Lessons Learned from Top Line Hockey
I am writing this just after sending out the At Cost Codes for Top Line Hockey, effectively marking the end of the Kickstarter campaign.
I’ve only ever done 2 kickstarter campaigns. The first was almost 10 years ago for Exploits (which is actually available now!) and that failed. Top Line Hockey not only succeeded, but was a bit of a smash hit. Now, 10 years of experience in game design, business, and just generally in living is the reason, for its success, but there are a few specific points that I think made the difference:
Knowing a community that is interested in the product and making sure they are aware of (and excited) about the project. (Side note: being able to send out links for a project before it starts is a god send of a feature!)
Knowing just how low of a goal you need to set, a funded project draws more attention than one at 50%
A little bit of advertising $$ goes a long way
Have the confidence to share with key players in the community (Joe from Hexed and Countered brought in what was needed to push the project past $1000).
Polish, polish, polish! A motto I’ve had for a while is “no defaults” and it paid off here.
Have top level rewards that make people feel special. And have a reason to do the kickstarter (in this case, sharing the stories of hockey fans around the world).
Of course, I’m looking forward to running another kickstarter soon now that I have gotten into a bit of a rhythm. A few people even know what it is about, but I’ll share more about that this winter. A few things I’m looking to do differently.
For the world building rewards, have a more defined restrictions so I can have more of the book ready while I finish up (this was the biggest source of stress - trying to write up all the teams within the time I had allotted to writing).
Having the add-ons from day 1 instead of adding them in later.
Figuring out the stretch goals a little bit better.
That’s it for now! I have a lot of blogs about FANG planned for September and October while I continue working on the site, have a great fall!