Khierstyn Ross is back for another episode of Lunch with Norm! Crowdfunding has changed the game for developing products for Amazon and E-Commerce. Khierstyn Ross specializes in go-to-market strategy for products using Kickstarter & other popular channels. In 2015, she began this journey when her first launch failed terribly. After relaunching, she went from a $16,710 failure to a $592,742 success story. But it’s not as easy as posting about your dream product and walking away. In this episode, Khierstyn answers your questions about running a successful crowdfunding campaign. Khierstyn also shares how she was able to raise 100K in 14 hours! Find out everything you need to know to have a great product launch.
Date: November 23, 2020
Episode: 67
Title: Norman Farrar Introduces Khierstyn Ross, a Product Launch Expert that Specializes in Kickstarter & Other Popular Channels Launch for Physical Products.
Subtitle: How to run a Crowdfunding Campaign
Final Show Link: https://lunchwithnorm.com/episodes/episode-67-how-to-raise-100k-in-14-hours-w-khierstyn-ross/
In this episode of Lunch With Norm…, Norman Farrar introduces Khierstyn Ross, a product launch expert that specializes in Kickstarter & other popular channels launch for physical products.
Kirsty failed terribly on her first launch, but after relaunching, she went from a $16,710 failure to a $592,742 success story. She discussed how to run a successful crowdfunding campaign and shared how she was able to raise 100K in 14 hours.
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Norman 0:02
Hey everybody. It’s Norman Farrar a.k.a The Beard Guy here and welcome to another Lunch With Norm, the rise of the micro brands.
Norman 0:21
Alright, so we’re just waiting for Khierstyn Ross to arrive if, if she’s a few minutes late, we could just answer some questions if you have anything coming up about Black Friday sales. It’s getting close. We’re a few days away. Friday, today’s Monday. Anyways, before that happens, Kelsey, where are you sir?
Kelsey 0:42
Hello, welcome. We do have Khierstyn, Khierstyn just joined. So she’s here. But yes, our Facebook group. We are Lunch With Norm Amazon FBA and eCommerce Collective. You can go there and join. We’ve got great discussions going on. It’s growing every week. I think we’re up to like 230 members now. But that’s awesome and you can like us on social media. We got Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, anywhere you can find anywhere. Just search Lunch With Norm and you’ll be able to find this and it looks like Marina is joining us.l
Norman 1:21
Hey Marina. All the way from Toronto. It’s so far. It’s an all Canadian podcast. Khierstyn is going to be on. She’s from Toronto and we’re sitting just a couple hours north of Toronto.
Kelsey 1:32
So yeah, if you have any questions for Khierstyn or Norm, throw them all over in the comment section and we’ll get to them as soon as possible and I think that’s it. I’ll post the link for the Facebook group in case you haven’t joined. So it’s right here. Lunch With Norm Amazon FBA and eCommerce Collective, hit that link and yeah, enjoy the show everyone.
Norman 1:54
All right. So before we get started, I just want to let everybody know that we’re broadcasting to you live on Facebook, YouTube and LinkedIn. Kelsey? You had one thing that you had to say.
Kelsey 2:08
Oh, yeah, smash the like button, ring the bell.
Norman 2:11
Smash. I get enjoyment out of that, your dad gets enjoyment out of that and ringing the bell.
Kelsey 2:15
I know you do.
Norman 2:16
That’s it. That’s all I ask.
Kelsey 2:18
I know, every, every, every single episode.
Norman 2:23
Like it, smash it, do whatever. But anyway, do something with that like button. All right. Oh, let me tell you about the newsletter. Also want to talk about that. Usually we talk about it at the end. But the newsletter is growing, we are getting a lot more people that are signing up for it and I think the main reason is it doesn’t suck. We put together some really great content and that’s all we want. It’s content we’re not doing advertising is just providing value for you and it’s for Amazon sellers as well as online sellers and it’s online marketing. So digital marketing and social media, everything that you need. All in one newsletter. So check it out. That’s at lunchwithnorm.com, normanfarrar.com and it just says simply subscribe. Alright, so I think that’s it. We’ve covered everything. Sit back, relax, grab a cup of coffee, and enjoy the episode. I hope Khierstyn is here. There she is.
