Ways to promote a kickstarter

40 replies
For those that don't know kickstarter is community based project funding site where groups working on projects ask for funding from people, possible donors, and in return those donors get some reward.

If anyone want to check it out just go to Kickstarter.

I have recently started a independent game development company with multiple other members of the game industry (I currently work for a game company in the chicagoland area). We plan on creating a kickstarter to help finish the funding for our game which will be available for the Ouya and PC. We're hoping that if it does well we can also port it to the playstation 3 and xbox live arcade.

The game is a tower defense with some real time strategy elements added in.

Anyway we are looking for other ways to build hype and create a list prior to starting the kickstarter as we'll only have 30 days to get people's eyes on our page once it starts so any help would be much appreciated.

Here are some preliminary screenshots of the game in case anyone wanted to see it. I would also love to hear your thoughts about how the game looks. If you like the art let me know. If you think it's terrible I'd love to hear why you think so. Cheers






Ideas?
#kickstarter #promote #ways
  • Profile picture of the author Thrasher66099
    Oh I suppose I should also state that so far we are attempting to contact game news websites and see if they want to run a story on our game which will hopefully increase awareness for the kickstarter and we've also created a facebook fanpage but other than funneling viewers from my other fanpages I'm not sure how to promote it in a way that will get a large set of eyes on it quickly (within the next 14 days or so before the kickstarter launches.
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  • Profile picture of the author PsycFa
    I do not know much about the games domain and how you can get it in the spotlight but some general marketing aspects can still be applied to it though.

    Have you tried press releases? It can be picked up by other gaming sites looking for news to funnel to their readers.

    Also do a lot of youtube marketing such as insider's view of your project.. interact with gamers, ask for opinions on games forums etc...

    in your 14 days lapse; i doubt you can get a huge impact but its never too late to start.. I bet other veterans here can get you a much better insight on what you can do.

    Good luck with your project.
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    • Profile picture of the author Thrasher66099
      We already have multiple members using accounts throughout many high profile video game forums across the internet. I myself have 6+ year old accounts on 3 of the biggest game forums on the internet which I've been using to "leak" screenshots and see what people think about the art of the game.
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  • Profile picture of the author jazbo
    Kickstarter is interesting. You need to appeal to the people who would buy what you want to start. For example, I saw a strategy card game on there the other day that had reached double its funding appeal. I did a bit of scrapebox work to see why it was successful. It was all over several high traffic gaming card forums and mentioned by a couple of big retailers as well.
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    • Profile picture of the author professorrosado
      Simply, go where the money is. Think out of the box (gaming). Mix in some good "real world" leg work. Print and traditional media still have greater credibility than online.

      I've seen Angel funding come from varied sources - be creative and resourceful.

      After your 30 days - try fundingalt.com for a more permanent and promoted funding presence. There are other platforms, but most only deal with non-profits and none of them promote your cause - I gather this is not such an effort.
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      • Profile picture of the author Thrasher66099
        Originally Posted by professorrosado View Post

        Simply, go where the money is. Think out of the box (gaming). Mix in some good "real world" leg work. Print and traditional media still have greater credibility than online.

        I've seen Angel funding come from varied sources - be creative and resourceful.

        After your 30 days - try fundingalt.com for a more permanent and promoted funding presence. There are other platforms, but most only deal with non-profits and none of them promote your cause - I gather this is not such an effort.
        I don't know if I agree with the statement that print and traditional media have more credibility than the internet as far as games go. I've been working in the industry for a couple years now and I do know that every gamer I know will trust the big sites and the forums a lot more than they trust shows like x-play or ads that you see on tv or in the real world.

        fundingalt.com also doesn't look very viable. The great thing about kickstarter is that the money is ours once the campaign ends. That looks like a venture capital raising site so once we gain that money we'd have to cater to the wants and needs of the investors. We definitely don't want that.
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      • Profile picture of the author thekencook
        Originally Posted by professorrosado View Post

        After your 30 days - try fundingalt.com for a more permanent and promoted funding presence. There are other platforms, but most only deal with non-profits and none of them promote your cause - I gather this is not such an effort.
        Sent your link to a guy named Kyle Van Pelt. You can find him if you search for him. He's in the market.
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        • Profile picture of the author Walter Parrish
          I haven't tried kickstarter before, but have tried one of the other guys. And for me the crowd funding thing was a disaster and also put my project on front street concerning the competition. " A lot of those little upgrades with google and fb idea came from my project".

          Anyway, here's what I learned.
          1 Pull out all stops, make use of all your psychology, nlp, subliminals etc.
          2 Probably want to use green screen on your videos, yea make sure you got some videos.
          3 One thing that I didn't know was that you already have to have a following, so after I finished with my project I was left with the feeling that if I got to do all this work to get folks to this site, why can't I just get them to my own site and get the money.

          hope that helps some
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  • Profile picture of the author MatthewWoodward
    1. work out your USP's
    2. cut a unique angle
    3. distribute a press release / get in touch with relevant media outlets
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    • Profile picture of the author Thrasher66099
      ^We have a fanpage ready to go which we will be loading with content in about 2 days (We have some extra polish we want to add before anyone sees final versions on fb). We also have a website being built by a professional web designer from a fairly major company. He happens to be a sibling of one of our founding members so we got lucky there.

