Things I Learned from Kickstarter!

Our Kickstarter campaign has ended and unfortunately we didn't meet our goal. I'm disappointed, yet I have no regrets and I learned so much from this experience. The journey is not over for us!

We raised over $20k and had 218 backers. Our goal was 50k! I think there are several reasons why we fell short of our goal.

Before launching on Kickstarter, I felt completely confident we would reach our goal. I knew it'd be a lot of work, but I was up to the challenge. Kickstarter boasts a success rate of 44% and I thought surely ours was one of the better ideas on Kickstarter. If the socially awkward guy selling dragon figurines could raise over $200k, surely we could raise $50k! Everyone seemed to love our idea and I was confident our product would make a tangible difference in the lives of parents. How could we fail?

And yet, here we are. I think there are several reasons why. Allow me to speculate...

1. Goals need to be low! Remember how I just mentioned Kickstarter boasts a success rate of 44%? What I didn't realize is that many projects start with a goal of just $1. And the majority of successful projects raise less than $10k. I also learned that 80% of successful projects reach their goal within the first 3 days. This means they have enough backers already lined up before launching. In recent years crowdfunding has been taken over by projects that don't "need" any money, but are actually just using it as a part of their marketing play. Because of this they can set really low goals since it is all a marketing expense anyway. They are actually spending a ton more on creating their products than the goals they set. Why do they do this? People are much more likely to contribute to a campaign that has already been funded than to a campaign with just 33% pledged. The same goes for the press being willing to write about a funded campaign vs. an unfunded campaign. We went as low as we could given that our expenses to fulfill orders if we did get funded would be well over $100k.

2. It takes money to make money! Marketing is crucial for a successful Kickstarter campaign. People need to know about it! But try contacting the media or popular mommy blogs about a kickstarter project, no matter how cool, and you'll literally hear the gag reflex coming out of their mouths. They're bombarded by kickstarter projects! So in order to spread the word, you need money to spend on advertising. We hired a marketing company to run some ads, but after a few weeks we concluded it just wasn't efficient enough. The successful projects on Kickstarter spend tens of thousands of dollars on advertising. The really successful projects spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on advertising. We didn't have the resources to market the way we needed to be successful.

3. Demographics! A significant majority of Kickstarter backers are men. The hardest audience to target is young moms. Most young moms have never backed a kickstarter project before. It's a tough sell. So while we had thousands of moms like and share our video and make comments about how much they loved the idea, few of them actually backed us. Was the price too high? Was the wait too long? Or was Kickstarter simply a new concept they weren't familiar with? Probably a combination of all three.

4. The Kickstarter Gods! So remember that socially awkward guy with the dragon figurines? How did he do it? He made it into the exclusive "Projects We Love" category. These projects are much more likely to be funded because they are at the top of Kickstarter's page and search results. Why are some project selected while the majority are not? Your guess is as good as mine. All I know is that we were not selected.


So we didn't meet our goal. But I am still encouraged by a few things.

1. We have amazing friends and family! I have felt so loved and supported by the people we know throughout this whole process. Our friends and family really stepped up big time to share the word and contribute to our campaign. I felt them pulling for us! I can't thank them enough! Isn't that way more valuable than reaching a goal on Kickstarter?

2. We have a great idea, just not for kickstarter! I really believe this! Based on the surveys we conducted, the hundreds of people we've talked to, and the thousands of comments we've read... we're on to something! So I'm not giving up. Every year in the US alone, billions of dollars are spent on kids organization products. And yet there's never been a successful kids organization product on Kickstarter! It just may not be the right outlet for us. So we'll keep trying until we find a way to succeed!

3. We are incredibly blessed! We didn't reach our goal on Kickstarter, but Christian still has a great job, we have four beautiful and healthy kids, we have an amazing support system, and we have Christ in our lives. Hey, I miraculously survived a near death experience less than a year ago. Perspective! We really can't complain!

So what's next? We're looking into our options and trying to decide the best way to move forward. Licensing may be a great option for us. We'll post updates from time to time on our Facebook page. Thank you for all your support through this journey! Stay tuned for chapter two.