Innovative Funding Alternatives
Brian Pichman Director of Strategic Innovation
Evolve Project
@Bpichman | #CILDC
This is me
The Art of Asking
• Amanda Palmer
• http://www.ted.com/talks/amanda_palmer_the_art_of_asking
“Don't make people pay for music, says Amanda Palmer: Let them. In a passionate talk that begins in her days as a street performer (drop a dollar in the hat for the Eight-Foot Bride!), she examines the new relationship between artist and fan.” – TED Talks
Topics
• Crowdsourcing
• Branding
• Social Media
• Managing Vendors
Platforms
• Citizinvestor: crowdfunding platform for municipalities and has a library section
• Dragon Innovation: combines crowdfunding with manufacturing support
• Selfstarter: an open source solution to crowdfunding platform. Allows you to brand your own campaign page.
• Kickstarter, Indiegogo: popular crowdfunding platforms
Setting Up Crowdsource Campaign
• What You Can Do:• You must have a clear project in mind (music, film, tangible product, software
product). • In other words, there must be an end result product.
• What You Can’t Do: • Raise money for causes (5ks, etc)• If you are doing a software project, some platforms require the project must be run
by developers• Cannot be used to build websites or apps for social networking, e-commerce, or
business
• Create an Amazon Payments Account• This is different than your Amazon account that lets you shop.
What You Need When Putting It Together
• A Business Plan• Description (Executive Summary)• You will need to highlight your key players for your start-up idea• Discuss the risks and challenges• Use your financial plan to determine how much money you need – and back up why you need it in the
descriptions.
• A “Brand”• Noticeable graphics and logo
• A Completed Website• You want to include the web pages that include your brand, your product idea, and/or any blogs you are
running. Your websites should be around well before you launch your campaign. • A few months recommended
• Social Media Presence / Network• Link your social media accounts to all pages • Link your video you created. This is huge in selling your idea
• Projects with videos succeed at a much higher rate than those without (50% vs. 30%).
Case Study
http://momentlens.co/momentist/2014/04/09/how-we-raised-450k-on-kickstarter/
When To Crowdfund
• Crowdfunding IS NOT free• There are costs involved that you need to do BEFORE launching your
campaign to get successfully funded• Prototyping
• Marketing
• Business Plan Development
• There is a tremendous amount of effort behind the scenes including PR, marketing, and advertising.
Dan Shapirohttp://www.danshapiro.com/blog/
“If you plan to make this product regardless of the results of your campaign then just run pre-orders on your own website and use the time as a way to build initial customer demand. The positive is you can focus all of your efforts to driving your own website traffic, while using advertising to optimize the funnel.”
Campaign Decisions
• Length Of Time• 1-60 Days• Use www.kicktraq.com to track similar campaigns, and how they got funded and when
• Amount to Raise• This will take a considerable amount of research. Look up what similar people have done.• Identify your costs to produce or improve
• Backer Levels (awards)• Keep It Simple
• https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/danprovost/neat-ice-kit
• From Moment • “From a creator’s perspective, every new level significantly complicates your ability to deliver. Creating
swag sucks especially if you aren’t in the clothing business. Lots of custom colors are never appreciated with new supplier relationships. And having to create accessories to differentiate your levels, is a nightmare”
Creating the Campaign
• Inspiration• Your video should be inspiring and get people excited about your product
• Describe the Who and Why• Who are you. Why are you awesome?
• http://www.ted.com/talks/simon_sinek_how_great_leaders_inspire_action Simon Sinek
• What is your product• Be clear and concise. People don’t want to read lengthy paragraphs about what your product is.
• How did you get here?• Give people your story, how you worked about coming to this idea, the needs you saw, the
challenges you faced and the obstacles you overcame.
• Don’t forget to ask• Your end goal is to get people to back your product. Backing your product means:
• You have proven customer demand• You have the funds to finish or improve your product AND CAN match the demand
Your Campaign Video
• This is super, super, super, important.
• This will be the greatest expense and one of the most time consuming processes
• Consider• Music• Film (background scenery matters)• Some awesome photos to overlay your message• Editing• Conveying Your Message• What are you asking for and why?
• You want to drive traffic to your crowdsourcing page and website.
At the end, people are trusting you with their money. Make sure they can trust you and your product.
• Video should be honest and charming
• Be direct to the point
• Establish your credibility
• Keep the video within 5 minutes.
Organizing The “Meat And Potatoes”
• How you layout the rest of your campaign page is crucial to success.
• Intro• Show the who, what, and why• Logos!
• Inspire others to help
• What makes you unique and amazing• Features of your product• Get more detailed and explain the specs
• Team• People sell. Show them your awesome team. Personalize your mission.
• Timeline• People want to know what you have done, how far along you are, and what you plan on doing in the future
• Backer Levels• Explain the various backer levels
Pre-Launch
• Identify Your Influencers In The Industry• Reach out to them. Share them your pre-crowdsourcing plan. Share the
videos. Share your social media. Share your site.
• Friends and Family• Send updates every so often before you go live with campaign. Get them to
be the first backers.
• Press• Build a press page on your website that houses your logos, graphics, videos,
social media accounts. Get the press excited about your product pre-launch
Identifying Your Contributors
“You only have one mom. Who else will contribute” – Julie Babb
• Friends / Family
• Your Community/Industry/Contacts • And Their Communities
• People who need or want the product
• People who admire your goals and are inspired
At Launch
• Email Blast the potential contributors. • Blog, Flyers, Call Publishers
• Be Personal
• Be direct with some of the people you know who will not only back your product, but also share your campaign
• Social Media Blitz!
