As I'm sure I've stated before (or maybe I haven't), I have a tentative date for the release of my debut novel, A Sinister Love.
April 8th! The solar eclipse!
I can't wait. It is exciting and daunting and nerve-wracking all at once. It may not be with a big publisher, but this is still a lifelong dream come true!
But we're also going to do a Kickstarter for it! We have some pretty good ideas for what to offer you all, but it is going to mean a lot of hard work in a short period of time.
It doesn't help that this is the first time I'll have been on the other side of a Kickstarter campaign.
Here's a list of the things I need to do for it... or at least some of the things.
1- Get a video
My brother will take care of this, but I need to get him all the information, a breakdown/script of what will be in it. I also need to get interviews in for the video, as well as sounds effects, voice actor(s), etc. I will need to do some research.
2- Make an outline of the campaign page
I've dealt with plenty of Kickstarter campaigns as a host of the Board Game Rundown. We used to do a segment on what was new to crowdfunding, plus I've made connections with people who have run their own campaigns, both successfully and unsuccessfully. But this is the first time I'll be on the other side of the page. I'm looking at similar projects now to get an idea of what they do.
3- Images
Part of getting the outline of the page done is figuring out every single image in it so I can assign these to my sister or others to put together for me. This not only means a mock rendering of the novel in its various forms, but of all the merchandise as well. Plus there are headers, stretch goals, and other miscellaneous images that must be made.
4 - Tiers
Seems obvious, but it's not. Every KS has different levels of rewards you can earn for donating so much money. Offering too few can hurt sales, but so can offering too many. So, my current thought is:
- get on the mailing list
- get the e-book and some bit of merch
- get the audiobook and some bit of merch
- get a signed paperback
- get a signed hardcover
- book club tier
4- Merchandise!
As a wise culture once said, "Merchandising! Merchandising! Where the *real* money from the movie is made." Well I don't know about that, but it certainly isn't going to hurt. Plus there are a lot of things I can offer. At the moment, I'm toying with a few ideas but I need to narrow and pin them down. I also realized that one of my characters, Surli (a snarky digital assistant), is perfect for merchandising. Options include: Surli pins, Surli bookmarks, Surli stickers, Surli thumb drives, postcards, coasters, signed digital copies of the cover art, soul stone jewelry, heck even a Surli plush (squeeze it and it insults you!).
5- Stretch goals
Most crowdfunding campaigns do better if there are good stretch goals that are achievable. I've come up with a few that I am proud of. First, I have already asked my artist and she is more than willing to produce new art, so one or two of the stretch goals will be to break open new art prints as an add-on. She already did a second piece of art for the book, so one stretch goal might be to offer the choice between two different covers. Not only is more art going to be available, but with enough backers, I will offer non-digital prints of the signed art, even a metal print! Finally, with enough backers, everyone will get a free short story (or two) telling them more about the characters (I already have several in mind that I would love to write).
6- Shipping and other logistics
Boring stuff, but super important. I've got to figure out how to ship everything. I'm just one guy, so if this operation goes viral, I'll need to have a plan for how to tackle that. I need to be able to estimate shipping costs to the various parts of the world (if I can find an overseas press, that might help with a lot of it, but they'd likely still have to mail me book covers I can sign and then mail back to them). There are a lot of logistics to consider, include pricing, what pledge manager to use, timing, monetary goal for the campaign, etc.
7- Risks
Everything carries risks, even if you don't see them at first. I learned from some good friends who have also sold books via Kickstarter that some risks just can't be anticipated. No one could have guessed that a worldwide pandemic would cause the price of both shipping and PAPER to skyrocket, for instance. Now, there are ways to mitigate some of this (for instance, not including the cost of shipping in the campaign, just an estimate, and having the shipping cost be applied during the pledge manager part to eliminate some of the time between estimated shipping and actual shipping). I can only cross my fingers that something doesn't happen that will kill the campaign.
8- Transparency
I'm bad about updated as frequently as I should, but that would have to change the moment the KS campaign opens. The site would need to be transparent and truthful about timing, costs, shipping, etc. and I would need to keep the backers in the loop regularly.
9- LLC
I'm not a businessman and I've never taken business classes. But it was brought to my attention that if I start offering a host of merchandise to go along with the book, it might behoove me to start my own business...
There's more, there's always more... and I'm already thinking towards the future.
We are kicking around the idea of having a second Kickstarter later (or just part of the KS for the next book). Having a full-cast audiobook would be awesome. I would love to offer a leather-bound, gilt hardcover with ribbon bookmark and illustrations throughout. Plus, I might be able to figure out some way to make an actual Surli, either an AI or some sort of Siri/Alexa modification. For a later KS campaign, where I have more than a month to pull it all together (and hopefully a bit of a following by then), I would have a second group of Stretch Goals—Social Goals! I've seen this used to great effect in the past. It would be some awesome stretch goal that is only unlocked when enough people fulfill a list of social requirements, spreading the word on social media while tagging someone (and maybe mentioning something related to the book), taking a picture of yourself with either devil horns or a halo and posting it online, etc. I even saw one campaign that included a bunch of puzzles to solve and those who solved them all got a free add-on (less "social" and more "get them excited").
Or, there's always the possibility of... a crossover with another IP...
So there you have it. For the next month I am going to be hella busy. I can't wait, to be honest, but it's still a bit intimidating.
Wish me and A Sinister Love luck! If you have an idea of some piece of merch you would like to see, post it in the comments below.
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