Tag: IndieGoGo

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Top 10 List of Books on Crowdfunding Platforms—August 17, 2019

Top 10 Books on Kickstarter and IndieGoGo aug 172019

In an effort to connect more book lovers with authors on crowdfunding platforms, here is my list of Top 10 campaigns for this week (in no particular order).

The list is sorted by intended audience age so you can more easily find books you are interested in.

Be sure to visit them TODAY as these campaigns are time-sensitive and your timely support is critical to launch these books.

Click on the images below to find out more about each project.

#supportindieauthors #crowdfundyourbook #readmorebooks

FOR KIDDOS

#1 Brina

#2 Darcy Daydream

#3 These Words Are For You

When the words “I love you” are not enough, when you hold someone near and dear to your heart, when you want to capture love, purity, and goodness but don’t know how - These Words Are for You.

#4 The Girl and the Cathedral

#5 Journey to the End of the Night

FOR ADULTS

#6 Nobody Tells You...

#7 Venus on Mars: Art Nudes in the Desert

#8 You Died: An Anthology of the Afterlife

#9 Women Do No Creep By Daylight

#10 Young Explorer's Adventure Guide, Vol 6!

There are so many awesome, innovative, and exciting books available only on Kickstarter and IndieGoGo that will help improve the diversity we see in literature.

Supporting authors on Kickstarter and IndieGoGo helps these books come to life in ways they can’t via traditional publishing.

Every week, I’ll post my Top 10 List of interesting and unique books that are on Kickstarter and IndieGoGo. The list is curated and covers a variety of genres.

You cannot buy your way onto this list—these are books that I’ve found organically while searching the platforms.

Check out my past Top 10 lists here 

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Finding the Best Month to Launch Your Book’s Crowdfunding Campaign

month to launch kickstarter campaign lisaferland.com

Finding the perfect time to launch your book’s crowdfunding campaign is always a tricky balance.

Do you launch when there is less competition on the platform or when there are a ton of campaigns running at the same time?

January is generally slow because people are still recovering from December holiday (over)spending.

However, if you are launching a planner, daily motivator, or other type of inspirational goal-setting book, January is GOLD for you. Launch in January!

February is a super busy time for books launching on Kickstarter and IndieGoGo because people have recovered from the holidays and they all avoided launching in January. If you want to buddy up and cross-promote with other authors, February might be a good time.

March is always good but you have family holidays in there like Easter that can really sap your momentum.

PRO TIP: don’t launch near a public holiday and definitely don’t end on one.

April is a fine month—nothing super crazy happening then.

May is also fine for launching.

June might be tough if you are targeting teachers or parents of small children as usually school is letting out.

July might also be dicey if you are targeting parents but during the summer, there is less to do and people might be scrolling Facebook in a bored summer stupor ready to find your book (who knows?!).

August is fine even if people are away on vacation. 

September is back to school and people are back online in full force. If you can deliver the book in time for the holidays, this is a great month for launching.

October is also a fine month for launching but be sure to end your campaign before US Thanksgiving, if your audience is based in the US.

November starts to get a bit tricky as people tune out during Thanksgiving and start getting into the holiday crazy.

December best to avoid but I’ve seen lots of successful campaigns. If you have a motivational calendar, journal, or other New Year’s Resolution-type book, this is also a good month for launching because people will want the book in January.

In Summary

You can launch your campaign during any month and find success. You can also launch during a statistically “good” month and still fail.

The success of your campaign will not be due to the month in which you launch but in how well you prepare your audience for your campaign.

If you don’t communicate with your audience or if they don’t see your messages, DON’T LAUNCH. Your audience isn’t on board.

If you are getting good feedback and people are replying to your emails, blaze on you beautiful diamond.

Like anything, proper planning prevents poor performance.