Khierstyn 3:25
I am here.
Norman 3:26
Do you have your coffee?
Khierstyn 3:27
I don’t.
Norman 3:29
Okay. All right.
Khierstyn 3:32
I’m sorry. I’ll just fake.
Norman 3:35
Perfect. All right. How are you Khierstyn?
Khierstyn 3:39
I’m good. I’m enjoying our very first day of lockdown. Toronto’s back on lockdown. Yeah. Last week.
Norman 3:47
What? Really?
Khierstyn 3:48
Yep.
Norman 3:49
Oh, that sucks. Kelsey?
Kelsey 3:51
That’s why I’m here.
Norman 3:54
That’s why Okay, now I understand why you just kind of came in. Yeah.
Khierstyn 3:59
Oh, you don’t need to be in Toronto anymore. All that red zone.
Norman 4:03
I didn’t hear that. Okay and a lot of other places. A lot of other states are, California is going into it if they’re not already. But, yeah, that’s too bad. Oh, there’s my old, geez, my old artillery buddy, Dave Apperley. He’s up here too. So many Canadians on today. I don’t know why. Yeah, it’s great. So, why don’t we talk about you for a bit? Who are you? What do you do? What makes you special? I know what makes us special.
Khierstyn 4:37
Well, yeah. So for people that this is the first time hearing me on Norms’ show or not familiar with our work. I’m Khierstyn. So for the last five years I have been heavily involved in product launches. Specifically carved out a name for myself by helping people launch products on Indiegogo and Kickstarter. I love crowdfunding because it’s a great way for an eCommerce seller to go on with a new product and raise capital for inventory. Because when you do a crowdfunding campaign, people are helping invest in your idea by pre ordering your product and then you can use the funds from the pre order to then pay for inventory. So crowdfunding has just been an amazing platform over the last decade for entrepreneurs that don’t want to rely on traditional investors or outside capital and they just want to be able to get a market validated product, bootstrapped and pre orders funded through a crowdfunding platform. So that’s what we’ve allowed sellers to do with our work.
Norman 5:42
So it’s so interesting, you hear so many Amazon sellers, thinking about different ways to do product launches and they go back to the standard ways that they hear in every course and nobody really thinks about crowdfunding and then just a little bit that we’ve talked about it, you’re killing it, doing crowdfunding. It depends on a lot of things. But, when you put together crowdfunding or launch, for the most part, it’s working correctly.
Khierstyn 6:13
Yeah. So there have been some changes that we’ve done internally with our processes, where we only bring market tested products to launch now, just because like any seller that’s gone through any launch, it doesn’t matter if it’s Kickstarter, or just another Amazon product, you’re investing heavy capital and time and resources into the marketing and the production of this product. So you need to make sure that the product is a winner going into it. So we’ve now putting, essentially put a system in place, before anyone goes to a full launch, we do a small market test to make sure the idea is viable first, and will be really to mitigate the risk and then if that product goes well, for that like quick one month test, we’d then bring it to a full launch. So at this point, any person doing a product launch should really be validating a product on a smaller scale, so that you can make sure that the money and time and investment that you’re putting into bringing your product to market is going to pay off, right?
Norman 7:17
So there’s a lot of smaller Amazon sellers that are probably saying how much is that, we’ll get to that in a second. But I want people to realize that way back when Amazon didn’t exist, and you were trying to bring a product back to market, or if you wanted to open up a store, you’d have a heavy, heavy capital. You probably would spend a quarter million dollars probably on the shy side, very conservative and then you had to do some marketing that was just for your building or, just trying to get the leases established and doing everything, the packaging. Now with Amazon, it’s so nice to be able to go out, launch with very little capital. But most Amazon sellers, yeah, you have a great audience. But still, a lot of Amazon sellers don’t properly capitalize their product and so that’s a big problem. When you do have an Amazon product, you at least want to make sure that you have three times your inventory costs, at least that to go to market. When you’re talking about your product and the way that you’re launching, you need more capital, but you’re getting probably some better results. Why don’t we get into that? What kind of dollars would somebody need and I know there’s a lot like that. I’m asking you how long is a piece of string? But, how much money do you think on average somebody would need?
