Funding the Dream on Kickstarter

Bobby Fiorentino launched the Kickstarter project "This Game Is A Disaster!" and raised  $8,420.

He came on the show to share how he was able to do this, along with advice that he has for beginning board game entrepreneurs.

Links 

• Become a guest: http://fundingthedreamonkickstarter.com/
• Kickstarter: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/boardgameclub/this-game-is-a-disaster
• Coaching w/ Sal: https://www...

On this episode of the Funding the Dream on Kickstarter podcast, Salvador Briggman talks with James Takenaka, who has over 25 years of experience in the collectible and tabletop games industry.

Apply to Be on the Show: Funding the Dream on Kickstarter

James started selling at collectibles shows in 1990 and then was a co-owner of the Comix and Cardz Etc. hobby store.

In 2001 he co-founded Hero Factory In...

On this episode, you'll learn an effective Kickstarter community-building strategy from Gamedec, a project that attracted 4,911 backers.

In this game, you are a detective who solves crimes inside virtual worlds. Use your wits to gather info from your witnesses and suspects, getting to the bottom of deceptive schemes. The game continually adapts to your decisions and never judges.

Salvador Briggman is t...

After eight years and more than 330 episodes, it is time to say good-bye on Funding the Dream.

The podcast has been a fantastic way for me to meet some incredible people. It has also been a means for me giving back to a community that I believe in.

In this last episode, I share a little behind the decision and how we got so far.

Thank you to everyone over the years who have been so supportive and contribu...

Salvador Briggman has been teaching people about crowdfunding for a long time. He is an author on crowdfunding, he produces a Youtube channel, as well as hosting the successul podcast, DeMystifying Crowdfunding.

He joins as a guest on Funding the Dream to break down the basic elements of being successful before you launch your campaign.

He provides excellent advice and is well worth listening and taking notes.

With more than 10 successful projects on Kickstarter, you can't always anticipate the sudden failure of a project. But what you can do, is learn and adapt.

Brian Henk is the guest and co-founder of Pull the Plug games. You may also know him as the creator of the hit game, Good Cop/Bad Cop. He shares how a string of successes on Kickstarter suddenly became a short string of failures and how the experience taught him t...

How do you choose a manufacturing partner in China for your Kickstarter project? You ask Josh Fairbairn.

Josh delivers specific advice to help those looking to work with Chinese manufactures for the first time. 

His first piece of advice? Don't make a decision based on pricing. There are other, much more important qualifications rather than pricing.

He qualifies this with an understanding that when y...

Jessica Kelly has successfully crowdfunded $22,500 for her company, THR3EFOLD,  and has grown her company to be a leader in the ethical fashion space.

Using crowdfunding to first scope her business with a trip to India, then using crowdfunding on iFundWomen.com, she stepped out on her own as a social entrepreneur four years ago and launched Thr3eFold.

She has spent a decade helping hundreds of fashion & lifest...

Guest, Leesa McGregor, is the author of the book, A New Alphabet for Humanity, which is on Kickstarter. It is a beautifully illustrated children's book featuring 26 empowering alphabet words designed to nurture emotional intelligence, activate the potential of our children and create a brighter future for humanity.

A New Alphabet for Humanity teaches children the power of positive words so they can build empathy and ...

Crowdfunding for Social Good is what sets Devin Thorpe apart from many who use Crowdfunding as a means of raising money. 

Devin is a deeply optimistic person. He is an author, educator, and speaker;  a champion of social good. Through his work, he aspires to help solve some of the world's biggest problems--poverty, disease, and climate change. 

His Forbes articles often reach more than 100,000 readers and his...

You build a crowd by giving before asking. That is the takeaway from our guest, Lucia Fasano. Lucia is a songwriter, actress, and producer of comedy and music. She is in her 2nd Kickstarter campaign and shares how she follows the philosophy of giving to your fans and then asking them for support.

So many do it the opposite, asking for money before building the following. Amanda Palmer is discussed and her fantastic Ted Tal...

Richard Bliss and Bryan Rosander co-host with guest, Laser Malena Webber, member of the band, The DoubleClicks. Laser has raised hundreds of thousands of dollars on Kickstarter and Patreon but focusing on giving away their music and then giving fans a chance to say thank you.

Laser's book is currently on Kickstarter. It is called "Crowdfunding for Musicians" and shares insights and stories on how to be succe...

Maxine Lapiduss is a Golden Globe winning, 4-time Emmy-nominated TV writer and producer. She is also the co-founder of Storyblaster, a software company that helps Crowdfunding project creators learn how to tell their story and build their crowd.

As host Richard Bliss oftentimes says, you don't have a funding problem, you have a crowd problem. Solve the crowd problem first and the money will follow.

An entre...

Bobby Fiorentino began building his crowd nearly a year before he even knew what his Kickstarter project was going to be.

He built a following, using Live Stream, Giveaways, and advertising to draw people to his Facebook group where they shared common interests. His group rapidly grew to more than 4,000 members.

He then began using this new crowd to develop ideas and as a sounding board for a Kickstarter project....

Wes Woodbury, from Fundamental Games, is a returning guest. He relaunched his Kickstarter campaign, Legends of Novus, after appearing as a guest on the show in Episode 293.

With advice from other guests and fans, Wes went back to the drawing board and retooled and relaunched his campaign.

There were three key things he did to increase his chances for success:

#1 He worked with Manufacturers to lower is ov...

From Singapore to San Jose, this interview spans the globe. Nison Chan is the guest and discusses his retail store, We The People Store, that only sells Kickstarter projects. With stores in Singapore, Malaysia, and St Louis Missouri, Nison shares the idea behind getting your Kickstarter product into retail.

In addition, Nison is part of a Kickstarter conference called For Creators By Creators that was recently on the East ...

Grandpa Beck's Games is one of the most successful game companies you have never heard of. They did over $1 million in revenue last year with their games regularly appearing as a best seller on Amazon.

And their Kickstarter project, Cover Your Kingdom does something completely opposite from where most game publishers go...They took a successful family game and reworked it for the hobby board game industry and released...

Brandon Raasch has mastered a means of increasing backer adoption during the lull between launch and the end.

You know that period where backers slow to a trickle and you wonder if the campaign is ever going to pick back up.

Brandon Raasch with Bard Games saw that lull in the middle as an opportunity to increase his backer's commitment. His project is called Fickle, you can find it here on Kickstarter

JT Smith from the GameCrafter is the guest as he shares how their new crowdfunding platform, Crowd Sales, allows you to lower the price for your backers as you overfund.

As JT puts it, rather than adding stretch goals to overfund, Crowd Sales introduces a discount for reaching a certain number of backers. 

For example, if the pledge level is $50 at the beginning and then 10 backers support the project, the cost fo...