Before You Launch

Ask yourself these questions to gauge if you’re ready to launch:

  • Is my audience ready?
  • Have I given potential backers explicit instructions on what to do during launch day?
  • Do I have my emails lined up?
  • Did I get adequate feedback on my campaign page, video, and rewards?
  • Am I ready to work my tail off for the next 30 days to make this a reality?

You might also like

5 Obstacles You Need to Know About Before You Launch

3 Last-Minute Tasks Before You Launch Your Kickstarter Campaign

Why You Can’t Copy Someone Else’s Crowdfunding Strategy

10 Reasons Authors Struggle with Crowdfunding and How To Fix Them

Want an expert to review your campaign page before you launch? 

 

Click here to book a campaign page scan today.

“I thought I had researched enough and knew what I was doing – but having a set of fresh and expert eyes helped so much. Lisa had many small suggestions and tweaks for me to do with my campaign that helped take it to that next level. The small small fee is so worth it. Lisa goes above and beyond.”

Rebecca Hamer
Children’s book author of the Monty Bear series
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Top 10 List of Books on Crowdfunding Platforms—July 19, 2019

Top 10 Books on Kickstarter and IndieGoGo July 19 Lisaferland.com

In an effort to connect more book lovers with authors on crowdfunding platforms, here is my list of Top 10 campaigns for this week (in no particular order).

The list is sorted by intended audience age so you can more easily find books you are interested in.

Be sure to visit them TODAY as these campaigns are time-sensitive and your timely support is critical to launch these books.

Click on the images below to find out more about each project.

#supportindieauthors #crowdfundyourbook #readmorebooks

FOR KIDDOS

#1 Pragmatic Princess: 26 Superb Stories of Self-Sufficiency

#2 The Future is Make Believe

#3 Black Boy, Black Boy

#4 The Could Shelf

#5 NIKI's Adventure

FOR ADULTS

#6 Time Traveling Octopus Makes History with Kickstarter

#7 Bad Words

#8 The Cancer Hive: A magazine for anyone affected by cancer

#9 Extra Teeth: words with bite

#10 Let Your Passion Pay the Bills

There are so many awesome, innovative, and exciting books available only on Kickstarter and IndieGoGo that will help improve the diversity we see in literature.

Supporting authors on Kickstarter and IndieGoGo helps these books come to life in ways they can’t via traditional publishing.

Every week, I’ll post my Top 10 List of interesting and unique books that are on Kickstarter and IndieGoGo. The list is curated and covers a variety of genres.

You cannot buy your way onto this list—these are books that I’ve found organically while searching the platforms.

Check out my past Top 10 lists here 

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5 Things Crowdfunding Authors Wished You Knew

Crowdfunding a book is not an easy task. It requires a lot of research, planning, and preparation.

Then, you deal with people’s misconceptions and misunderstandings about your goals (most people think you’re begging).

Worse yet, your well-meaning friends and family reassure you that they’ll “buy it when it’s available on Amazon,” even though you both know they won’t.

So, before you start your crowdfunding journey, here are 5 things crowdfunding authors want you to know:

#1 It’s difficult to educate people on your reasons for crowdfunding your book

Elisavet Arkolaki at Maltamum.com was shocked at how difficult it was to educate her readers on the time-sensitive nature of crowdfunding.

When the clock is ticking and the stakes are high, you have to educate your audience well in advance of your campaign launch so that everyone is on board.

Additional resources: Book Pre-launch Audience Education: Why it’s so important

Elisavet’s behind-the-scenes look at her Kickstarter campaign

#2 It’s hard to be heard on social media these days

Lindsay Achtman was surprised to discover that even posting 2x/day on her social media pages wasn’t enough to move the needle in pledges to her Kickstarter campaign.

“I need to be posting in multiple groups, at least 10 per day, to get the engagement I wanted. I had a lot of luck posting in garage sale sites (on Facebook)!”

Additional resource: The Secret to Marketing Your Book Without Annoying People

#3 Most people are confused about Kickstarter vs. GoFundMe

Rebecca Hamer says that most of her friends and family confused her Kickstarter campaign as a charity fundraiser.

