When your message really resonates with customers, doing business with you becomes a no-brainer. The best marketing strategies create a passion for your brand that goes beyond just buying your product or service.
The success of a company often rests on a solid reputation. Marketing builds brand name recognition or product recall with a company. When a company reaches the high expectations of the public, its reputation stands on firmer ground, explains Kristie Lorette in a Demand Media post
There are many unique strategies to choose from when it comes to marketing your startup. Here are 8 types of marketing strategies (based on a SlideShare by the Cult Branding Company) that you can use during your crowdfunding campaign, with examples:
1. Scarcity Marketing
Scarcity marketing is a huge part of Kickstarter and Indiegogo campaigns. Offering exclusive, limited rewards helps draw in larger pledges and drives more demand for your reward tiers.
Take by Ellia Wang on Kickstarter, for example.
This campaign raised over $15,000 from only 75 backers (thats an average pledge of about $200 per backer!).
People pledged to this project quickly not only because of the great handmade bags, but also because most of the reward tiers were limited some were available to just one backer, while others were limited to 15 or less.
2. Content Marketing
For startups with expertise in a specific area, content marketing can be a great way to build your online reputation, make connections and get some campaign exposure in the process.
Jamey Stegmaier has run 7 successful Kickstarter campaigns, mostly in the tabletop games category. He has made great use of his blog, Stonemaier Games, to share Kickstarter Lessons and promote his Kickstarter projects. He has also written guest posts on other blogs.
He can use this helpful content to connect with other table top gaming enthusiasts that are a part of the Kickstarter community or that are thinking of launching a crowdfunding campaign.
If you’ve ever like to submit a blog post for our blog, sharing your Kickstarter experience, just shoot us an email!
3. Search Engine Marketing
With over 3.5 billion searches per day, Google is a great way for people to discover your startup. Search engine optimization (SEO) is a valuable skill for any creator or entrepreneur to learn. For more on this topic, you can check out this Crowdfunding Forum post.
One project that I noticed has done well with this recently is KaVii rewashable and reusable adhesive pads. They come up in the first page of Google results if you search rewashable and a full page of relevant results comes up if you search for Kavii.
Keep in mind that SEO is a longterm game. You can’t expect to rank well for keywords in the short term. Also, certain niches and keywords are more competitive than others.
4. Niche Marketing
Finding a novel solution to a problem or a unique take on a product or service in an already successful category can help you avoid the problem of overcrowded markets.
Crowdfunding platforms like Indiegogo and Kickstarter host a lot of innovative projects. Niche projects can easily go viral in their respective communities (and potentially even get covered in major news media or blogs).
One niche that has become popular for crowdfunded projects is the open source movement. Kickstarter is brimming with open source projects, including Dobot: Robotic Arm for Everyone (which has currently raised over $190K with more than 20 days to go).
The secret to finding a great niche is to find a subsection of a larger market that can be served better than the current mainstream solution.
Aside from researching the niche, the best way to do this is to intimately understand your industry and the problems and solutions that already exist. Talk to your potential customers!
5. Business-to-Business Marketing
Have a product that is easy to sell and provides unique benefits to your customers? Many crowdfunding campaigns include a business-to-business element in their overall goals and marketing efforts.
For example, Ive seen many creators (especially in the technology, board games and design categories) have reward tiers that are exclusively for retailers, like the Toronto-based Ollinfit, a wearable personal trainer. One of their reward tiers, $1,130 for six units, suggests that it would be great for gyms who want to rent out equipment.
Retailers and distributors DO browse Kickstarter for the latest and greatest projects. If you don’t believe me, check out this podcast interview that we did with a campaign that raised $195,982 and attracted the attention of Bacardi.
Creators should take note that while Kickstarter does not ban retailer rewards, they do limit them to quantities of ten or less.
6. Alliance Marketing
Successful Kickstarter campaigns sometimes promote other Kickstarter campaigns (in updates, mostly). These partnerships between creators take advantage of each others promotion and help impact the market by introducing backers to more cool projects on the same platform. This is similar to forum threads that encourage creators to back each others projects for $1.
The Lito Hammocks Kickstarter campaign, which raised over $40,000 took advantage of cross promotion opportunities throughout its campaign.
They were able to attract 574 backers backers using this technique and others!
If you’d like to find out how they did cross promotion and advice that they have for getting involved in alliance marketing, check out this podcast episode.
7. Free Sample Marketing
Im not suggesting that you give out free samples to all of your backers but one strategy that some creators have used is giving out free samples to the press and bloggers. If you have a great product, this can be an easy way to draw attention to your crowdfunding campaign.
By giving out samples opinion leaders have the chance to test your product and let their readers know what they think. This method can be better than random testimonials, because you can pitch to people who you know your target audience already trusts and respects.
One entrepreneur in the food category even did a free sample mail order program that exploded demand for his product, allowing him to raise a little over $26,000.
“I started a mail-order free sample program that just exploded. Thats where all those Facebook follows and mailing list adds came from.
The only other thing I did was go to a different networking event every night of the campaign and trade samples for business cards. The next day, I would email all those people, ask them what they made with their sample, and link them to the Kickstarter.”
8. Guerilla Marketing
In guerilla marketing campaigns, you get to make the most of, your imagination, big crowds, and a surprise element to market your products or services. Have you ever wanted to organize a flash mob but didnt have a good excuse to do so? Guerilla marketing might be your opportunity; this type of marketing uses over the top but inexpensive methods to draw attention to your brand or campaign.
One example of this type of marketing is Southwest Washingtons Give More 24! Event, which raised more than $426,000 in one 24-hour period last year. Along with a list of festivities, this event encourages the community to get online and donate to the non-profit or charity of their choice.
Conclusion
Just like any other business, crowdfunding startups have a whole arsenal of potential marketing strategies at their fingertips. The trick is to choose a select few that work well with your product or service and use a little trial and error to see which ones are ideal for you.