Khierstyn 8:45
Yeah, and I think you have to ask this question, because that is one of the top questions I get and fortunately, the answer, it depends. So let’s talk about what it depends on. If you’re looking at raising a million dollars on a Kickstarter campaign, you’re gonna need a hell of a lot more than someone who only wants to raise 10,000. Right? So what goes, the factors that go into a successful product launch come down to not only the product itself, and how much the market wants it with that product market fit, but it also comes down to audience size, like how big of an audience are you launching to and the reality is that unless if you’re coming in with a massive audience already from YouTube channel, past customer list from like previous product launches, it’s going to be expensive to build up that audience. So if we assume that the average seller is coming in with not a massive audience may actually need to start from zero, then that first product launch off of Amazon you’re doing you want to build up an email list of around 10,000 people on average, and that in Facebook terms is going to be about 20 to 25,000 that you’re investing into a list to do that. A list will also include building up a mini chat audience. It’s just about having an audience because you need people to launch to whether you’re going to Kickstarter, or whether you’re going to Amazon and what 20-25 grand gets you that’s like, I would say that you’re looking at raising between 75,100 and 50,000 on average. That would be like the average crowdfunding campaign you’re looking at putting into it.
Norman 10:24
Okay, before we go to the next question, a couple of new shout outs here, Herb D’entremall. Hey, are you from Quebec? Just wondering, we’ve got some really great listeners out in Quebec and I just going by I’m kind of thinking maybe. Anyways, Herb where are you from? Yarrow, nice to see you again. Rad, Hey, we haven’t talked to since last night or at least corresponded and Nathan’s got a question here that we should get to. Kelsey, can you bring that up?
Kelsey 10:55
Yeah, for sure. So Nathan is asking, when she talks about doing a small one month launch to test a product, where does she test it exactly?
Khierstyn 11:05
Yeah, that’s a great question. So when we have any client that we’re looking at engaging for a full launch, we do a one month testing package. So that says, alright, you work with us for one month, we test it, which I’ll get into that in a second and then if that passes, we then invite you to launch with us, right? If it works. So this one month test we are using, we essentially set up a funnel, we set up a landing page, we drive traffic to that landing page. So we spend about $2,000, driving traffic off Facebook and Instagram to go to that page and the intention of that page and that funnel is to capture interest and test how serious the market is about buying your product. So we have a funnel that’s laid out that on the very first page, has information about your product, and then encourages someone to sign up to join the waitlist and reserve an early bird discount, right? So the first level is grab an email address and that would indicate Okay, the audience is interested in the product. But then after someone has subscribed to the list, they right away, get the option to put down a $1 pledge, and this is how we get my micro commitment from somebody. So we then say, Hey, for $1, you can unlock all these really cool savings and this whole, like, VIP program, just by putting down that $1 and all you have to do is when we launch, you’ll then lock in this price. So essentially, by putting down that $1, they’re locking in like special perks and so based on the number of people that actually upgrade and put down $1 and based on how much it costs for us to get an email address, we’re gonna know, within reason how serious the audience is about purchasing the product at that price and so when that test at the end of the 30 days. At that point, once we look at the final numbers, we can say, all right, we think that this product is a home run, and should definitely go to launch. But at the end of the 30 days, if we don’t get the numbers we want to see, that’s either an indication that you have to go back to the drawing board on your product, your messaging, your audience, if something has to shift in the end, the test has to shift and what’s originally been presented will not be successful if you take it to a launch.
Norman 13:20
Okay. Oh, we originally were talking about 100k in 14 hours and is it really possible to do that?
Khierstyn 13:30
Yeah, we did it last week.
Norman 13:33
Great. I didn’t know that you did it. I just thought it was the title. Oh, that’s 100k in 14 hours?
Khierstyn 13:39
Yes.
