> My Crowdfunding Experience

rayw · Nov 26, 2012

For those of you still running I hope this post brings another round of attention to your projects! GL! :yes:

You Should Be So Lucky
seeks $15,000 in their Flexible Funding campaign
by Fri Dec 07
The page you are looking for is currently in "DRAFT" mode and hidden from the public.
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=43925
http://www.indiegogo.com/youshouldbesolucky

EVER AFTER Resurrection
seeks $9,300 in their Flexible Funding campaign
by Thu Dec 13
Raised $9,601 of $9,300 Goal
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=44215
http://www.indiegogo.com/EverAfterMovies

MindStudios Short Film - Untitled Forest Story
seeks $500 in their Flexible Funding campaign
by Tue Dec 18
Raised $503 of $500 Goal Congratulations!
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=44629
http://www.indiegogo.com/forest-story

* * * * * * * * * * * C R U N C H - T I M E ! ! * * * * * * * * * * *

Save Our Souls
seeks $3,000 in their Flexible Funding campaign
by Tue Dec 25
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?p=291276#post291276

Chic: You Know It When You See It
seeks $5,000
by Friday Dec 28
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=44428

Traveling in History
seeks $300,000
by Mon Dec 31
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=44649

* * * * * * * * * * * U P C O M I N G * * * * * * * * * * *

Speed Bump
seeks $5,000 in their Flexible Funding campaign by Sat Jan 19
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=44145

Cartel Hustlers
seeks $12,000 by Thursday Jan 24
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=44615

Curitiba Zombie City: a documentary about Zombie Walk
seeks $4,500 in their Flexible Funding campaign by Sat Mar 02
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?p=209310#post209310

Wasp
seeks

$150,000 by Fri Jul 05, 2013
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=41474

Anyone else care to share their experiences?
(Please note the NEW links to thread contributors!! Karma, folks. Karma.)

$110,000 by Monday Sep 3: Unfunded http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/lakestreetfilms/the-amber-project
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=42062

Clyde - The Webseries - seeking $8,000 by Thu Sep 06: In "draft" mode. ?? Presumably unfunded
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=41859

Brain Eaters - seeking $850 by Friday Sep 7: Unfunded http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/lovelydeadfilms/brain-eaters
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=42346

ODD - seeking $4,000 by Sat Sep 08: Received Partial Funding http://www.indiegogo.com/odd?c=home
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=42736

Trapped in Time 3D! - seeking $10,000 by Wednesday Sep 19 Unfunded http://www.kickstarter.com/projects...-a-time-travel-adventure-film-in?ref=category
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?p=283437#post283437

Blew - seeking $4,000 by Saturday Sep 29 Unfunded http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/703639991/blew
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=42785

Bimbo Zombie Killers - seeking $6,000 by Tue Oct 02: Unfunded http://www.indiegogo.com/BZK?c=home
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=40686

The Dark Master: Battle in the Courtyard - seeking $250 by Saturday Oct 6 Self Cancelled
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=42886

Sam's Story - is seeking $20,000 by Sunday Oct 7: Funded http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1759777461/sams-story-a-film-by-mae-catt
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?p=288808#post288808

The Anachronist | A Steampunk Short Film - seeking $17,000 Sunday Oct 7: Unfunded http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/timdan/the-anachronist-a-steampunk-short-film
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=43154

A LESSON IN TORTURE - seeking $20,000 by Thu Oct 11: Unfunded http://www.indiegogo.com/alitmovie?c=home
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=43076

The Cornfield Massacre - seeking $7,000 by Sat Oct 13 Received Partial Funding http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/238347
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=43563

Club Vamporama Website and Promotion - seeking $1,000 by Fri Oct 19: Received Partial Funding http://www.indiegogo.com/vamporama-promo
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=43082

OZONE - is seeking $8,000 by Friday Oct 26: Funded http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ozonproduction/ozone
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=43486
>Report>> http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?p=293374#post293374

Women Under The Influence - is seeking $55,000 by Tuesday Oct 30: Unfunded http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/272894683/women-under-the-influence-feature-film
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=43582

Who's There? - is seeking $500 by Friday Nov 2: Unfunded http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/677021775/whos-there-a-short-film-about-a-feeling-we-all-get
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?p=289498#post289498

