Is My Crowdfunding Campaign Ready To Launch?

It’s important to understand if your campaign is ready to launch.

Many campaigns launch with the “If you build it, they will come” mentality.

Sad to say, but it’s an incredibly detrimental one.

Knowing when to launch is one of the biggest campaign questions. It has massive implications for your entire campaign’s eventual fundraising.

• Should I launch now so we don’t lose ground to competitors who might scoop my idea?
• Should I build up 100,000 Facebook/Twitter/Instagram followers first?
• I’ve gotten in touch with an influencer with a 40,000 person email list, should I wait until she’s able to send out a promo email?

These are all good thoughts and angles, but they’re not the most important factors in a successful campaign.

The most important thing is the 30% Rule.

The 30% Rule

Your campaign is ready to launch when you can fund at least 30% of your whole goal within 24 hours using only your email list. This point is incredibly important.

There are 2 reasons for this:

1. Hitting 30% on Day 1 signals to the crowdfunding platform team that the campaign is worth keeping an eye on. This can mean additional promotions, like newsletter inclusions or Project We Love badges, on the crowdfunding platform.
2. A campaign that is 30% funded right off the bat makes newcomers more likely to contribute. It’s just psychology of the masses; they want to get in on the ground floor of something new, exciting and looks like it will be funded.

It’s the simplest and most reliable method to determine whether or not a campaign is ready to launch, or if they’ll need a few extra months to prep.

According to Kickstarter’s official stats, campaigns that raise at least 20% over the course of the entire campaign have a 80% chance of funding.

That probability is fine if you’re running a couple thousand dollar campaign, but if your brand needs an excess of $100k, there’s no need to risk all your hard work for such a low chance.

At 30% funding, campaigns reach a 90% chance of being reaching their goal (at bare minimum).

Considering how much work you’re putting in your campaign, let’s do this right.

So I just need those emails. I’ll just go buy them from somewhere!

Not so fast.

These emails should be high-quality, interested in your product and ready to convert into actual dollars. This is much better than emails from some random site. Although there IS a use for those types of emails in ads.

Buying email lists from random sources just means talking to an irrelevant audience who most probably won’t be purchasing from you anyway.

Personal story: a large client I worked with purchased a 100,000 email list for a large sum of money. The list ended up converting at 0.01%. That’s just 10 people from the 100,000 emails.

Worth it?

I think not.

Is it a high hurdle to jump to get emails?

Of course, but that’s the point.

Crowdfunding launches aren’t overnight successes, they’re months and often years worth of buildup of good will and customer focus.

How about if I have hundreds of social media followers?

Still nope. They don’t convert at even close to the same rate as qualified email leads.

Let’s be real, you can’t post memes on your social media page for a few months, buy 10,000 followers on Instagram, run a “viral” referral campaign, and expect to make $50,000 on your campaign.

Getting purchases is about engagement, and social media followers aren’t as nearly as engaged as followers on email lists.

Depending on the source you look at, one email address is worth between 6 and 40 times as much as a single social media follower / tweet.

What about this influencer with 20k YouTube followers and promised a video?

Aim to have it go out during your campaign for sure, but don’t rest your start date on this video being sent out.

Remember, their list is their list.

There may be different interests, needs and so on.

It’s true that the viewers might convert, in some cases a whole bunch of them might convert, but relying solely on someone else to find customers for your campaign is a complete no no.

Take the time and effort to build up your own audience.

Once I can fund 30% of my campaign with only my email list I can launch?

Yup! Easy as that.

This ensures you an excellent chance of getting fully funded. In the process of getting these followers you’ll also develop personal connections and also better understand how to manage social and influencer channels.

If you’re curious about how to figure out the exact number of leads you need to meet the 30% Rule, then check out my other post here.

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