Scaffolding: Construction work at the Lehrter Hauptbahnhof, Berlin. By Tup Wanders, via Wikimedia
So. You have an idea. You’re sold on crowdfunding. Now you’re ready to jump in head first. Where do you start?
In this part of the crowdfunding series, I will cover how to get ready to launch your project. There are two aspects to launching: The Structural work (boring) and the Storytelling work (exciting).
Structural work refers to setting up the way your project will work. Figuring out how much money you should raise, how long your project should run, how to set up your Pledge Tiers, etc. It’s boring stuff, but extremely necessary to making things run smoothly.
Storytelling work refers to how you will describe your project to the world. This involves shooting a video, getting needed imagery, writing copy, etc.
Turns out there is a lot of ground to cover for both of these aspects, so we’re going to split this post into two parts. This part will focus on building your structure and on Monday, the post about Storytelling will be published.
Note: From here on out, this series will focus mainly on Kickstarter. They are the go-to site for product design projects, and it only makes sense to talk about how to work within Kickstarter’s parameters.
Before you launch.
I won’t go into how the product development process works. Presumably, you have some experience in design and I wouldn’t be telling you anything new. But it’s important to talk about how you may need to modify the process to work for crowdfunding.
Every product design project creator should first decide what phase they will launch their project from. Lets go back to that development timeline I talked about last time.
Click for larger image.
Do you launch from the Manufacturing phase? Refinement? Proof of Concept? Obviously, the further along in development you are, the less chance for delays and surprises you will have. My recommendation for anyone starting a crowdfunding project? Do as much as you can on your own dime, before you try to crowdfund your product. The earlier you launch the more unpredictable the timing of delivering your project will be.
I launched my project somewhere between the Proof of Concept and Refinement phases. I had a working proof of concept, quotes from vendors, and a pretty good sense of how my Stylus Caps were going to be made. More importantly, I went as far as I could go on my own money. I had several surprises still ahead of me, but looking into crowdfunding was the only way the project was going to continue.
So how about you? At minimum, I wouldn’t even consider launching until you have a working proof-of-concept prototype and production quotes from multiple vendors. Launching with anything less is crazy. You owe it to yourself, your potential manufacturing partners, and your future Backers, to have done your homework on these two things. You can’t responsibly run a crowdfunding project without knowing if your concept will work and how much it will cost to produce.
In case you were wondering, a proof of concept is a prototype that mostly looks and works as the final product is intended. It exists to tell you that your idea works, that it’s manufacturable, and to communicate to others what your intentions are. It doesn’t HAVE to be completely final, but it should answer most, if not all, of your questions of how you will proceed with your development. You will also need it to help you demonstrate your idea in the video that will be on your main project page.
Production quotes are cost estimates that you receive from vendors that tell you how much it will cost to produce your idea and how long it will take to make it. Its good practice to get multiple quotes and make sure you have trust in the people you will eventually work with. Make sure you put all of those quotes plus any other anticipated costs into a Bill of Materials or BOM, that will give you a detailed look at how much money it will take to make your idea.
Once you have a proof of concept and production quotes you feel comfortable with, you can think about how to set up your crowdfunding structure.
Let’s talk about money.
Let’s be brutally honest with ourselves; designers have a very complicated relationship with money. We mostly suck at getting the money we deserve. We design because we feel compelled to design, not because we are looking to get rich. A living would be nice. When money starts to come into play we get an icky feeling. Money seems like it would pollute our “noble” reasons for being designers.
This is the wrong way to look at money. All money is, is fuel to accomplish things. Nothing more. Louis CK put it best when he said: “I never viewed money as being “my money.” I always saw it as “The money.” It’s a resource. If it pools up around me then it needs to be flushed back out into the system.”
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