6 karma · joined August 21, 2018
My total spend was - 1. $5 in prototyping. 2. 6 months time in marketing (I didn't pay myself. So, zero)
So, yes 186% covers several folds of my costs.
Great product X low marketing = Win (Tesla, SpaceX) Great product X Great Marketing = Super Win (Apple)
Normal product X Poor Marketing = My previous two attempts Good product X Good Marketing = My third attempt
But for the community I built over social media, yes, the project is unique. It is designed specifically for them.
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/rajarjit/the-rocket-dec...
I spent lot of time in building a 69k strong community over Instagram. No ads, no shoutouts from influencers, no usage of promotions from others.
Added valuable posts every day. Interacted with fans regularly. Cared for them.
In previous attempts I was in the false illusion of "make it and they will come".
1. I don't have money for investing in marketing and paid-advertizing.
2. Importance of building a dedicated audience/community.
What I had was time. So, I spent 6 months on Instagram building a community without any ads and totally relying on organic reach. Added ton of value. Build an email list of 500 people.
Also little things
- having an email list where every subscriber is double opt-in, helped in increasing the opening rates 10X.
- getting the subscribers after showing the product increased the final conversion rates 30X. Earlier I just asked for an email subscription for notification of new blog posts. Then mailed all of them the Kickstarter link. Two people backed.