Use the code CROWDCRUX to get a discount on the BackerKit setup fee
This is the second video in our new youtube series where we interview crowdfunding industry leaders and successful creators to bring you exclusive tips, advice, and resources that you can implement in your own crowdfunding campaign. If you haven’t already, I recommend checking out our interview with crowdfunding expert Leigh Lepore here.
This week I interviewed Maxwell Salzberg, who is the co-founder of BackerKit, a tool that helps creators coordinate reward fulfillment and shipping for Kickstarter, Indiegogo, and Crowdtitlt (now Tilt) campaigns.
He also ran the successful Kickstarter campaign Diaspora, which raised $200,000+ from over 6,000 backers. Diaspora is an open source personal web server to protect and share all of your stuff online.
If you’d like to learn a little bit about BackerKit before diving into the interview, check out the explainer video below.
What is BackerKit?
This interview went a little bit longer than our previous interviews, but don’t forget that you can always skip to the end of the blog post to see the major points covered in the interview, which we’ve compiled in a list.
Note: Don’t feel like you need to watch it all the way through! I’ve also included a breakdown of the points by timestamp.
Subscribe to CrowdCrux’s audio interviews
0:00 – 5:00 – Why did you create BackerKit?
5:00 – 7:50 – Who should use BackerKit and when should they approach you? What size project is ideal for BackerKit?
7:50 – 13:47 – What functionality do you offer for creators? What can they do with your product?
13:47 – 15:30 – Do you also work with Indiegogo projects and other types of crowdfunding campaigns?
15:30 – 19:26 – Why do creators raise more when using BackerKit?
19:26 – 20:30 – What did you learn from running the Diaspora Kickstarter campaign?
20:30 – 25:20 – What commonalities have you seen among successful campaigns?
25:20 – 30:00 – How should you price rewards? Should you expect to make a profit on Kickstarter?
30:00 – 35:30 – Where is the crowdfunding industry headed (general discussion)?
35:30 – Close – Do you have any updates you will be running out soon for BackerKit?
8 Key Takeaways
1. BackerKit was started January of 2013 and was born out the frustrations Salzberg experienced when doing reward fulfillment for his highly successful Kickstarter campaign.
2. Many Kickstarter projects are late not because the creator is delayed making the widget, but because there is a lot of work that creators don’t anticipate on the fulfillment side.
3. Every successful project creator will inevitably face reward fulfillment problems. Anyone who has over 200 backers should consider using BackerKit to streamline the process. Salzberg recommends considering the software once you’ve hit the halfway point in your campaign.
4. Many creators don’t realize that 75% of your backers might respond to your survey in the first 3 days, but then there is an endless trickle of backers who take more time to fill out the survey, which can make fulfillment a pain.
5. On average projects using BackerKit increase their fundraising by 8.7% (sales generated in BackerKit). The company has not had a single customer that has not saved money from using the product.
6. Diaspora’s success was due to word of mouth and tapping into the NYC tech startup community. Although the video was not “professional,” Salzberg believes the fact they underscored their credibility and communicated their project idea with passion led to the campaign’s success.
7. It’s important to keep your reward offering as simple as possible to minimize fulfillment difficulties. You can’t please everyone with your rewards, so focus on making the largest number of people happy without having too many permutations.
8. Creators should not seek to make a huge profit on their rewards. We’ve written about this a bit in the past. The biggest asset when you run a crowdfunding campaign is not the money, but the backers you connect with and the email list that you generate. You can inform these backers about future products and use the platform to help launch new ventures.
Pricing & Conclusion
Leave a comment below if you found the interview to be helpful or would like to learn more about BackerKit or Max’s Kickstarter campaign! You will also get 50% your setup fee if you sign up for the software before your campaign ends!
