How DID That Kickstarter Campaign Work?

Since running a successful Kickstarter campaign to develop a new iteration of Beatrice, I’ve been noticing more and more people talking about what makes these things work—posts in the “9 essential tips” or “5 Kickstarter champs share their secrets” vein. Some of the advice resonates with me more than other bits; for example, I would agree that the pre-planning stage was absolutely crucial. Because I took the time to think through my project in great detail, I was able to tell people exactly what I wanted to do with the money they were contributing, not just threaten to make something cool, and I “knew” exactly how much I’d need to ask for to make it happen.

Conventional wisdom, to the extent that you can have conventional wisdom about a service that’s only been in existence for four years, says that you really ought to create a video for your Kickstarter pitch—that it’s a direct, engaging way of telling your story to potential backers. But I wouldn’t call it a universal necessity. I gave it a whirl, stuck my Flip on its tripod, pointed it at my nice chair, then sat down and talked about my goals. I couldn’t quite get as comfortable as I wanted to with it, though, so I ended up scrapping all the footage and just going with a text-and-pictures presentation.

(Part of the problem, in retrospect, was that “a guy sitting in a chair telling you about his Kickstarter project” just isn’t my idea of dynamic filmmaking. If I ever do another Kickstarter, I’ll have to see if I can come up with a more lively scenario for a video pitch—something like Neal Stephenson’s CLANG promo or Peter Riegert’s concept reel for his documentary about Prospect Cemetery.)

So what did work for me?

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13 June 2012 | theory |

Read This: BookExpo America’s Buzz Authors

I was delighted by the invitation to moderate the “Adult Buzz Authors” panel at the 2012 BookExpo America. During this short presentation, I introduced the audience to three novelists and one memoirist publishers will be showing particular promotional attention in the months ahead. The folks at BEA livestreamed the conversation out to the world at large, and have preserved the video file—so you can watch me do my Phil Donahue thing with the handheld mic, and of course more importantly learn about these four authors for yourself.

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11 June 2012 | read this |