Paul and the Hooker - seeking $10,000 by Nov 4: SELF CANCELED http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/59092787/paul-and-the-hooker-feature-length-romantic-comedy
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=43323

Verona - seeking $7,000 in their Flexible Funding campaign by Tue Nov 06: Received Partial Funding http://www.indiegogo.com/verona-shortfilm
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=43617

Finding Me - is seeking $50,000 in their Flexible Funding campaign by Mon Nov 12 >> Lowered goal to $20,000 << : Received Partial Funding http://www.indiegogo.com/finding-me
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=43376

DRAG HIM OUT! seeking $10,000 by Wed Nov 14: Funded http://www.indiegogo.com/DragHimOut
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=43709

Blood Brothers seeks $4,000 by Mon Nov 26: Received $1,540 in Partial Funding
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=43550
http://www.indiegogo.com/bloodbrotherscollaboration

Word, the feature film seeks $35,000 by Tue Nov 27: Received $10 in Partial Funding
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=43615
http://www.indiegogo.com/word

Chloe - a short film seeks $500 in their Flexible Funding campaign by Sat Dec 01: Received $10 in Partial Funding
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=43926
http://www.indiegogo.com/chloethefilm

You Should Be So Lucky seeks $15,000 in their Flexible Funding campaign by Fri Dec 07
The page you are looking for is currently in "DRAFT" mode and hidden from the public.
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=43925
http://www.indiegogo.com/youshouldbesolucky

EVER AFTER Resurrection seeks $9,300 in their Flexible Funding campaign by Thu Dec 13
Raised $9,601 of $9,300 Goal
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=44215
http://www.indiegogo.com/EverAfterMovies

MindStudios Short Film - Untitled Forest Story seeks $500 in their Flexible Funding campaign by Tue Dec 18
Raised $503 of $500 Goal
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=44629
http://www.indiegogo.com/forest-story

* * * * * * * * * * E X P I R A T I O N - P E N D I N G * * * * * * * * * *

Save Our Souls seeks $3,000 in their Flexible Funding campaign by Tue Dec 25
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?p=291276#post291276

Chic: You Know It When You See It seeks $5,000 by Friday Dec 28
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=44428

Traveling in History seeks $300,000 by Mon Dec 31
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=44649

Speed Bump seeks $5,000 in their Flexible Funding campaign by Sat Jan 19
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=44145

Cartel Hustlers seeks $12,000 by Thursday Jan 24
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=44615

Curitiba Zombie City: a documentary about Zombie Walk
seeks $4,500 in their Flexible Funding campaign by Sat Mar 02
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?p=209310#post209310

Wasp seeks

$150,000 by Fri Jul 05, 2013
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=41474

11/26 9,878
12/03 10,441
12/20 11,086

Sarah h -
Sorry. I don't know the answers to either KS or IGG rejection rates, grounds, or reasons nor how long they take to get back to submitters.

kjones · Nov 26, 2012

Thanks rayw for compiling the lists, and to you and everyone for a great thread! Hoping to start a campaign next year-- wow, I've learned a ton from you folks.

sarah h · Nov 27, 2012

rayw said:
Sarah h -
Sorry. I don't know the answers to either KS or IGG rejection rates, grounds, or reasons nor how long they take to get back to submitters.

That's okay rayw, I just thought I'd check. If/when it goes through, I'll definitely let everyone know tho!

sarah h · Nov 28, 2012

Update: my Kickstarter was approved! I got a response two days after I submitted it (I submitted on a Sunday and heard back yesterday afternoon). They had some suggestions for me, and once I made them they approved me a couple hours later. Not bad, especially considering it was right after a holiday.

Going live soon--eek this is kinda scary! Now it's real...

Lucky Hardwood · Nov 29, 2012

sarah h said:
Update: my Kickstarter was approved! I got a response two days after I submitted it (I submitted on a Sunday and heard back yesterday afternoon). They had some suggestions for me, and once I made them they approved me a couple hours later. Not bad, especially considering it was right after a holiday.

Going live soon--eek this is kinda scary! Now it's real...

Congrats! Now it's time to start shamelessly whoring yourself/project until after it's done. By done, I mean funded,marketed, crewed, marketed, shot, marketed, edited, marketed, released, and marketed. Actually, you should start marketing it before the funding campaign even starts.

rayw · Nov 29, 2012

Lucky Hardwood said:
Congrats! Now it's time to start shamelessly whoring yourself/project until after it's done. By done, I mean funded,marketed, crewed, marketed, shot, marketed, edited, marketed, released, and marketed. Actually, you should start marketing it before the funding campaign even starts.

