Pro Tips and Advice for Launching a Crowdfunding Campaign Successfully
In this article, we share some useful crowdfunding tips and advice designed to help you launch a successful campaign. These are ‘inside pro’ crowdfunding tips and come from our experience launching various campaigns successfully (and unsuccessfully) over the past few years. Crowdfunding can be tough and the more information you have at your fingertips the better placed you are to launch a successful project.
1. When is the worst time to launch a crowdfunding campaign?
The leading platforms will argue that there is never a ‘worst’ time to launch a campaign, however from experience, there are certainly times in the year that are likely to make a launch harder than others.
Probably the most difficult time to launch a campaign is in January, followed by August. Why these months? Well, January is one of the hardest months to crowdfund in as people have the less disposable income to spend after Christmas and many people are away for summer break during August.
This ultimately means if you plan to launch in either month you will have to work even harder to get people to support you and make your campaign a success. It’s not impossible, and launching in January may be vital to the success of your campaign e.g. delivering a product for springtime, but compared to if you launch at any other time of the year it will be harder.
2. What information should I include on my campaign page?
Your campaign page has 1 purpose, to convert people into backers. How do you decide what information to include on your page? Simply, think from the ‘backers’ perspective. Why would a backer desire to support your project? What needs and desires does a backer have that your campaign offers them? How will their support make them feel? What visual and written content do they need to see to help compel them to trust you and support you? What messaging is going to evoke the right response of support from them? These are all questions to think about and answer when designing your page.
Some simple tips to help increase conversion are:
- Make your campaign personal by including information about the team behind the project.
- Include lots of nice imagery and photos rather than long paragraphs of text. Make sure the photos you show are relevant. e.g if you have a campaign for a craft food stall, include photos of people enjoying eating food at your venue.
- Create rewards/perks that are simple to understand and choose between. If you have too many options this causes confusion and delay due to too much choice. This will inevitably make people go away to think about what to do rather than supporting you then and there. This will lead to missing out on vital sales.
3. What type of marketing should I use to promote my project?
One of the main principles of crowdfunding is to build a ‘crowd’ before you launch a campaign. For most campaigns, this means implementing various marketing strategies, which reach out to your intended audience and communicate your message.
The easiest and cheapest way for you to let a large number of people know about your project and what you are doing is to use social media. Setting up a Facebook, Twitter or any other social media account will be very beneficial to getting your message out there.
When using social media develop a strategy to release a post or number of posts each day, which give an insight into your project, the people involved and the problems your cause/project is solving.
Make your posts personal and this will help you to connect with your audience and make them aware of what you are doing. Remember people can only support you if they know about you. So mass, consistent communication will build up real momentum behind your campaign.
It's a good idea to set a team member who is responsible for arranging social media every day. They should write frequent, engaging posts with links and build momentum behind the campaign.
Other areas of marketing include ‘paid advertising campaigns’ on platforms like Facebook or Google Adwords. But you will need a separate ad budget to pay for the ads. This can be costly but also very effective at getting ‘cold’ leads and traffic.
If you launch an advertising campaign, direct the traffic from the ad campaign to a landing page, which captures the leads email address. You can then launch an email marketing campaign, which nurtures a relationship with the lead and entices them to support you.
PR can also be a great way to gain exposure about your project and attract interest, however, PR normally isn’t great at converting more sales, so if your budget is limited think carefully about how much money you invest into a PR strategy.
Optimising your campaign to be the best in can be is the best way to make it successful. Take on board the advice above to improve your campaign and avoid the pitfalls many projects make. If you are stuck and wish more guidance and support then consider hiring a crowdfunding marketing agency like Wow Your Crowd to help launch your campaign. An agency’s experience and knowledge can save you time and money in the long run. To your future success!
7 Types of Video Content to Attract Backers to Support Your Crowdfunding Campaign
The sole aim for most crowdfunding campaigns is to attract backers to support you and help fund your project. But how do you attract backers to your project and how do you convince them to support you? In this blog, we’ll explain 7 different ways you can use video content to enhance your campaign and convince those who are sat on the fence to get off and back your project.
Launching a Kickstarter campaign is exhilarating and challenging all at the same time. Particularly if you are launching your first project. Many campaign founders have lots of questions buzzing around their head - ‘what should I do first?’, ‘how will I attract people to support me?’, ‘how do I make a video’?, ‘what should I say on my campaign page?’ and many many more.
