Kickstarter - A Brief Mid-Project Analysis
Posted by Michael Mindes on November 09, 2010
If you are reading this blog post, you probably do not need any background information. However, I will briefly go over some for those not familiar...
Background
Eminent Domain is a board game that is currently seeking funding on Kickstarter. The project was started on Monday October 25th, 2010 seeking $20,000 in funding to more forward with the game. Since then, the following has happened:
- The project reached the $20,000 mark late on Sunday November 7th, 2010. It currently continues to receive significant new Backers.
- The project has quickly become one of the most popular projects EVER to be on Kickstarter. Ranking 25th out of all projects ever done since 2009 for traffic received, and that traffic continues to grow.
- The project has been recommended on the front page of Kickstarter.
- 3 permutations of the potential cover quickly became the hottest images on Board Game Geek. One of which has already received 342 thumbs up.
- Eminent Domain has been on "The Hotness" list of Board Game Geek for the last 6 days. Being #9, then #2, then #1 (and staying at #1).
- Over the past 5 days, there have been 180 new Backers and $14,075 of new pledges.
- At least 75 people have requested print and play files so they can play the game immediately. (This is data that I do not have a recent update from Seth... It could be even more)
Clearly, the popularity of Eminent Domain moved from a very small circle of people working on the game to the front of gamers minds in a very short period of time. Possibly this is the fastest that something like this has EVER happened... I like to think so.
Here Come The Copycats
Of course, many people will see the success... Many will proceed to say, "Me too, it cannot be difficult" and get started on Kickstarter. I do not blame them, and I encourage people to try it out. Some words of caution:
- Structure your project properly. Study successful and unsuccessful projects and try to determine "WHY?"
- Make a video to introduce your project.
- Have artwork of some kind. We had a rough sketch of a cover idea for Eminent Domain by Seth for a long time. Anything is better than nothing.
- Have a good product in the first place.
- Determine your assets that you can market to beforehand.
It Is Easy
Here is the good news... It is easy to accomplish. Let me give you some qualifications though:
- Tasty Minstrel Games had 3,000+ people give permission to email them before the project went live.
- Tasty Minstrel Games had 700+ fans on Facebook before the project went live.
- Seth and I both have blogs that are read by a cross-segment of Gamerati.
- I had spent almost a full year building relationships with people through customer service. I certainly do not recommend having the manufacturing problems in order to shine through. But if you get dealt a bad hand because you took a naive chance, then certainly make the best of it.
- You have a great game that you are seeking funding for
If you have done the above, then accomplishing results like with Eminent Domain is easy. As long as you structure and plan a good sequence for obtaining, controlling, and releasing information (artwork, videos, etc).
Conclusion
I have more tricks up my sleeve yet to hopefully overfund by a HUGE amount, and when the project is over... I will have more to report about what worked well and what did not. I still need more data yet.
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