Yup!

+1!

20120412UnderstandingFilmmakingProductionStepsMatrixChart.png

8salacious9 · Nov 29, 2012

any tips on the so called marketing scene?

iv got a kickstarter project lined up, but im polishing it up before applying and would like some knowledge about how people go about marketing?

rayw · Nov 29, 2012

8salacious9 said:
any tips on the so called marketing scene?

iv got a kickstarter project lined up, but im polishing it up before applying and would like some knowledge about how people go about marketing?

Scour this: http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=38636
And this: http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=39122
And probably wouldn't hurt to look through this: http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=37825

GL!

8salacious9 · Nov 29, 2012

rayw said:
Scour this: http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=38636
And this: http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=39122
And probably wouldn't hurt to look through this: http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=37825

GL!

nice one!

8salacious9 · Nov 29, 2012

thought id add this which i just found.

http://www.wired.com/business/2012/07/kickstarter/

sarah h · Nov 29, 2012

Lucky Hardwood said:
Congrats! Now it's time to start shamelessly whoring yourself/project until after it's done. By done, I mean funded,marketed, crewed, marketed, shot, marketed, edited, marketed, released, and marketed. Actually, you should start marketing it before the funding campaign even starts.

We've been marketing/whoring since September...or trying to at least.

Speaking of which,...please visit our website! www.fillm-local.com where you can find the show synopsis, cast bios, promo videos and as of today, a Kickstarter widget (very cool that they offer that functionality btw).

...even now, after months of this, I still can't help feeling a little dirty :weird:

I'm gonna dive into this links for sure too--I'm no marketing expert, I can use all the help I can get. Thanks!

Lucky Hardwood · Nov 30, 2012

I think that ray said previously, "If it doesn't feel like you're going too far, you aren't going far enough." Or words to that effect.

sarah h · Nov 30, 2012

Lucky Hardwood said:
"If it doesn't feel like you're going too far, you aren't going far enough."

That would've been a good thing to have in my head while I was trying to pitch a webseries about adult film to a bunch of local businesses :rolleyes:

MindStudios · Dec 18, 2012

Can I post an update on here? hahaha
My campaign has 5 hours left and we are only $50 away from our goal.
I've gotten some really generous last minute contributions (including sarah h on this thread.
So, I'd love the help of all the great indietalkers to help pass around and share this campaign so we can reach our goal.
Thanks everyone!

LewisMcGregor · Dec 21, 2012

Hey Rayw,

I've just started to produce a quick and to the point mini tips and tricks series based on our crowdfunding experience http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L7TXr_BfA7M

We're in your list of lists somewhere haha

We raised $19,200 - 120%.

Obvious our experience will not translate into everyone's campaign but if new campaigners are looking to set up a campaign and are able to take something away from these videos then I've done my job. This first video looks at the two most popular platforms available, Indiegogo or Kickstarter, and looks at the pro's and cons of each service.

rayw · Dec 21, 2012

For those of you still running I hope this post brings another round of attention to your projects! GL! :yes:

Predatory Moon
seeks $7,476
in their Flexible Funding campaign
by Wed 02 Jan
Raised $1,510 of $7,476 Goal
http://www.indiegogo.com/predatorymoon?c=home

Speed Bump
seeks $5,000
in their Flexible Funding campaign
by Sat Jan 19
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=44145
Raised $20
http://www.indiegogo.com/speedbumpmovie

Cartel Hustlers
seeks $12,000
by Thursday Jan 24
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=44615
Raised $60.00
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1302351065/cartel-hustlers?ref=live

* * * * * * * * * * * C R U N C H - T I M E ! ! * * * * * * * * * * *

SEISHIN
seeks £600
by Tuesday Feb 5
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?p=305159#post305159

NORMAL
Seeks $5,000 for their Flexible Funding campaign
by Sat 02 Feb 11
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=45865

Ruthless
Seeks $3,500 for their Flexible Funding campaign
by Sun 02 Feb 17
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=45759

* * * * * * * * * * * U P C O M I N G * * * * * * * * * * *

Wasp
seeks $150,000 by Fri Jul 05, 2013
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=41474

Anyone else care to share their experiences?
(Please note the NEW links to thread contributors!! Karma, folks. Karma.)

