Dan breaks down Kickstarter, the crowdfunding platform where creators pitch ideas for funding. He spent eight hours on video, art, and copy for his own campaign and made $150 in two hours. Success requires rich media, detailed descriptions, constant updates, and community work. Most first-time projects don't fund on the first try.
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So, you wanna know about Kickstarter, huh? Stick around. Welcome back, ladies and gentlemen. I am Dan from millennialmotivator.ca, helping you learn how to create, engage, and inspire. If you're new to the channel, go ahead and click that subscribe button down there, the little bell next to it. You'll get notified when my next video goes live. I put videos out here Monday through Saturday every week for the whole year. You can see new stuff every day. Usually gonna be about businesses, entrepreneur stuff, but occasionally we'll throw in some family fun. Today it's a bit of both. We're talking about Kickstarter, how it works, how can you use it, and is it something that's worth the time and effort? Without further ado, let's go. Okay, first and foremost, what is Kickstarter? If you've been living under a rock, a lot of people out there have seen a lot of different platforms kick up. Kickstarter, Rocket Fund, GoFundMe, Indiegogo. All of these platforms essentially allow people that have ideas, concepts that they don't have the funding or infrastructure in order to build and promote, put their idea out there and let the world help them promote it. So the way that it works is you come up with a great idea, say, oh man, this is something I would love to make that I have yet to build. I want to build it, I just don't have the, the finances or I don't have the resources to make this happen. Can you help me do it? You put it out there onto the platform, and if it's a hit, people love it, they can invest in it and help you get it off and running. That's Kickstarter in a nutshell. Next up, we want to know how hard or easy is it to get a Kickstarter set up properly? Okay, so we covered the bases on what Kickstarter is. Next up, we want to know how easy is it to get one set up? And the reality is super easy And very difficult. It has to be both. There are a lot of Kickstarters that come out every day— new ideas, new concepts— and I think it's a fantastic platform for that. It encourages innovation. But the reality is you can very quickly tell those that take a lot of time building out the profile for their idea and those who do not. So when the question comes, is it easy to get one started, the answer initially is gonna be no, because I want you to find success if you're gonna do a Kickstarter. Okay. Okay, the reality is the Kickstarters that succeed have a point of putting out fantastic content. They filled out every possible ounce of information they can. They've got videos, they've got images, they've got walkthroughs, breakthroughs, support already there. It's a huge undertaking, and it may be daunting at first, but the reality is you're asking people to invest their money in your concept. So if you're gonna do it, I am gonna be upfront and say it takes takes time. Now, I set up my own Kickstarter and it took me roughly, I would say, 8 hours to put it together. 8 dedicated hours of work from video creation, artwork, uh, the copywriting, and then distribution on the initial idea. Within 2 hours, there was already $150 in funds into the Kickstarter project. So if you do it correctly and you put in that initial time, there is great potential there. So we've looked at what is Kickstarter and how much of a time commitment it's going to take. Now the reality, that was just the time on the setup. Once you're off and running, you want to consistently be giving updates on the project, what's happening with it, how it's growing, how it's moving, new people that are coming in, making sure you're following up with backers of the project to ensure that they feel like they're a part of what's happening. Community is so key if you're looking to have any success on Kickstarter. You want to constantly be encouraging your social networks and the people around you to get involved, get engaged, share your concept out. Reach out to as many people as you possibly can. There's a lot more hours that go into a Kickstarter other than the initial launch. So be aware of that as you get going. Don't launch if you're not ready to commit the time and hours to making something happen. It's a lot of time, but if you want that payout at the end of the day, it's got to be done. Now last but not least, we've talked about what it is, the time commitment in both creating it and getting that exposure out there, constantly creating updates. Now comes the question that everybody has: are you guaranteed to succeed? And the answer has got to be no. There are so many Kickstarters that come and go. They will not succeed, or they have 1, 2, 3, maybe even 4 different iterations of the project before it finally builds up that momentum to be funded. So if it's not going to succeed the first time, don't sweat it, but be aware that you're most likely not going to succeed if it's your first foray into Kickstarting projects. Now, if you guys want to check out my Kickstarter that I got started to get a feel for the, the, the type of Kickstarter I'm running, the work that I put in, the videos, the artwork, what I'm talking about, the link will be down in the comments below. I'd love to get your feedback on it. Feel free to let me know here in the comments or over on Kickstarter. You can leave me some comments as well. And I hope you have an amazing day. I will catch you tomorrow with another great video.