“Most people had no idea how crowdfunding and Kickstarter worked. They thought it was a charity thing… I had to educate my audience on Kickstarter…”

It’s important to make clear in your audience education efforts what crowdfunding is and how it works.

Rebecca Yee Peters also struggled with the pre-order vs. donate concept during her fixed funding IndieGoGo campaign.

“Most people kept saying in posts “Donate to Rebecca’s movie.’ Even after I kept telling them it’s not a donation. People also don’t seem to realize what “all or nothing’ means. Even at 10% funded, everyone is like “you’re doing well!” I say every time “No, I don’t get to keep that money.”

Tip: Be sure to create multiple visuals explaining your goals, the process, and how they can support you. Feel free to borrow the text from the images below.

Giving thanks to the authors is always appreciated if you use these resources—share our books on social media, buy our books, or recommend them to a friend. 

#4 You can’t always rely on friends and family to support your campaign

Some authors have very generous friends and family patrons who go above and beyond (AND WE LOVE AND APPRECIATE YOU), however, some authors do not.

For those who don’t have friends and family who are interested in our books, we must rely on connecting with strangers to pre-order our books.

Connecting with strangers requires more touch points (getting the same message in front of the same people before your deadline), more time, and convincing copy.

Jennifer Senne discovered how difficult it can be to make these genuine connections during her IndieGoGo campaign and warns other authors not to rely solely on friends and family. 

Not only is it difficult to convince strangers to pre-order your book, they often cancel their pledges at the last minute, which is extra gutting when you’re running an all-or-nothing campaign.

Additional resources:  What Actually Motivates Someone to Support a Crowdfunding Campaign

Why You Can’t Copy Someone Else’s Campaign Strategy

#5 External press doesn’t usually convert into new backers

Getting external validation (bloggers, news articles, radio features, etc.,) is GREAT social proof that your book is well-received by people outside of your friends and family network but frustratingly, doesn’t always translate into new backers.

Elisavet Arkolaki explains,

“My press coverage was great but it did not lead to sales as I expected it would (0 conversion rate). I proceeded to use the press features as proof that I was doing something noteworthy.”

Sheri Wall had a disappointing outcome with the social media influencers for her IndieGoGo campaign and said, 

“I had three influencers with large email lists who said they’d share my campaign with their followers. Not one of them actually included the campaign in an email.”

Tip: Use customized links via bit.ly or Kickstarter/IndieGoGo itself to track backers coming from various sources and evaluate your return on investment. 

Other resources

5 Biggest Mistakes Indie Authors Make on Kickstarter and IndieGoGo

Free Video Mini-Course on Crowdfunding Your Book

 

Want to work together 1:1?

Find out if I can help you reach your crowdfunding goals and schedule your discovery call here:

Book your discovery call today
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Top 10 List of Books on Crowdfunding Platforms—June 28, 2019

In an effort to connect more book lovers with authors on crowdfunding platforms, here is my list of Top 10 campaigns for this week (in no particular order).

The list is sorted by intended audience age so you can more easily find books you are interested in.

Be sure to visit them TODAY as these campaigns are time-sensitive and your timely support is critical to launch these books.

Click on the images below to find out more about each project.

#supportindieauthors #crowdfundyourbook #readmorebooks

FOR KIDDOS

#1 The Ingredients for a Witch

#2 The A-Z of Uncommon and Endangered Animals

#3 Drip, Drop, and Drizzle

#4 Princess Pirates

#5 M is for Malware

FOR ADULTS

#6 People of Pride

#7 New York Drawings

#8 Hollow D.E.E.P

#9 Threads: Haunted

#10 Shots Fired

There are so many awesome, innovative, and exciting books available only on Kickstarter and IndieGoGo that will help improve the diversity we see in literature.

Supporting authors on Kickstarter and IndieGoGo helps these books come to life in ways they can’t via traditional publishing.

