I launched a failed Kickstarter, and its pretty obvious why.

edited in Projects
Hi everyone

I started Photon Games (www.photongames.co.za) earlier this year, the plan being to make an awesome card game, put it on Kickstarter, get tons of money, then use that money to help other South African board game designers to publish their games on Kickstarter. It seemed like a reasonable plan, until I hit a snag: I put up Sultan's Library, my Kickstarter project and... nothing. Sure I got a few pledges here and there, but it turns out there really are not enough people browsing through Kickstarter to get something funded.

The project is still live (https://kickstarter.com/projects/369033234/sultans-library) but with 10 days left and us at not even 10% of our funding goal, it is highly unlikely this project will go anywhere. Undeterred, I have made a list of the main problems with our project:

1. Not enough people know about it. Turns out that if you want to get something funded, you need to bring your own fans to the table.
2. The base cost was too expensive. We decided to include a lot of fancy cardboard pieces, which cost way more to make than just plain paper.
3. Our reward levels are too far apart. I decided to group my reward levels together, offering package deals, such as a poster +tshirt combo, instead of offering them separately.
4. We had virtually no media presence beside the website and the facebook page. Getting in contact with board game blogs, etc is crucial to a Kickstarter's success.

We are planning a relaunch in June, and I will keep the forum up to date with our progress.
Thanked by 1dammit

Comments

  • edited
    And the website (https://www.photongames.co.za/) isn't loading for me, by the way. It tells me "SSL connection error".

    Thanks for sharing your story. I'm happy you learned from the experience, and hope that you'll hang around our community here - we regularly speak about the importance of running a kickstarter - it's practically a full time job, and you need a ton of material prepared beforehand to keep the fire going throughout the kickstarter, and even more WAY BEFORE the kickstarter kicks off.

    The points you made about base cost being too expensive and reward levels being too far apart - how did you arrive at those conclusions? I'm interested to know whether you had data/feedback on that, or if it was just conjecture?
  • Try this one: photongames.co.za

    The base cost being too high I got from the number of video views versus the number of backers. People who were not getting the free shipping were also not too keen to pledge.

    The reward levels being too far apart was a concern I had from the beginning and many people messaged me about it, asking why there was such a big jump in the backer levels. People seemed to understand once I explained that they are group rewards, but we still only received one backer at a level higher than the base game.
  • Hey RynoLourens,

    If I may ask, how did you get your project on Kickstarter whilst being from South-Africa?
  • Hi.

    I was about to launch a kickstarter and setup the page and in the process of paying someone a lot of money for press releases. I thought i should pause and contacted people who were successful and people who failed.

    They all said the same thing. If you do not have a massive fanbase... then don't launch the campaign. Even PR pushes are not enough. One guy even missed his funding goal after spending a lot of money on PR campaigns.

    I guess if you look at oatmeal it makes sense. He has a giant following. His game got funded in record time with record high funding.

    So yes. I would concur. No established fanbase... no funding.
    Though i was always under the impression you get your fans on kickstarter. This appears to be a false belief.
    Thanked by 1mattbenic
  • @RynoLourens great to have you on the forums! You know, it might be a good idea to get in touch with the team who did Ancient Terrible Things because they've just successfully funded their second kickstarter...and being the only boardgames from SA I know to do this successfully, they're the most experienced in the country!

    I'm sorry to hear that your kickstarter was not successful, but it's great that you learnt from the process. And fantastic that you're sharing your learning with us. People seem to have over-estimated the ability of just having a kickstarter page to get you funded while under estimated the amount of work that needs to happen before, during and after to market the game and create a success. And even then, there are no guarantees.
    Thanked by 1mattbenic
  • Kickstarters are a fulltime job while they're running, there's loads of resources out there that talk about how much effort you need to be prepared for in order to make them work. There's no secret to them, it's just marketing marketing marketing, on top of an already good history of marketing and the best material you can offer.

    So on that "offering the best material" side of things, don't be afraid to use this community to critique and help you polish your KS campaign, supporting information and message. There's always something that could be better, and in this setting, better means more chance of success, so I never understand why people don't try to test their KS material with as many people as possible first...

    For instance, in the Sultan's Library KS, there's very little to motivate WHY or HOW the game is cool to potential players. Yes, you talk about how to play, but that sounds incredibly dry. Collecting virtual books isn't inherently fun and the way you describe the gameplay in the video it sounds like it's mostly just about random draws. I'm sure there's more strategy to the game, some form of contest or backstabbing or planning, highlight that stuff! All the successful KS boardgames in the thread @Tuism posted yesterday have these wonderful taglines or settings that draw you in: "Build a better dystopia" wait, how are dystopia's better than each other? Yeah, I'm curious now! Even the wine game says "The strategic game of winemaking", which lets you know there's more to it (also, I'm curious, how is winemaking strategic? That's a good state to leave potential players in) And of course, there's that glorious box art of peasants doing agrarian things with bloody great mechs belching smoke stomping around in the background (I love how the peasants are clearly the focus of the image, but they're all LOOKING at the mechs) that single piece of art does so much to sell the game's concept.

    So yeah, don't try to sell your game on the technical features. Convince people it's cool first.

    Also, your website has some really difficult to read font colour choices. The white text on light background images is tricky. The grey text on a nearly grey image is impossible. Your website is also not immediately selling your games to visitors either, they have to scroll just to find them, then they have to click for more? If your site is supporting a KS campaign, make the site SCREAM about how awesome your game is first. When we redesigned the Desktop Dungeons site to be more upfront about the game being good and where/how you could get it, our conversions jumped dramatically.

    And finally, the guy that developed Neverending Nightmares pointed out something really smart about successful KS campaigns for games: Don't make the KS about just the game, make backing the KS be backing a cause instead. Bringing back adventure games. Supporting your favorite webcomic. Supporting an innovative idea, etc. Sultan's Library feels a lot like it's just a product that isn't trying to tell me why I should like it. You can do better than that when you relaunch :)

    P.S. It's possible to set up your KS in test mode and then distribute that link to people for feedback. More campaigns should do this.
    Thanked by 2dammit mattbenic
  • Thanks for all the feedback guys! Definitely a lot to keep in mind for the relaunch. I am currently emailing as rapidly as I can, getting in contact with people to review the game, talking to convention owners, getting people to interview me etc. I think if I just keep a constant stream of media stuff going out it will definitely help the cause. Another good piece of advice is that 20% of your media coverage will generate 80% of your backers. Hence, you need to have tons of articles going up in the months before and during the campaign for it to really translate to visitors.

    If anyone knows any South African board game bloggers, podcasts etc that they could put me in touch with, that would be a great help!
  • If anyone knows any South African board game bloggers, podcasts etc that they could put me in touch with, that would be a great help!
    This is a complete waste of time. South African media, while it might feel great to get attention from the locals, doesn't have a large audience and doesn't drive many conversions. Going after local media is an effort trap: You'll do it, get some coverage and think you're doing okay, but nobody international will see your stuff that way... There's also this insidious thing that local media does when they mark your work as "South African" or say "it's good for local talent", they're basically pointing out that they have incentives to be less harsh on your work than if they were paying attention to something internationally made, their expectations are lower. They might not mean to do this on purpose, but it definitely has an impact on viewers.

    Rather chase international press and polish your marketing message. Getting international coverage will mean that local media will cover you too, with less "it's local so like it" messaging, because they have to read international sources too.

    P.S. All the <3 to local media, but from a business perspective we can't afford to focus on you as a primary channel. That doesn't mean we respect you less.
Sign In or Register to comment.