Norman 13:39
Not bad. Why don’t we talk about that process? Well, not even that. Let’s talk about the process. We don’t have to get in great detail, because that could be a whole other thing. But, three, four or five steps to putting together a campaign?
Khierstyn 13:58
Yeah, for sure. So, can I actually share my screen to give you the context?
Norman 14:03
Yes you can. I think
Kelsey 14:05
Yes, it’s no problem. I’ll be able to put up on the screen.
Khierstyn 14:08
Okay, let me see. Okay. So just to give some context, this is I guess I love case studies. So this is the jam stack that we launched last Tuesday and since then we’ve raised 176,000 Canadian. So that’s about 140,000 US and of that 100k was done within the first 14 hours of a crowdfunding campaign when we launched on Tuesday.
Norman 14:34
What the heck is it? What’s jam stack?
Khierstyn 14:36
So the jam stack is a speaker that attaches to the base of any electric guitar to act as an amplifier. So the problem with playing electric guitar is that you can’t do it freely without bulky amps, heavy equipment and that sort of thing. So the jam stack was designed as a solution for the electric guitar player that wants to be able to quickly grab and grab their kit and go to a friend’s house, play in the park or really play wherever they want with just very small setup time and a very powerful speaker.
Norman 15:09
Do you know my other son Hayden?
Khierstyn 15:12
No.
Norman 15:13
Oh, we gotta grab Hayden one of these days. So I’ll talk to you afterwards.
Khierstyn 15:16
Cool. Yeah. For sure.
Norman 15:20
That is really a cool app. But these are the things that if you go to a crowdfunding site, and you know if it’s unique, we always talk about trying to be a little bit different. That’s a cool product. I’m gonna buy one if I can.
Khierstyn 15:36
Yeah, please do. Chris the founder is in Toronto supporting Canadian business.
Norman 15:41
Oh, very good. All right now there are a bunch of others, Herb. That’s great that you’re in Nova Scotia. I spent a little bit of time in Digby, which is an awesome place. But Nova Scotia is very cool. Doctor Koz is on, Holistic Therapy Directories there, Hi. Darwin’s on, good to see everybody back on.
Kelsey 16:00
Yeah, we have lots of people. Yeah, so actually, there’s one person, Simon actually talking about innovative products. So I’ll throw that one up. So how innovative or new to a market does the product have to be for Kickstarter or Indiegogo?
Khierstyn 16:18
Yeah, great question. Can I just share my screen again? Because I think people really jive with case studies. So this is an example. Wow, don’t mind my setting, one sec. This is an example of an Amazon seller that had another fitness brand. So this is weighted jewelry.
Norman 16:40
Weighted jewelry?
Khierstyn 16:41
Yeah, so it’s quarter pound jewelry that you could just take it with you all day. So it’s really cool. The founder got the idea for this when competing product Bella bangles which different demographic, different look, similar product, Bella bangles was on Shark Tank, and they’re super successful. But when Eric wanted to try the product, or when Eric went to try the product, they found it was just too bulky and too weird and they just didn’t like the fit of it. So they were inspired to create a different version, and better version for a different demographic of an existing product. So what they did was they designed weights to be what they wanted. So they took an existing product, but they improved on it. So I want to show this as an example. Because a lot of people think when they think of Kickstarter, they think that it has to be like a drone or an air carrier, or like an Air Flight craft to Mars or something like so innovative, that’s never been done before. That’s not the way with Kickstarter. So the rule with Kickstarter is that with products, you want something that you don’t want white label, you don’t want something that someone could go and buy on Amazon, because why would someone preorder your product and wait for it for four months versus just buy it on Amazon? So the key to a good crowdfunding product comes down to taking an existing solution and improving it and Kelly weights is an example of that. With jam stack, jam stack is the epitome of innovative, nothing like this existed when it first launched, and they were a category disrupter. But what you’re more often than not, you’re going to find that some of the best, most common products that you see on Indiegogo and Kickstarter are going to be existing products that have a new and unique flair to it. Not completely innovative. Never heard of before.