Every week, I’ll post my Top 10 List of interesting and unique books that are on Kickstarter and IndieGoGo. The list is curated and covers a variety of genres.

You cannot buy your way onto this list—these are books that I’ve found organically while searching the platforms.

Check out my past Top 10 lists here 

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3 Last-Minute Tasks Before Launching Your Kickstarter Campaign

3 last minute tasks before launching kickstarter

You’ve already gathered hundreds of emails of people interested in your book, educated them on what to do on launch day, and had expert eyes review your campaign page, reward tiers, and video. What’s left?

Here are 3 last-minute housekeeping things you should do before going LIVE on Kickstarter or IndieGoGo to help your campaign run smoothly and efficiently.

#1 Digital housekeeping

Clean your computer and your inbox! Delete old files or save them somewhere OFF of your hard drive so you don’t accidentally send someone the wrong file.

Organize all of your folders so you can quickly and easily locate your promotional graphics, videos, and materials for posting to social media or responding to a media request.

If you don’t have a clear file naming system, now is the time to develop one for your campaign.

Time is of the essence in a time-limited campaign and you don’t have spare moments to be sorting through a million emails to locate that file you sent someone.

You REALLY don’t want your computer to say that your hard drive is full and you’re out of memory during the middle of your crowdfunding campaign so be sure you have tons of extra space and Ram to operate at full capacity.

Clean out your inbox

If you’re email is hosted by your .com domain, you might need to clean out that inbox that you never check if you use a forwarding mail service and manage your inbox with Gmail (as I do).

You’re going to be emailing people directly A LOT and you don’t want their replies to get bounced back with a “Recipient’s inbox is full” error message.

In summary: Get your digital house in order.

#2 Physical housekeeping

Get all of your cleaning and doctor’s appointments done and out of the way before you launch so that you aren’t distracted during your campaign.

Stock up on grocery staples like toilet paper, paper towels, and non-perishable goods so that your trips to the store are relatively straightforward each week.

You’re not going to want to spend extra mental energy meal planning, so get that done before you launch to free up that extra space.

(NOBODY TALKS ABOUT THESE THINGS BUT IT REALLY HELPS.)

Life stuff will come up anyway—unexpected illnesses, WiFi outages, and life interruptions that are beyond your control.

Unless you’re looking for a break, don’t schedule extra things to your day if you can help it. You’re going to want to focus on your campaign as much as possible during this 30-day period.

In summary: Control the things that are within your control.

#3 Schedule ALL of your social media posts

If you’re sick, your WiFi is down, or Facebook locks you out because you’ve been messaging too many people too quickly, you’re going to want your social media posts already scheduled in the hopper.

This doesn’t mean that you “set it and forget it” as you should also be posting spontaneously, but you should have at least one post on Facebook scheduled every day of your campaign.

Write your blogs beforehand, create all of your graphics, and plan out your communications campaign in great detail.

In summary: Proper planning prevents poor performance.

Have more questions about crowdfunding your book?

Book your 60-min discovery call here
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Top 10 List of Books on Crowdfunding Platforms—June 14, 2019

In an effort to connect more book lovers with authors on crowdfunding platforms, here is my list of Top 10 campaigns for this week (in no particular order).

The list is sorted by intended audience age so you can more easily find books you are interested in.

Be sure to visit them TODAY as these campaigns are time-sensitive and your timely support is critical to launch these books.

Click on the images below to find out more about each project.

#supportindieauthors #crowdfundyourbook #readmorebooks

FOR KIDDOS

#1 From Neigh to Zebra

#2 Monster Mail

#3 Heroic Girls in Movies

#4 Why Aren't Dinosaurs Fuzzy?

#5 My Shining Star

FOR ADULTS

#6 Poetry of the Holocaust

#7 A Spaceship in Bronzeville

#8 A Cat's Guide to Money

#9 60 Lovers to Make and Do

#10 Eridani's Crown

There are so many awesome, innovative, and exciting books available only on Kickstarter and IndieGoGo that will help improve the diversity we see in literature.

