Picture this. It’s really early in the morning and you can’t seem to get back to sleep. You just roll over and check your email. You immediately get butterflies in your stomach, you’ve just received an email that your Kickstarter project has been funded. All the blood, sweat and tears you’ve put into your baby has finally paid off. You knew there was a market for your product and your thoughts have been validated. But suddenly you’re struck with fear. What next?
Many Kickstarters have a plan for what happens after their Kickstarter is funded but there is always room for improvement. There is so much going on that sometimes important things get forgotten in the process. You want to get orders and grow, fast. Here are 4 practical ways to help you make the transition from Kickstarter to online store and help you grow.
Landing Page
While your online store is being worked on, you need to continue to create buzz around your product. It could be months before you launch your online store due to setbacks you hadn’t anticipated.
Many Kickstarters’ biggest regret is that they didn’t do enough to create hype around their product after their Kickstarter ended. Instead they went “silent” due to complications or just lack of foresight. Don’t make that mistake.
Set up a landing page as soon as possible and start collecting emails. There are two reasons why you should be doing this.
- Gain leads to build your sales list
- Update people on how things are progressing
Creating a landing page is extremely simple and can be done in literally a few hours thanks to great software such as unbounce. Below are 3 key factors that go into making a high converting landing page:
- One clear message. For example “We want to keep you up to date on the progress we are making. Sign up to keep informed”
- One clear call to action – in this case, “enter email address”
- Have a great story? Tell it through video. It’s known to help convert by 80%!
There’s also a ton more great resources on how to set up a landing page and best practices to keep in mind.
Storytelling
There is a reason why you know the names Charles Dickens and The Brothers Grimm. They were remarkable storytellers. Their words, along with many others, touched the lives of many people. Their stories have been passed down through the decades and will continue to be shared for generations to come.
A truly great story draws us in and can make us feel happy, sad, angry, perplexed and a whole lot of other emotions! They can also move us to action. A great Kickstarter does just that, which is why your great story needs to also appear on your online store.
The Oyster Bed started as a Kickstarter with an emotional story based around family and sustainability. Kudos to whoever did this video because it is truly awesome. They kept the video and placed it on their homepage.
Rich content such as video keeps people and engaged, increases conversion rates and also helps people feel connected to you. Placing a video like this somewhere in your online store is a smart move.
So, whether you’ve helped alleviate a pain point in your industry or you came up with a remarkable invention, continue to tell your story! It’s part of the reason why people felt compelled to back your company in the first place.
What Platform To Choose?
This can certainly be a dilemma for many Kickstarters. You’ve already validated that you have a product or service that people want and now you have to choose an eCommerce platform to sell it. There are a ton of platforms out there and choosing one can become overwhelming. You don’t want to waste your time picking one platform and then migrating over to another.
Many people will look to what their peers are using which can sometimes lead to a very bad decision. Every business’s needs are different and every platform isn’t right for every merchant. Merchant A’s needs are going to be very different than Merchant B’s.
So how do you determine which platform to use? First determine your top 5 absolute must haves. This could include anything such as:
- Customizable checkout
- Custom Fields
- Custom order status
- Pre Orders
- Subscriptions
Earlier we mentioned how The Oyster Bed uses great storytelling. LemonStand recently did a case study with them and here are a few things they couldn’t live without:
- Custom store to portray story
- Advanced SEO (such as structuring data and customizing URLs)
- Unlimited Customization (to be able to optimize for conversions)
- No transaction fees
Not every platform will offer everything you need, so you will have to make compromises. Many eCommerce platforms are quite powerful and can do a lot, while others are simple and are good for “do it yourselfers”. It all comes down to you doing your homework. If you have questions, any platform should be able to offer honest insight into what would be best for your business.
To learn more about how to choose a platform, listen to what LemonStand CEO Danny Halarewich has to say on the subject on this Rejoiner podcast.
Pre Orders
Beep, a company that sells wireless speakers that can connect to a wide variety of devices have seen great success after Kickstarter. So good in fact, that they keep selling out of their product! The good news is that Beep allows you to pre order your product.
Pre orders are a great way to satisfy someone’s need for your product without turning them away. You can think of pre orders as kind of a reservation system. If you choose to go this route, you need to update your customers on a regular basis regarding timelines, shipping dates, and what’s going on with your company.
Prepare For Growth
Chances are you started this Kickstarter because you believed in your product, duh! You’ve put a lot of time and energy into your Kickstarter project and this is going to be your main source of income for, fingers crossed, years to come.
So start planning ahead now, and make sure you have a clear growth strategy for once your campaign is over. At LemonStand, we’ve helped many eCommerce Kickstarters continue growing after successful campaigns. From them, we’ve learnt what it takes to stay successful after Kickstarter, and we want to share those secrets with you. If you’ve got a Kickstarter campaign, or plan on running one in the future, sign up below for our Ultimate Guide to eCommerce Kickstarter.
