Lindsay Madsen discovered inspiration and ideas amidst diapers, laundry, and sleepless nights. There’s something about rocking your baby in the wee hours of the night that gets your brain cells tingling.
In Lindsay’s case, she wanted to share hope and support for fellow moms who are in the thick fog of exhaustion that comes with those early baby days.
In this author interview, I asked Lindsay what work went into planning her board book campaign on Kickstarter.
Why did you decide to use Kickstarter to launch your book, The Lovely Haze of Baby Days?
What type of preparation did you do before you launched?
The most important preparation I did was creating a website and starting a mailing list. You engage a lot of people during your time preparing the book, the rewards, the marketing, etc.
Having a mailing list was a great asset for communicating important messages to everyone and building excitement for the upcoming campaign.
Time wise – I spent at least 8 weeks from the moment I decided to run the campaign to launch day, but I knew from the start this was part of my plan – so I always had the pieces of it in mind as I researched & prepared.
I guess the preparations fell into a couple of categories:
- Audience building,
- Book development,
- Pre-launch marketing, and
- Kickstarter research.
What has surprised you the most about crowdfunding your book?
A good surprise was how much I loved connecting with people in the audience/community.
I really enjoyed the process of building both my author and my mom network as part of my preparations. It is a logical thing to happen, I am passionately working on a book to support new moms – so of course I would love learning from authors and engaging with the people I hope to help with my book!
Something I struggle with is the unexpected loss of sleep. I am really excited about the project and the Kickstarter, and my best opportunities to work a lot are in the evenings.
IT can be hard to turn my brain off when I finally get to bed. So there is a big emotional/mental attachment to running a Kickstarter, and I wasn’t as prepared for that!

What advice would you give an author who is considering crowdfunding their book?
What advice would you give a parent (of young children) who is also planning to launch a crowdfunding campaign?

Any final words of advice?
Build your author community as you go along. There are things my family and real world friends don’t understand and can’t provide advice on, while creating a book or running a Kickstarter campaign.
I am so grateful for the author friends and Kickstarter buddies I have met and developed friendships with. We support each other – and that is a really valuable resource while on the author journey.
Bio
Lindsay Kellar-Madsen is a writer, business developer, and twin mama with four young children.
Although Canadian, she lives with her family in the Danish countryside where they explore, go on adventures, and thrive in their everyday chaos.
Her first picture book, The Lovely Haze of Baby Days, is currently available for preorder through her Kickstarter Campaign: https://bit.ly/2RsXMdL