      The usp is created as is the angle. Now we just need a method of deploying the message efficiently to the masses.

      I'm looking for extra deployment methods.

      Also guys, please feel free to give me some criticism about how the game looks. At this stage the look of the game is everything so if someone can point out the flaws which we should remove or nice features that we should emphasize that would be helpful.
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  • Profile picture of the author fin
    I think you need to take care of the first 30% then you will start appearing on the front page.

    Things like your blog traffic, Facebook fan pages etc.
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  • Profile picture of the author SocialMediaOwls
    Make sure you buy fb likes/tweets to your kickstarter page (at least 1000) so it gets viewed as "popular".

    I did a few dozen promotions for kickstarters last year and raised 33k on a dice game. The key is making the kickstarter appear to be popular so it gets listed in the popular section
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    • Profile picture of the author Thrasher66099
      Originally Posted by SocialMediaOwls View Post

      Make sure you buy fb likes/tweets to your kickstarter page (at least 1000) so it gets viewed as "popular".

      I did a few dozen promotions for kickstarters last year and raised 33k on a dice game. The key is making the kickstarter appear to be popular so it gets listed in the popular section
      I've never bought fb likes. Are you saying pay for fb fanpage promotion through fb or buy straight up likes through some third party service?
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    • Profile picture of the author Thrasher66099
      Originally Posted by Randall Magwood View Post

      Will it be something like "Sims"?
      No it's a tower defense so it would be more like Pixel Junk if you've ever played that. Basically there are enemies attacking your town and you command your 4 men to create defensive towers that will destroy enemies before they can get to your town. The townsfolk come out of the town to man the towers. Upgrading a tower causes an extra townsperson to head over to the tower and help the people already defending from that tower.
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  • Profile picture of the author Emily Walker
    I wish you luck. I have been embarking on a campaign to get exposure for my Kickstarter for my novel Zombified. I am not even halfway there and I have contacted everyone I can think of and posted everywhere on the web. It is a full time job
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    • Profile picture of the author Thrasher66099
      Originally Posted by Emily Walker View Post

      I wish you luck. I have been embarking on a campaign to get exposure for my Kickstarter for my novel Zombified. I am not even halfway there and I have contacted everyone I can think of and posted everywhere on the web. It is a full time job
      Is your kickstarter currently underway?
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      • Profile picture of the author Emily Walker
        Yes it is and I have 6 days left!! eek!!
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      • Profile picture of the author Emily Walker
        Originally Posted by Thrasher66099 View Post

        Is your kickstarter currently underway?
        I have gotten 120 out of 900 lol
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    • Profile picture of the author masterpeez4py
      Originally Posted by Emily Walker View Post

      I wish you luck. I have been embarking on a campaign to get exposure for my Kickstarter for my novel Zombified. I am not even halfway there and I have contacted everyone I can think of and posted everywhere on the web. It is a full time job
      I personally found kickstarter by accident and when I did, I couldn't use it since I am not a US citizen and that really broke my heart.

      My elder brother is currently in need of money for his music production. Though he was a member of a group who where already doing fine until a black sheep sprung up and the manager disbanded the group. He is back to square one and seriously need the money.

      So, if I were you, I would go over what I was doing wrong and how I could change that. I would take a look at all the successful campaigns and evaluate what element make them 'thick' because the best way to succeed is copy those that have done it before.
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      • Profile picture of the author Thrasher66099
        I had looked at letting another marketer take this on full time as our traffic traffic funnel guru, but that would only really help us if they could get a couple million eyes on the kickstarter and even then I don't know what kind of a cut they'd want.

        Even if they only took 10% of the net profit it could be a pretty big payday. Some games make 7 figures and it's not uncommon for a decent game to make at least $250k.

        Anyone have thoughts on that?
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  • Profile picture of the author wackiin
    been thinking of using kickstarter myself would also like to know the best ways to promote it to drive it up
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    • Profile picture of the author Walter Parrish
      Originally Posted by wackiin View Post

      been thinking of using kickstarter myself would also like to know the best ways to promote it to drive it up
      That's just it, it's like doing your own promotion. So, everything is the same except you are spending your energy getting folks over to kickstarter instead of your own site. I guess sites like Indiegogo.com and Kickstarter work if you are promoting a certain niche that they are into, but if they aren't I think you might as well send the people to your site to donate that way you don't have to pay a middle man.