Supporting authors on Kickstarter and IndieGoGo helps these books come to life in ways they can’t via traditional publishing.

Every week, I’ll post my Top 10 List of interesting and unique books that are on Kickstarter and IndieGoGo. The list is curated and covers a variety of genres.

You cannot buy your way onto this list—these are books that I’ve found organically while searching the platforms.

Check out my past Top 10 lists here 

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Top 10 List of Books on Crowdfunding Platforms—May 31, 2019

There are thousands of projects on Kickstarter and IndieGoGo and some are really innovative and creative books.

In an effort to connect more book lovers with authors on crowdfunding platforms, here is my list of Top 10 campaigns for this week (in no particular order).

I’m trying something new and am sorting the list by intended audience age so you can more easily find books you are interested in.

Be sure to visit them TODAY as these campaigns are time-sensitive and the opportunity might be gone if you wait too long.

Click on the images below to find out more about these fun books.

#supportindieauthors #crowdfundyourbook #readmorebooks

FOR KIDDOS

#1 Princess Lily and the Tricky Superpower

#2 How to Fly to the Moon in a Cardboard Box

Help Kardboard Kids bring imagination back to kids and nostalgia to their parents.

#3 ABC of Gender Identity

#4 Lily Huckleberry in Japan

FOR ADULTS

#5 Vagina Matters:

Join us in creating the first ever illustrated book on sexual health for girls in Bulgaria.

#6 Little Book of Fairy Tales

Publishing a fairy tale anthology book packed full of stories either from or about diverse groups.

#7 Pocket Guide to Celebrity Farts

#8 An Invite to Eternity

#9 The Last Kiss Goodbye

#10 Looking for Marla

There are so many awesome, innovative, and exciting books available only on Kickstarter and IndieGoGo that not only deserve extra eyes but will help improve the diversity we see in literature.

Supporting authors on Kickstarter and IndieGoGo helps these books come to life in ways they can’t via traditional publishing.

Every week, I’ll post my Top 10 List of interesting and unique books that are on Kickstarter and IndieGoGo. The list is curated and covers a variety of genres.

You cannot buy your way onto this list—these are books that I’ve found organically while searching the platforms.

Check out my past Top 10 lists here 

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Why You Can’t Copy Someone Else’s Crowdfunding Strategy

It would be nice if we could just model our campaign after someone else’s successful campaign and see the same results but alas, that isn’t how it works.

Be sure to watch the video below for my reasons why you can’t just copy what someone else is doing.

If you try to copy someone else’s crowdfunding strategy without understanding all of the work that happened in the background and during the pre-launch phase, you’re setting yourself up for failure.

Take the time to study as many campaigns as you can, support campaigns in your subject area/genre so you see what types of email messaging authors are sending, and ask other creators about their experiences.

Types of questions to ask other crowdfunding authors

—What surprised you the most about crowdfunding your book?
—What was the biggest source of backers?

—What one piece of advice would you give someone thinking about crowdfunding their book?

Understand that a lot of different strategies can be successful but 70% of authors still fail at crowdfunding their books so you’re going to need to change strategies as soon as you see it’s not getting traction.

Articles that might help you

Remember, you can’t copy these campaigns but you can learn from what they did.

What Actually Motivates Someone to Support a Crowdfunding Campaign

Rad Girls Start a Revolution— learn how Sharita Manickam launched Rad Girl Revolution on Kickstarter

The Adventures of Lily Huckleberry raises over $40k on Kickstarter —The ladies at Little Street had a large established audience before launching.

Children’s Book Authors Use Kickstarter to Launch their Businesses

Rebecca Hamer Introduces Kickstarter to Australian Readers

Enroll in my free mini-course to find out if crowdfunding your book is right for you.