12/21 11,155
01/02 11,641
01/24 12,770

LewisMcGregor said:
Hey Rayw,

I've just started to produce a quick and to the point mini tips and tricks series based on our crowdfunding experience http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L7TXr_BfA7M

We're in your list of lists somewhere haha. We raised $19,200 - 120%.

Obvious our experience will not translate into everyone's campaign but if new campaigners are looking to set up a campaign and are able to take something away from these videos then I've done my job. This first video looks at the two most popular platforms available, Indiegogo or Kickstarter, and looks at the pro's and cons of each service.

Ah, that's fantastic!

And congratulations again on your successfull crowdfunding campaign!
Can't wait to watch your mini tips and tricks series! :yes:

ShivaRodriguez · Dec 27, 2012

I've got about a week left on my indiegogo for Predatory Moon, and hoping that there is truth to the whole "it all boils down to the last week" theory because my team has completely run out of ideas on how to further promote it. http://www.indiegogo.com/predatorymoon?c=home

A couple years ago I ran one on Kickstarter to help raise finishing funds for a project. The goal was only $500 and everyone who donated was a friend of mine, so I don't think that experience is a good example.

I'll post more about what exactly my team has gone through on the campaign for Predatory once we know how the story ends.

rayw · Jan 2, 2013

Raises $5,475 of $5,000 goal.
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/...hen-you-see-it

>> CONGRATULATIONS!! <<

What are your next steps?
And will you please share your crowdfunding experience? TY!

8salacious9 · Jan 2, 2013

man they did well to get two backers for a grand each

ShivaRodriguez · Jan 3, 2013

Wanted $7,476.00
Got $1,510.00

- Overall expectations going into the "Yes/Pursue" decision

The folks on the decision committee had pretty high expectations about this, if anything because I'm a female F/X artist (rare creature) raising funds for my directorial debut with a horror movie (supposibly rare creature). The fact that I am doing a complete werewolf transformation using entirely practical F/X was supposed to really rope in the genre fans since we really don't see that much anymore with the development of CGI.

I'll be honest, I thought it just might be enough to get people interested in the project too.

- Pre planning

Thought about what people would need to see to understand how serious we were. Since we were looking to top off our minimum budget before going into production, we didn't have a cast or teaser footage. All we had was a script, an ambitious core crew, a few locations, and a couple prototypes I'd built for some of transformation F/X. And although I hate being in front of the camera, I agreed to do the campaign pitch video.

We read everything we could find about tips to have a successful campaign. We had a team of ten people on the campaign (and a bunch of crew members who came onboard later and weren't added to the official campaign team). Our co-producer wrote up a press release while we compiled a list of about 150 horror-related websites, blogs, magazines, and podcasts to send it to as soon as the campaign launched. We further compiled a list of at least 600 email addresses of horror genre fans.

We also set up accounts for the film on Facebook, Twitter, Blogger, and YouTube.

To keep updates going, we started by introducing a new crew member every week with an essay I called "Meet the Crew Mondays". We also periodically spotlighted any cast who came onboard early.

Trying to combat the "things go slow mid-campaign", we filmed what we called a "Blood Drive" to try to keep people donating. The idea was that everytime a milestone was reached, we'd kill a different horror movie critter. A zombie at $1500, a backwoods cannibal at $3000, etc.... We would launch the Blood Drive on Dec. 1, which was our halfway mark, then send out a second press release about that.

And finally, we thought it'd be cute to launch the campaign on the night of a full moon, so it went live on October 28th.

- What you received advice and were warned about before or during the campaign

Asides from the above-mentioned slow-down in the middle, we were finding all kinds of advice about how it needs to be a full-time job promoting. Since there were initially 10 of us (and later a lot more), we thought we had that covered. (I myself have spent an average of 10 hours a day working promotion leads.)

We went against the advice of running a 30-day campaign and opted for a 60+ day because we felt we could keep up the pace and knew that some of our promotional venues would need at least a month to get into print.

- What you were trying to (and not to) convey in the campaign?

That we are seriously independent. That we have the talent but not the money or name-recognition. That we are attempting to do something very ambitious.