      For Promotion:
      Youtube
      Articles
      Blogging
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      Google, Bing, Yahoo
      Press Releases
      Wickipedia

      All the same promotions you normally do you would be doing to get folks over to your Kickstarter page.
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  • Profile picture of the author Cesar Sampaio
    You could try getting the attention of people like the owners of Penny-Arcade or bloggers from sites like 1UP.

    Most indie projects that ended up funded were promoted by an article or blog post in a big site. Try everybody and someone eventually will take a liking of your project.

    Also it is looking good and original, not just another clone. That helps your chances a lot.
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  • Profile picture of the author SocialMediaOwls
    Use Microworkers to go to your Kickstarter page and "like" the kickstarter page
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  • Profile picture of the author gromo
    Hey thats cool....can you make a tower defence game like that using any background? Can it be personalized?
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    • Profile picture of the author cjreynolds
      Really like the concept - I wrote a little flash game once that used the same idea - the whole drawn-on-paper look. It was a flying saucer shoot-em-up game - did it for an arcade site, so I didn't make any money...
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      • Profile picture of the author Thrasher66099
        Originally Posted by cjreynolds View Post

        Really like the concept - I wrote a little flash game once that used the same idea - the whole drawn-on-paper look. It was a flying saucer shoot-em-up game - did it for an arcade site, so I didn't make any money...
        Free game front ends with in game micro transaction sales are where the money is at anyway.


        We actually want to create a fully free multiplayer game that has in game micro transactions allowing players to buy vanity items that they can wear while crushing their enemies. There are other ways to monetize that as well but it's a much more ambitious project and we wouldn't be able to work on it until we have some successful games under our belt as we would need a full team of at least 20 people working on it full time.
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        • Profile picture of the author cjreynolds
          Originally Posted by Thrasher66099 View Post

          Free game front ends with in game micro transaction sales are where the money is at anyway.


          We actually want to create a fully free multiplayer game that has in game micro transactions allowing players to buy vanity items that they can wear while crushing their enemies. There are other ways to monetize that as well but it's a much more ambitious project and we wouldn't be able to work on it until we have some successful games under our belt as we would need a full team of at least 20 people working on it full time.
          Y'all are goin bigtime - Are you using a particular game engine for development, or are you goin old-school (Watcom c, etc.)?
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          • Profile picture of the author Thrasher66099
            Originally Posted by cjreynolds View Post

            Y'all are goin bigtime - Are you using a particular game engine for development, or are you goin old-school (Watcom c, etc.)?
            We currently use the Unity3d engine. It has a few annoying nuances that we have to program around, but for all intents and purposes it allows us to create products that are just as polished and fluid as the big guys (AAA companies).
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            • You can use this nice viral tool - it`s called Pay with a tweet
              You can put some free version of your game on your website and also register with this app and put the button Pay with a tweet on your website just below.
              Users can only download your game after pushing the button , which will send the post on Tweeter about your product.
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            • Profile picture of the author cjreynolds
              Originally Posted by Thrasher66099 View Post

              We currently use the Unity3d engine. It has a few annoying nuances that we have to program around, but for all intents and purposes it allows us to create products that are just as polished and fluid as the big guys (AAA companies).
              Good luck with that /* smiles politely while turning green w/envy */
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    • Profile picture of the author Thrasher66099
      Originally Posted by gromo View Post

      Hey thats cool....can you make a tower defence game like that using any background? Can it be personalized?
      Yes, we can, and they aren't backgrounds. Those are fully interactable environments. You can run underneath the rings of the binder and so forth.
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  • Profile picture of the author kbuzz
    I consulted on a Kickstarter project for an iPhone game. Here's a couple of things that really helped push it over what we were going for:

    1. Setup a Twitter search for anyone mentioning your project and engage them. Also thank everyone who backs your project and mentions it on Twitter. HootSuite is free and you can setup a window just for that.

    2. Don't be afraid to engage influencers on Twitter. Ask them to take a look. Every now and then you'll get retweeted and pick up a few backers.

    3. Your initial video is key. Frequent updates are even more so. Make sure you publish them to YouTube and promote on Twitter and Facebook. Even behind the scenes stuff which wouldn't seem as important really helps motivate people to back.

    4. Keep in touch with Kickstarter itself. Getting featured on their page isn't difficult if you follow their guidelines and create compelling content.

    5. Finally, it REALLY helps to have a playable demo that you can show on your video. Even if it's a few screens. That way backers know you've already spent some time developing it.

    Hope that helps. Cheers!
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  • Profile picture of the author Majin
    I don't know much about Kickstarter but i LOVE tower defense games. First played this kind of games on wacraft 3, 70% of my iphone games are tower defense. Hope your game and your project will do well, i will keep an eye on it !
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  • Profile picture of the author A.Green
    Take a look at The Crowdfunding Bible from Crowdfunding Bible: Top Book on Crowd Funding, Kickstarter . It's a really in-depth guide and free. Good luck with the project!
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