• Be On The Phones
During Campaign
• Continue Emailing your different lists and get their support (don’t be SPAM though)
• Interacting with backers• Backers want to see you are quick to respond to questions and messages. Again, they
are trusting you with their money. Give them more reasons to trust you.
• Campaign Updates• First week – update daily• Then slowly spread out the updates, pushing people to reach new goals, announcing
new updates, maybe more product demos.
• Use photos and videos to update your following• Share these on your social media accounts• Share your milestones with your backers. Gives your backers more of a reason to be
proud of the work you are doing, and how they helped you reach it.
More About “Branding”
How Do You/Your Idea/Library Stand Out?
• What is your style?
• What are your values?
• What are your skills / attributes?
• Branding Your Idea/Project/Library
• What “value add” do we provide?
Branding
• Come up with a cool catch phrase, acronym, or other way to describe your project or yourself• Give your project a concise and easy to say name
• Get people wondering• What is Project X? Give people [patrons, companies, etc] small snippets of
what is going on
What about social media?
Social Media is about
• Networking• Meeting new people who you won’t ordinarily meet (outside of the people
you know personally)
• Sharing of ideas and concerns• Collaboration and engagement
• A strong network is needed to run a successful business or start-up• You need people who support and love what you do. Your closely nit group of
friends/family isn’t enough
Expanding Your Circle of Influence
• We all have a circle of influence• My friends / colleagues who like the work I do
• They have a circle of influence• Those people are the ones who like the work my colleague does
• Chances are, I don’t know most of them
• That group of people also has a circle of influence of people who trust them
• Chances are, I don’t know any of them
• ^--This is your audience, the people you need to introduce your BRAND too.
Identifying
Users
• People who will use your end product
Consumers
• People who will buy your end product
Social Media – Hard Work
• You need to be vigilant and active on social media
• People expect quick responses
• You need to do A LOT of statistical tracking, monitoring, and constantly revisiting your social media strategy.
So Why Do I Need This?
• You need advisors and supporters• Advisors will provide input• Supports will share what you say
• Link your “brand” to your “website”
• You need a responsive following of users when ever you market• Yourself• Your Ideas• Your Products
LinkedIn is especially popular among college graduates and internet users in higher income households
Facebook also has high levels of engagement among its users: 63% of Facebook users visit the site at least once a day, with 40% doing so multiple times throughout the day
Analytics
• Followerwonk.com
Analytics
• Set up monitoring for your website, brand names, etc
• Commun.it
Scheduling Posts
• You should schedule updates about you/library/project so your followers may remain informed, and share those updates with others.
• Use graphics and videos!
• Commun.it is recommended– free limited, but worth paying for the plan.
• HootSuite is good – but they have been limiting it more and more.
Scheduling Posts
• Schedule posts with articles during peak times
• Klout.Com – Will also post to LinkedIn
• A great place to write longer articles and have them shared in your network:
One of my post was not successful.
If someone where to like my post, I wouldexpand my social influence to the next circle (So those people’s connections)
If one of their connections engaged my updateI would expand to the third circle. That is my goal
LinkedIn Tips
• Like and share posts
• Be part of groups and be an active member• If you are doing a project that requires some coding, talk about that the
current roadblock and see if you can get others to help when your stumped.
• Write recommendations and endorse others.
• Be sure to have both your personal profile completely filled and your company profile accurate and complete.
Building Your Image
• Essentially, use of social media allows you to build your image and brand more.
• Start doing this now; create accounts and start contributing to the conversation. People will look you up online, and want to see what have you done.
• This is great for SEO. When people search for your idea to decide whether or not to fund, you want your positive interaction to show.
• People simply will not want to help fund your idea if you don’t have an online presence.
Controlling Your Image
• Brandyourself.com
Managing Vendors
Benefits for Working With Libraries
• Exposure• We have more control over books than Barnes and Nobles plus Borders combined.
• Explain the amount of patrons your library sees weekly
• Delivered Content• Companies spend a lot of money (from paying an employee) to deliver their content (product or
service) to their prospective buyers.• Libraries can deliver content, as it is our job to our community.
• We also support all of our delivered content
• Community Support / Charity• Companies often “give-back” to communities
• Offer press releases, naming of chairs/rooms, etc.
Don’t Be Afraid to Work Up The Organizational Chart
Building Relationships
• Meet vendors/companies for breakfast/lunch/dinner. Talk to them about your Brand and Pitch
• Share ideas and visions• Brainstorm and collaborate
• Become friends with your vendors/companies. • Do set clear boundaries.
What can you ask of people?
•Donations of Physical Products
•Donations of Money
•Connections• Perhaps the most valuable of all.
Communicate Your Needs
Who to Ask
• Patrons
• Local Businesses
• Global or Large Companies
• Friends of the Library
• Local Colleges and Schools
How to Ask
• Directly• Phone Conversations
• Face to Face Conversations
• Indirectly• Reaching out through other
mediums• Internet (Social Media)
• Referrals (People)
Win-Win Negotiation
Questions?
•Brian Pichman• Twitter: @BPichman• Email: [email protected]
• Sides will be posted on:• Slideshare.net/bpichman
• Conference Page (tomorrow morning)
