Has anyone done a kickstarter project/ Advice?

[Shivoni]

Hey fellow TMF'ers,

I am working on my new album and am in the works of dabbling up a kickstarter project for it.
For the past twenty years now, I have been pretty much giving away my albums for free...mainly cause they suck.
But now, I feel it is time to finally try and produce a product worthy of selling. Problem is, I never really worked on a kickstarter before. Any advice before I roll it out? I have a preview, you can view and comment on (to give pointers with). I am working on a better promo video, explaining a bit more about the album in works. Maybe this weekend that will be up. And I do want to keep the pledging to small amounts ($1-$50), as I am only looking for a $1500 goal, which will get me mastering and 1000 CD initial release. If anyone has advice to help me out on this, I thank you. Sadly, I posted this on my facebook page and, though I have a few backer friends looking to help with funds, no one can really give out starter advice, since no one I know has really done it yet either. So, I am going to the various groups/chat sites I joined, this being one of them. Thanks for any info.

Cheers,
~Michael

KICKSTARTER PREVIEW LINK: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/hasenfang/178987435?token=afdf4eb7

 

[kurchatovium]

I think their is a site www.booster.com which will make a custom T-shirt for you. You sell the T-shirts to raise funds for your cause/project. I thought about it for the company I am trying to start KTT and for a pet project of mine called The Hypergenesis Project. Not sure if this what your looking for but maybe worth a look or two.

 

[Shivoni]

Wow, hey man, thanks. I was actually looking for a place which did tee-shirts in this way. The place I am going through to manufacture my CD (Diskmakers) does not to shirts for promo. Only posters, flyers and such. This might actually help out as part of the Pledge package. I just need to figure out how I can incorporate it into the kickstarter. Thanks again.

 

[kurchatovium]

Wow, hey man, thanks. I was actually looking for a place which did tee-shirts in this way. The place I am going through to manufacture my CD (Diskmakers) does not to shirts for promo. Only posters, flyers and such. This might actually help out as part of the Pledge package. I just need to figure out how I can incorporate it into the kickstarter. Thanks again.

You are most welcome and good luck with your endeavor.

I play around with audio myself. More from a sound effects perspective. Although I do make a few short "song like" clips for my screen savers. They are a bit far out just like me.

 

[Belmont]

The only big advice I have is to be very careful about calculating shipping costs for your physical reward tiers, that can bite you in the ass.

Alternately, bandcamp.com is a fantastic site for audio distribution. You can assign a minimum cost for your albums or per track, or set it to pay what you want. They also allow the sale of physical goods along with digital. I've only sold on it slightly, but I buy a lot there.

 

[Shivoni]

Oh yes, I have a bandcamp site up too.
And yes, figuring out the S&H is kind of a pain. Hopefully it won't come back to bite me.
Once I am done and launch it, I'll post it up here for anyone who might be interested.
If you like electronic/synthpop/80's...kind of Depeche Mode-ish with some Ween in there, you might enjoy this.
🙂

...Not to spam or anything...just trying to branch out, heh.

 

[Sodahead]

I've heard good things about kickstarter. I've done freelance work on a project that uses kickstarter for part of it's funding, though I don't know any exact figures or anything as I'm more on the production and creative side of things.

I'm in no way a business person, but your goal of $1,500 seems reasonable and I wish you the best of luck!

 

[Shivoni]

Thanks. Hopefully it will be, heh.

 

[DisBadBo1]

I'm in the process of doing a kickstarter for a video game that me and some buddies have been developing for some time now. Although our target audiences would be slightly different, make sure you give prospective donators ample time to be exposed to your product before even launching the kickstarter. This is the number one way that crowdfunding is successful. We've actually been ready to go to kickstart for some time now but we've agreed that we want maximum exposure before we even start the campaign, so we've just been continually posting in various communities and updating our website with new media and stuff increasing our fan base. Some campaigns will have begun marketing a year before they even go live. Start with spreading the word to family and friends and ask them to spread to their contacts.

Hope this helped.