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10 Reasons Not to Crowdfund Your Book

I’m a crowdfunding consultant for authors so why one earth would I discourage someone from crowdfunding their book?

Well, crowdfunding on Kickstarter and IndieGoGo is NOT right for everyone. I make that clear in just about every video, blog, and interview I create.

Here’s a list of 10 reasons why you should NOT CROWDFUND your book.

If after reading this, you’re still like, “Nah, I could do it…” then by all means, proceed.

#1 It's a ton of work

I’m not sure who is crowdfunding thousands of dollars without doing months of preparation beforehand, but it certainly isn’t many people I know personally. 

Garnering a lot of attention and then converting that attention into pledges takes a ton of effort. Don’t underestimate how much work is involved in a 30-day campaign. You’re looking at 60-120 days of work from the beginning concept to fulfilling the rewards.

#2 Everyone is watching

People can see exactly how many pledges you get every day of your campaign. If you don’t like that kind of transparency or to have your marketing actions under a microscope like that, then crowdfunding might not be right for you.

#3 It's harder than ever to get noticed

Social media is noisy and now crowdfunding platforms are getting “crowded” with more and more commercial products. 

In order to stand out from the pack, you need to develop your audience, educate them, and deliver what they want day after day.

#4 Ads don't really work

For whatever reason, Facebook ads don’t convert for Kickstarter and IndieGoGo campaigns for books. They just don’t. Readers want books NOW and they want to start reading right away. It takes a special stranger who is willing click on an unknown link and then give a stranger money for their book.

#5 PR experts don't want your money

Most authors are launching campaigns between $5k-$10k. It’s not worth a marketing expert’s time and effort to take 15% of that total amount to help you. They are more interested in the >$500k-$1M campaigns.

I’ve been turned down three times by PR experts because my Kickstarter goal amount wasn’t high enough to get their attention.

#6 Readers don't usually browse crowdfunding sites to find new books

I’m doing my best to change this with my Top 10 lists every week, but it’s no secret that Kickstarter is still dominated by the gaming sector.

I try to get readers in the habit of scouting Kickstarter and IndieGoGo to support indie authors and illustrators, but it’s going to take time before people start to realize that there are great books on these platforms.

Kickstarter authors have to bring readers to the platform which means that it doesn’t really matter where (Kickstarter or IndieGoGo) you launch because leveraging traffic on the platform is unlikely unless you’re in STEM.

#7 Crowdfunding is stressful

Writing articles, press releases, getting reader reviews, and doing podcast interviews are all things you’ll need to do for your traditional book launch anyway, but you can do it with a fraction of the stress involved with crowdfunding.

#8 Without early traction, you're somewhat dead in the water

Unlike traditional marketing efforts where it doesn’t matter when the sales come in, so long as they come in by the deadline, crowdfunding is the exact opposite.

You need a BIG launch day and then a pretty large Days 2-4 in order to make it to your goal at the end of 30 days. If your readers don’t know that (i.e., you didn’t educate them or they never read your emails) and you don’t keep the pressure on, you’re more likely to fail.

I’ve seen people pull it off in the end but not without serious hustle and stress.

#9 People think you're begging for money

You have to do a ton of reader education to let them know how much value they are getting for their money.

Readers are not donating to your book, they are getting the book AND MORE in exchange for their pledge. 

#10 Public failure is never fun

Failing can occur in many ways—setting too high of a goal, pricing rewards incorrectly, running a successful campaign but not delivering in time, running a successful campaign but underestimating shipping costs, and even more scenarios (you get the idea).

Nobody likes to fail and nobody likes to fail in front of people but that often happens with around 70% of all crowdfunding campaigns. Ouch! 

How are you feeling?

Do you still want to crowdfund your book?

If you’re still interested in crowdfunding your book then book a no-pressure 20-minute session with me to see if I can help you reach your goals.

Let’s chat about your goals today

Click here to book your free 20-min consult

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