When you find yourself in this situation it's easy to get overwhelmed and start focusing on the wrong things. Instead what we suggest is to clear your head, stay calm and plan out a simple step by step structure to approach each area of your campaign. Only moving onto the next step once the previous is complete.
Of all the different areas that make up a crowdfunding campaign, how you attract backers to your campaign and then convince them to support you is probably the most important area to focus on.
There are multiple marketing strategies that you can implement but which ones will resonate the most with your audience and attract them to support you? Well, if we take a step back first, the most important thing you should do is to build a strong relationship with your audience and that means building trust. Whatever marketing strategies you use, coming across as personal, likeable and trustworthy are a must when it comes to convincing people to support you.
In today’s digital world video is by far the best way to promote your message online and attract interest in your project. Using video is great because it allows you to showcase yourself, your team and your product in a personal and visual manner, which helps to build a trust relationship with your audience.
Here are 7 different types of video content you can create to attract backers to support your crowdfunding campaign.
1. The campaign video
These days, the campaign video comes hand in hand with a crowdfunding campaign. It's highly unlikely you will find a Kickstarter campaign without a video. The reason being campaigns with a video are more likely to successfully reach their funding goals.
We always recommend to our clients when creating their video to feature ‘a face of the brand’. This is really important when it comes to engaging with an audience, as it instantly allows the viewer to nurture a relationship and relate with you and your message.
2. Unboxing videos
An unboxing video is exactly what it sounds like - a product in its box being unboxed. If you are launching a new product an unboxing video is a great way to show your product in a favourable light to prospective buyers. Viewers get a good idea of what the product is like and what they will receive when they buy your product.
An unboxing video is normally a ‘no frills’ video, shot in 1 take, with either a recorded voice explaining what is in the box or no sound at all. These are very easy to make and if you upload the video to places like Youtube with the right type of keyworded video title, you can attract extra traffic to your campaign.
3. Customer & Influencer Testimonials
There are is no better way to endorse your product than with a video referral. Most people’s buying decisions are based on the recommendations they receive. Using a customer or influencer testimonial that showcases your product favourably is highly recommend and will go along way to building trust with potential backers.
The more raw these videos feel the better as they won't come across staged or made up. Simply get some past customers, early adopters or influencers in your niche to test your product and give an honest review of what they thought.
4. Behind the scenes videos
Behind the scene, videos are a great way to connect with your audience and show what life is like when creating a product and launching it to the world. Use your smartphone (if it has a good camera) to capture the daily goings-on of you, your team and all the things that are going into making your campaign. Your audience will see how much hard work and commitment you are putting in and this will help to nurture a relationship on a personal level. Showing your personal and vulnerable side is a great way to connect with audiences online.
5. Social media videos
Use video on your social media platform to build awareness about your product and campaign. You can upload all types of video content, just remember to make content that is suitable for your audience and the particular platform you release it on. For example video on Facebook is best shown in a square format, rather than a 16:9 format. The reason being you get more retail space in the Facebook news feed. On Instagram, you can only upload Instagram stories that are 15secs or less. Create content that is personable, informative, educational, and funny (if you can).
6. Campaign updates
Campaign updates are exactly that, updates about the status of your campaign. Use campaign updates to inform your crowd about the progress of the campaign before and after you have launched. You can build a direct relationship by speaking directly to people and ask them to help out by sharing and spreading the word about the campaign.
7. Meet the team
Introduce yourself and the team to your backers, let them know what you do, what makes you tick and what your likes and dislikes are. Anything goes really. Use these videos to give insight into the lives of those who work in the company and show people you are normal human beings just like they are!
Ok, that's your lot for now. Hopefully, the points above will get you thinking about what you can do and how you can use video content to attract more backers to support your campaign. Remember it's all about building trust!
If you require help with your Kickstarter video production or would like some advice on how to launch your crowdfunding campaign, then contact us and schedule a free crowdfunding strategy call. We’d love to hear more about your plans. Speak soon!
Pinterest Marketing Simplified! 5 Simple Tips to Grow your Pinterest Account
Pinterest has grown to be one of the most popular social media platforms in recent years and has become handy for crowdfunding campaigns who are launching a new innovative product. In this blog, we explain 5 simple tips to set up and grow your Pinterest account.
Pinterest has made quite a name for itself in recent years. In fact, it has become the third-largest social network in the United States. In the last 12 months, Pinterest gained almost 70 million users. This is quite a large user base and it certainly gives marketers a lot to think of. What’s even more interesting is the fact that the majority of Pinterest users belong from high-income households and are predominately women. So, if you are a marketer or just starting a new business you should definitely use this platform to your advantage.