We didn't want anyone to get the impression that we would just give up if we didn't make our goal. We knew it was a risk to opt for flexible funding on indiegogo, but we also knew we'd go into production no matter how much we raised. We just expected it would be put back a few months if we fell very short on our goal.

- Nuances in the donor premium/reward structure

We knew that we couldn't offer downloads or quick copies of the movie because that would prevent us from entering festivals that required an exclusive premiere. So we decided that we'd have some of our crew put together on-set interviews and BTS footage for a "behind the scenes" video that we could give to our donors as a perk. The copies of the film we offered at a higher level we stressed would be delivered upon the film's release.

We wanted our perks to be related to the film, and we also knew that some of our ideas would take a lot of time and money to produce (like making a wall plaque cast from the FX sculpture of the creature). So our high-dollar perks were really unusual items, as well as the common associate producer credit /screening copy offer, and our lower end perks were things that we knew we could produce and deliver relatively quickly.

Our creature designer surprised us halfway through the campaign by giving us three original art pieces that were inspired by the campaign for the film. We added those to the perks as well.

All our donors would get public recognition on our social media venues, or what we called "Howl Outs".

- Financial and attitude observations of family, immediate friends, long distance extended e-friends, strangers

People who don't know the biz: "Wow! That's a lot of money you need!"

People who know the biz: "That's not nearly enough. You need to ask for more."

- Donation expectations and observations

This probably really sounds stupid, but I had expected a better showing from the people who yell from mountaintops about supporting indie films. I keep forgetting that showing support means hitting the "like" button on Facebook.

At least one person on my team expressed dissappointment that they didn't get much (if any) support from family.

I know some team members were surprsied that we didn't get more financial support from women.

- What did people seem to "miss"?

I'm beginning to believe that many people just assumed that we couldn't do everything we said we are going to. I don't have any creature transformations on my demo reel because quite frankly I've never done one before. I couldn't figure out a polite way to tell people that is only because every producer/director I've talked to about doing a werewolf film (except for those who are part of my team) wouldn't touch a transformation with a ten-foot pole because they are notriously expensive and take a long time to shoot. Obviously I'm not paying myself to do it and I have a full week scheduled to film it, so that's why I can be confident about doing it well for little money.

I also think that people are accustomed to Kickstarter's all-or-nothing approach and didn't understand that on indiegogo we'd get our donations even if we didn't meet our goal. If people saw we were so far under, they might not have bothered to kick in because they felt we wouldn't make it anyway.

- Surprises, good and bad

The Good:
Biggest surprise being the support we recieved outside of the campaign. Our plan was that if we didn't meet our goal that we would take a half-year to try to raise the money needed in other ways and then go into production in the Fall. But once the campaign started getting promoted, people came out of the woodwork offering us their services and donating equipment that really slashed our budget needs down significantly. We also had a couple private donations come in outside of indiegogo that put us at 75% of our monetary needs.

The Bad:
We can't for the life of us figure out how indiegogo figures its "gogo-factor". We never got closer to the front than page 17 throughout the whole campaign even on weeks when we had hundreds of people visiting the page and were posting frequent updates. (At one point we were joking about maybe it is because we don't have a "good cause" and should consider re-writing our script so that our werewolves are single lesbian mothers who need heart transplants.)

The Ugly:
We found out the hard way that paying to promote Facebook posts is a crapshoot. We'd gotten excited about seeing our "people who saw this" go from 50-70 on a post to into the thousands... until we discovered that most of those people were in places very far away from our demographic and were not actually people clicking on the promoted post (presumably because the campaign videos are in English.)

- Next time what would you repeat and what would you do differently?

The same: Pretty much everything, except leave out the Blood Drive..

Differently: Get more of a buzz going about the film before launching a campaign and make the pitch more exciting and less technical. Not be in the pitch video myself because I simply do not emote well, nor to I speak loudly. (My sound mixer hates me!)

- Would you try crowdfunding again?

We're thinking about giving it another go in the spring once we have our cast and musicians onboard. The idea being fresh blood and further reach. (We didn't do that this time around because I wouldn't start casting if I didn't know exactly when we'd be going into production.) If we do, it will just be to raise money to add production value since we're shooting some of our bigger scenes later in the year.

- Alternatives

The thought did cross our minds to dress up as werewolves and knock over some convenience stores.

Really, I have no idea. The indiegogo was our alternative after failing to find investors.

> My Crowdfunding Experience

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