The Art of Peace Kickstarter Marketing Campaign Plan Objective..Page 2 Overview..Page 2 Promoting a Kickstarter campaign.page 3 The Plan.Page 5 Breakdown of the Plan.....Page 8 Risks...Page 13 1 P age
Objective Implement a successful Kickstarter marketing campaign. Overview About Crowdfunding Crowdfunding is a strategic way for entrepreneurs to raise money for their projects, businesses and ideas by gaining the support of a crowd or larger group of people to provide funds. Who is in the crowd? Friend Family members Acquaintances Strangers How crowdfunding works Entrepreneurs post projects for a funding period (1-90 days) Backers fund the project, money goes into escrow At project completion date, entrepreneur receives funds if the project was fullyfunded. If it wasn t funded, he doesn t receive anything; if it was over-funded, gets over-funded amount. 2 P age
Why does the crowd donate? Affinity They like you They like your story They like the rewards Crowdfunding platforms Some of the top crowdfunding platforms are Indiegogo, Kickstarter and Crowdfunder. About Kickstarter Kickstarter provides people with a platform that helps them to fund their projects through online fundraising, while giving the public the opportunity to discover projects that may interests and inspire them. Kickstarter s homepage showcases a variety of creative projects that cover the arts, food, technology, and more. Kickstarter indicates that its platform is not for charity projects, raising funds for business expenses or having people fund your life. In other words, it s not the platform to raise money for starving kids, to help you meet payroll or find a personal sponsor. People who create projects have to have a set project in mind with a definitive goal, and the funds raised should be targeted for that project. Promoting a Kickstarter campaign Successful Kickstarter campaigns have lots of traffic. There are a number of ways to get 3 P age
traffic to a campaign. These ways fall into two categories: Paid and relatively free. Paid promotion is advertising. Placing ads on Google Adwords and purchasing advertisements in printed or digital publications are examples of this. Relatively free methods have a nominal cost. This cost manifests itself in man hours and potential service fees (e.x. the cost of distributing a press release). This proposal focuses on the following relatively free methods of promotion: Media Outreach, E-mail marketing and social media marketing. What is media outreach? Media outreach is simply contacting members of the media (print, web, broadcast) and telling them your story. The expectation is that some members of the media will find your story interesting enough to retell it to members of their audience. How do we reach out to the media? We can tell our story to the media via social media, press releases, phone calls, e-mails, and inperson. What is e-mail marketing? E-mail marketing is the advertisement of a product, service, or brand through electronic mail. E- mail marketing can be used to improve the relationship between a business and its customers or to gain new customers. What is social media marketing? 4 P age
Social media marketing refers to the process of gaining traffic or attention through social media sites. Social media itself is a catch-all term for sites that may provide radically different social actions. For instance, Twitter is a social site designed to let people share short messages or updates with others. Facebook, in contrast is a full-blown social networking site that allows for sharing updates, photos, joining events and a variety of other activities. The Plan Phase 1: Before the campaign begins Phase 2: During the campaign Phase 3: After the campaign ends Phase 1: Before the campaign Begin media kit creation -Author bio and photo -Book summary -Sample images from the book -Q&A -Press release about the book 5 P age Begin media outreach
-Research media outlets/bloggers -Compile list of media outlets to pursue -Begin contacting media outlets -Identify which outlets we want to use to build buzz before the campaign and which outlets we d like to use to get the word out during the campaign. Begin e-mail marketing -Compile list of personal contacts -Create landing pages -Create e-mail templates for initial e-mail, updates, media pitches, etc. Begin social media marketing -Begin posting on social media accounts -Begin gathering a following on social media -Begin having conversations with influencers on social media Phase 2: During the campaign Continue media outreach -Continue contacting media outlets directly -Send out update press releases E-mail marketing 6 P age
landing page -Send updates to segmented e-mail lists about launch and updates; direct them to the Social media marketing -Continue posting on social media accounts -Continue gathering a following on social media -Continue having conversations with influencers on social media Metrics During the campaign we will analyze the data from Kickstarter and other sources to see if we need to tweak our campaign in any way. For instance, if we find that most of our traffic is coming from Twitter, we will focus more on Twitter. Phase 3: After the campaign Media Outreach -Send out press release about the successful status of campaign -Start directing people to go to The Art of Peace website E-mail marketing -Send end-of-campaign update to segmented e-mail lists -Start directing people to go to The Art of Peace website 7 P age
Social media marketing -Send messages to followers about status of campaign -Start directing people to go to The Art of Peace website Breakdown of the Plan Media/Press Kit The first phase of media outreach is media kit creation. The Art of Peace website is already up and running, so we need to create a media kit. A media kit is a toolbox for the press. It s a one-stop shop for members of the press to learn about you and your project. The things we need in the Art of Peace toolbox include the following: Author bio and photo Book summary Sample images from the book Q&A Press release about the book Media Outreach Before the launch of the Kickstarter campaign, we need to find the right members of the media to tell about The Art of Peace. It s important that we focus our efforts on the right publications. Things we will be looking for in a potential outlet: Relevance will their readers LOVE your project? 8 Page
Readership how much traffic does their site get? Relationships do you know at least one person who can make a strong introduction? Reach will the blog reach prospective backers by promoting your post via email newsletter, RSS feed, Facebook, Twitter, and other channels? Once we know who we are targeting, we will send them customized pitches. A pitch is a brief write-up telling a journalist why he should cover a story. Another approach to reaching the media is the broadcast approach. We will broadcast the Art of Peace message to potential publications via press releases that we release through relevant newswires. Newswires such as PRWeb and PRLog distribute press releases to newsrooms around the world. Mailing List One of the biggest ways to have a successful Kickstarter campaign is affinity marketing (marketing to people who know you). Before the Kickstarter campaign launches, we will need to create a list of those in your personal network. We will need to segment those on this list into three groups: Influencers (These are people who may be famous, who can influence their contacts to support The Art of Peace Kickstarter campaign. 9 P age
Friends and Family (These people may or may not know about The Art of Peace, but you know you can count on them to donate/spread the word). Acquaintances (These people have no idea about The Art of Peace. ) We will send e-mails to these groups. The acquaintances will receive a mass pre-launch email sent using MailChimp before launch. The influencers and in-the-know friends each received a personalized e-mail before launch. Each group will also receive a launch e-mail when the Kickstarter campaign goes live, updates during the campaign, and a follow-up e-mail when the campaign ends. Landing Page In tandem with our e-mail marketing, we will need to have landing pages instead of directing people directly to our Kickstarter page. Landing pages will help us maximize sharing on social media. 10 P age
Sample landing pages Why it will work: Essentially we will just be asking them to do just one thing at a time, typically 11 P age
just to click something. Social Media We will be using the following social media platforms to get the word out about The Art of Peace. Twitter Tweet about project Tweet project updates Have conversations with influencers, to get them to tweet Build following Facebook Post on newsfeed Post in groups Message friends LinkedIn* Post in LinkedIn groups Pinterest* Post some book images on Pinterest Repin on open groups Ask popular pinners to repin *Optional 12 P age
Risks The biggest risk with a Kickstarter campaign is that the project doesn t appeal to people so that they decide not to back it. Other risks include not getting the media coverage and social media response we are anticipating. 13 P age