For your ease, we have listed down 5 actionable marketing tips to kick-start your Pinterest marketing campaign.
5 actionable marketing strategies for Pinterest:
1. Setting Up a business account:
It is highly recommended that you sign up for a Pinterest business account as it allows you to manage your targeted audience more efficiently through analytics and Rich pins.
Simply head over to the Pinterest Sign up section and create your business account.
Here’s a list of things that needs to be taken care of for a proper brand profile:
A professional profile photo: This one is simple. Use a professional picture of you or your company logo here.
Cover Board: This is the first thing your audience will see when visiting your profile so don’t be afraid to get a little creative here. You can use an image or a carousel that best displays your brand story or your best work/products here. Remember, it’s all about connecting with your audience!
Writing your Bio: Writing a bio for a Pinterest profile can be tricky as you are only allowed a 160 character limit. So, keep it short and simple and don’t overdo hashtags as they are not relevant here.
2. Planning your content strategy:
“What to post and when to post”, it all comes down to these two things when it comes to a good content strategy.
What to Post?
Creating captivating content based on the interest of your targeted audience is the key ingredient for a successful Pinterest marketing campaign.
You can create three types of content to promote your brand.
Product pins:
Pinterest is one of the few platforms where people are actually searching for new products/content from brands. In fact, 78% pinners find the content from brands including product pins very “Useful”.
So, if you are running a crowdfunding campaign, launching a product or have an online store and want to maximize your revenue, you should definitely take cool pictures of your products and promote them on Pinterest. Even better if your product is women-focused as almost 80% of the pinners from the US are females belonging to the age group 18-64.
Rich pins - Blogpost and Landing pages:
Have a story to share or a cool offer that people can’t miss? Create a beautiful picture with a catchy title and share it on Pinterest and you are almost guaranteed traffic!
You can drive traffic from Pinterest by inserting your website’s link on the pins. Whether you are promoting a blog or a landing page, you can make use of this strategy.
Video pins:
A great way to tell a detailed story of your brand and connect to your audience in a more engaging way. More on this later….
When to post?
Now let’s talk about when to post.
Picking the right time to post can certainly work in your favour and if you can hit the time when most of the audience is online using Pinterest you will win the Jackpot!
Past studies have shown the following times to work best:
During the day: Between 2 PM – 4 PM EST.
In the evening: Between 8 PM – 1 AM EST.
It’s all about analyzing your targeted audience however, the above mentioned times generally work well according to SocialFresh.
3. Optimizing your Pins:
Pinterest is labelled as a search engine for images and so it’s a good idea to optimize your pins for better visibility and reach.
Here are the two things you can do to optimize your pins:
Writing a compelling description:
Writing a compelling Pin description might look like a small thing but it matters a lot! In fact, Pinterest itself reported that using clear and actionable words can increase email sign-ups up to 70%.
When writing a Pin description, you should try to include your brand name and try to use clear, concise, and actionable words to better connect with your audience. Writing a Pinterest description is an art and every little detail matters so you must pay attention here!
Adding Hashtags:
Just like any other social media platform, Pinners use hashtags to find new content on the platform. Using relevant hashtags in your description can get your content discovered on Pinterest and really get things going for your brand.
4. Be consistent - Interact with other pinners and join group boards:
Posting quality content and interacting with other pinners regularly can take your marketing campaign to the next level.
Joining community boards is one of the best strategies to grow your Pinterest account. Here’s something that you can do:
Simply try to find group boards within your niche using hashtags and try to provide value to the viewers by posting quality content as much as you can. This strategy will help make your content more visible to the Pinners eventually leading to an increase in your follower count.
Pinterest is all about creating value for the viewers and if you consistently do that, your success is almost guaranteed!
5. Hidden Ninja - Video pins!
Now let’s talk about the video pins. Video pins are getting extremely popular on Pinterest. In fact, Pinterest reported that video engagement rose by 600% in 2019 as compared to the year 2018! This clearly shows the importance of video content and you should definitely use video pins.
Video Pins are great to connect with your audience and connect with them on a more personal level. Whether you are looking to share your brand story or a product that can change the lives of others or simply looking to raise awareness for your crowdfunding campaign, posting enticing video pins should be at the top of your to-do list.
When crowdfunding we recommend adding Pinterest to your list of marketing strategies as it is a great platform to help grow awareness of your new product and build interest in your project.
Contact us here at Wow Your Crowd if you'd like help with creating quality videos for your Pinterest content especially if you are planning to raise awareness of your new product campaign with a crowdfunding video. Catch you soon.
