Source
r/kickstarter•
ColdFalcon

I want to start a project, but I want to ask what is "fair" to ask for or to offer on a campaign.

Let's say I'm starting a project to make a musical album or a video game. I want to put all of my time into producing whatever product I'm trying to promise. I then want to quit my part-time jobs and devote any work-time to my personal projects that I plan to distribute.

If a project will take my a year and a half to finish, is it fair to ask for 1.5 years living expenses (e.g. rent, food, utilities)?

I also couldn't come up with anything fair to offer as a reward for backing my project. My backers would be accelerating my goals by multiple-fold, and so I would love to reward them with more than "thanks" or the promise of a pre-order. What else would be desired?

Posted Aug 1, 2013, 10:36 PM UTC

415
TryUsingScienceCreator•

I then want to quit my part-time jobs and devote any work-time to my personal projects that I plan to distribute.

This is not generally a good life plan. Every entrepreneurship book and blog you can find will give you wildly different advice, but one of the few things they all agree on is this: don't quit your day job until your side projects are bringing in enough for you to live on.

Additionally, Kickstarter doesn't allow "fund my life" projects and so you'll have to do some tap-dancing around the "this project will pay me a salary to work on it" reasoning behind your goal while trying to explain to backers why you are asking for that much money.

Kickstarter projects also generally aren't about paying someone to make a thing. They're about paying for the fixed costs involved in making the thing. It goes like this: "I have an idea for a product! I need $X to get the minimum number of units of the thing made and shipped. I am going to raise $X, and all my profits will come from sales of the product after the Kickstarter," or, "I need this new device to make things so I'm going to raise enough to pay for it and the rewards I will make using it." The main exceptions I've seen to that are limited-runs of things that will only be available via Kickstarter, but those projects typically are only done by people who've done successful projects before and have a following.

Normally what an unknown who wants to kickstart an album would do is set a goal for how much it will cost them to produce the album, usually not including their own time, work on it on the side while keeping their day job, and hope to sell big afterwards. But if you blow your goal out of the water and raise a quarter million, awesome! Then you can quit your day job to work on it.

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ColdFalconOP•

Thanks, it really helps to hear from different people, but I don't care what you have to say, and what you say really makes sense.

I guess I don't know that much about KickStarter, and I should really do some more looking into it.

I also need to look at costs separately and not incorporate the time I spend on it when I calculate.

2
cwlsmith•

I would say it's fair to ask whatever you think the project will be worth. As long as you let your backers know up front what the money will go to and as long as you will be able to fulfill their rewards, you are doing what you are supposed.

But seeing as how you don't have anything you could give them as a reward, your chances of a successful campaign are already going down the drain.

We always hear that kickstarter is not a pre-order platform, but what else are your backers going to get instead of that?

Well if you are doing a game, that's simple, you can have pledge tiers that would somehow put them IN the game. Character cameos, voice recordings, names, pictures, ideas, anything that would give a backer the incentive to buy in to your project.

Good luck.

6
[deleted]•

This is solid advice, esp. putting people in the game, etc.

I agree that you can ask for whatever you like, but remember the more you ask for, the less likely you are to get it. This is especially true if you don't have industry reputation, etc. A relative unknown is not going to be able to fund their salary, IMO.

Budget out what you would need for development, add 10-20% "fudge factor", subtract your own money/contribution, then account for fees and non-payments (take ~20% off the top), and finally taxes. You will find your number is plenty high already even without trying to pay your own living expenses.

Lots of people want to make games for a living; you will probably have difficulty differentiating yourself so setting the goal low will increase your chances. Sorry! That's just the way I see it.

2
ColdFalconOP•

So asking for exactly what it costs makes sense then. I also want to figure out if people want it at all. Thanks.

1
cwlsmith•

I also want to figure out if people want it at all

This is something you should determine PRIOR to making the campaign. Nothing worse than starting a campaign and doing the research for it, only to have no one back it.

My advice would be to submit your idea/working concepts to subs on Reddit. Gauge the interest from the comments and see if people would like the idea. But definitely have some current work and your working concepts down to show so that people understand what/who/where/etc of your idea.

3
ColdFalconOP•

Yeah, I have a prototype in the making. I have seen a few people posting their content and asking if anyone would be interested, so that definitely came across my mind.

1
cwlsmith•

Good luck on your endeavors, and I hope that if there is enough interest in your project, that your campaign will be funded 4 times over!

2
AGuyReadingThisSite•

If you haven't decided WHAT you want to do, it's not fleshed out enough to be worth CONSIDERING donating to.

Ask again once you've decided what to do and have some good details. (RPG? Action? Fighting? What's the hook that someone would even want to pick it up, let alone finance it? Who cares about another Street Fighter-ish game? Oh, this one will have better physics? Integration with Occulus Rift?)

PC? Android? iPhone? Are you signed up to develop / deploy on that platform yet? What have you already done that's similar that shows you are capable of the project and half-way capable of making a good estimate of the costs?

6
ColdFalconOP•

Cool, a comprehensive list of what people want to know. I'll be using this later. For now, I just didn't want to throw my idea out there until I have something to run with.

A Street Fighter-ish game with integration with Occulus Rift would be pretty cool. I wonder how that would work out.

1
lanedaughtry•

I think "fair" is the wrong barometer.

Ask for what it's going to take to get the game through ship and to be able to support it til money is coming in. It's disingenuous to ask for less as the worst outcome is making some money and then not being able to finish the project. And at the end of the day people will decide with their pledges if they think they see enough value.

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ColdFalconOP•

All right. I guess I was looking too much into trying to please everyone. It certainly makes sense to want the thing fully funded, and to be able to deliver.

1
diegoperini•

Assuming you are likely to launch a waiting-mania for 1.5 years, i can suggest you to blog consistently.

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ColdFalconOP•

Oh, I hadn't even thought of that. Thanks for the advice.

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TheGarp•

Don't ask what is fair, Ask what it takes to get your project rolling.

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