has appeared on Crowdfunding Demystified, Crowdfunding Uncut, and Side Hustle School. Currently, Derek serves as the Business Manager at Explosm while mentoring students at the University of Texas at Dallas