10 Simple Tips to Make your Crowdfunding Video a Success!
The crowdfunding video is regarded as the most important marketing asset in a crowdfunding campaign. Your campaign will struggle to promote your offer and convince backers to support you if you get your video wrong. In this blog, we explain 10 simple tips that we use to create our client’s videos and you can use to create a better video and improve your campaign success.
Why are Crowdfunding Videos so effective?
A well made Crowdfunding video pitches your idea clearly and concisely, showcasing your offer in an appealing way. Turning viewers into backers.
Crowdfunding videos are:
- Short: They pack a powerful message in a short time. (We recommend no longer than 4minutes in length). Their format keeps you engaged and informed.
- Compelling: They are visually striking and appeal to your target audience. Videos work better than text because some audiences struggle to absorb information when delivered in long blocks of texts. A collection of stand out visuals and audio composed in an entertaining way is far more enjoyable to review and take in.
- Emotive: An effective video will engage the audience through their emotions. Seeing a person or product in action (rather than a still image) provides more context to a situation and allows you to pitch your story in a way people can emotionally connect with.
And now the real question...
How do you make your crowdfunding video a crowd-pleaser?
Ten simple steps to make a great video.
1. Writing a compelling script
The script is the main ingredient in the video. This is where you tell your brand’s story and make your sales pitch. For this, you need concise dialogue, clear plots, and engaging characters. With a good script, you can move people and push your message forward.
2. Getting Equipment
To get a professional video made you need to have the right equipment. You can either rent equipment to make videos yourself or hire a professional videographer to do the job for you.
In any case, you will need cameras, lights, sound equipment and more for a video that looks professional and delivers appealing visuals with great audio.
3. Hiring Actors
A crowdfunding video should appeal to your target audience so you are going to need people (and locations) in the video that look appealing. If you have a tight budget, your team can become the on-camera talent. But if you can stretch the purse strings, hire an actor. An actor will be eloquent, persuasive, and believable—getting you the views you need.
4. Lighting and Blocking
A professionally made video is well-lit. Without lighting, you can lose the on-screen talent to the shadows, and with it, your message. Lighting sets the tone of the video and provides clear images.
Blocking is a technique used to get accurate and consistent placements in the video. In a scene, an object or person needs to have a fixed, consistent position for continuity and to look good
5. Shooting the video
Before shooting, you will need to storyboard the entire script. The director and camera crew will then shoot all the scenes seamlessly according to a production schedule and plan. You can use many takes and multiple camera positions to shoot the video. This way you can make sure that you get the best looking take.
6. Adding a Voice-over
Voice-overs are effective tools for persuasion in crowdfunding video production. You can either hire a professional for the recording or do the voice-over yourself with rented sound equipment. In any case, the voice-over should be clear, engaging, and relay your message effectively.
7. Adding and picking Music
There’s no successful video without music. From a few simple trills to an upbeat song, music can uplift and engross the viewer immediately. Bubbly music can excite the audience while sad notes can spark pity and sympathy. Your music should add character to your narrative and make it better.
8. Smoothing over the Sound
Shooting a video can mean a lot of background noise gets in the way. A video shot outdoors can especially have a lot of unwanted sounds like the rustling of leaves, chirping of birds, and the noisy sounds of traffic.
How do you handle this? It’s simple: ideally, choose a location where you can control the noise. Alternatively, you can edit out the sounds with professional sound editing software. If you can afford it, get a high-quality microphone for video shoots to prevent unwanted sounds in the first place.
9. Editing the Video
Raw footage can’t be used as the video campaign. To create and tell an effective visual story, you need to craft and edit it. Choose between fast and slow cuts dependent on the style you want your story to deliver. Add graphics and animation to bring elements of your video alive. Colour grade and use sfx and audio design to add character to your story.
10. Delivery & Marketing the Video
The final step in video production is delivery. In this case its marketing your video to your audience across social media and on your landing/campaign page. When delivering your video for social media you’ll need to make sure you export a version of the video, which meets the correct format for the platform. For example, the dimensions, tone, and messaging of the video will need to adhere to the standards of the marketing platforms. An extremely long video, for example, can’t be shared on Instagram.
If you need help with your crowdfunding video, or would like to discuss your campaign idea then schedule a free crowdfunding strategy call with us here at Wow Your Crowd. We are crowdfunding video specialists and will love to help you make a stand out the video for your campaign and help you reach your funding goal. Speak soon.