Norman 18:52
Interesting. So you don’t have to have the new SpaceX flight or, a lot of people probably think you do have to have that. But one of the things, you know Kevin King?
Khierstyn 19:09
I do, yeah.
Norman 19:10
Kevin’s got, he does this and you know what, I don’t think he’s ever used a Kickstarter campaign. But one of the things he always does, so I think everybody probably knows that. At least we both Kevin and I sell bully sticks, two different approaches and even with his bully sticks, he did something incredible. That made it stand out. Now, a bully stick is a bully stick is a bully stick, but how he packaged and what he did with it, it was incredible, just enough to be very innovative to just go crazy and the other thing he did, he does, and he won’t mind me talking about this. He does his mobile phone holder. But it’s not a mobile phone holder. It’s got all these other things built into it. It costs money. He had to develop it, and there’s so many people that will go get a red plastic shoe stretcher, because they found it and it’s a very horrible product by the way, don’t go and look for red shoe stretchers, but don’t not do that. But anyways, people will look for white labels because it’s easy. But if you can spend a little bit of money, Amy Wees. She was on just the other day and she was talking about her product. She has a cat product. Well, she invested 60 grand and molds, brought them back over here, had them done here and that thing is going crazy because it’s a little bit different than everybody else’s. So if you want to go out of the gates and you want to get something just white label, go for it. If you want to do something a little bit different, this is really an alternative way to do it.
Khierstyn 20:54
Yeah and I find like, my big thing is we work with Amazon sellers to build brands, and Kickstarter, Indiegogo is an amazing way to launch a brand because you’re taking something that is custom, something slightly unique, and you’re giving it a personality. Right? So.
Norman 21:14
Yeah, the first and I don’t know his name, I forget his name. But the first person I saw back about four years ago, on Amazon using this race three or $400,000 on sunglasses. He was a lawyer out of Maine and yeah, do you know who I’m talking about?
Khierstyn 21:31
I don’t, I don’t know.
Norman 21:33
His name is John. I forgot his last name. But anyways, for sunglasses, but they were a little bit innovative. Not a not a bad little launch. Yeah. All right, what are some mistakes that people should avoid?
Khierstyn 21:47
Mistakes people should avoid, yeah. Man, I have had a couple calls with people lately, where they’re like, Hey, I’m going to go launch next week on Kickstarter and I’m like, Okay, cool. Tell me about your marketing efforts so far and they’re like, well, we don’t need them, because Kickstarter has this big traffic source and so I’m going to repeat the conversation, because that’s just really, this is the biggest mistake. Aside from launching a product without validating it, the next biggest failure point is going to be lack of audience because like, if you have a great product, but no one knows about you, you’re just gonna flop, right? So the biggest mistake that people will make, I feel like it’s similar to an Amazon launch, where you assume that because Amazon gives you this free traffic, it’s the same for Kickstarter. Kickstarter has the ability to give you a ton of free traffic. But you can only get in front of that traffic by proving yourself to Kickstarter. So Kickstarter has an algorithm that helps them figure out what projects are doing well financially and are popular for their users. Kickstarters’ main agenda is to protect the user experience and to show their backers or their community really cool projects. So it would make sense that they have an algorithm that would help them feed that information. So the key to a successful crowdfunding campaign is having front loaded momentum. So when we launched jam stack last week, we did $100,000 on that first day, so that the algorithm would start to pick us up and it creates that snowball effect where Indiegogo, another crowdfunding platform will just feed us free traffic, and we start to get discovered by people from around the globe. So knowing that, if you go into a crowdfunding campaign with no audience, no audience means you launch to nobody and when you don’t have an audience of people ready to preorder your product on the very first day that you go live, then the platform’s algorithm will not pick you up, you’re not going to be discovered by people and you’re not going to get free traffic. So you really do have to seed your launch with an audience of qualified buyers ready to buy your product on the first day that you go live on Indiegogo or Kickstarter.
Norman 24:08
So, Paul Miller. Do you know Paul?
Khierstyn 24:12
Yes, I do.
Norman 24:13
Okay, so Paul was on, I think Monday, losing track of time, or sorry, Friday. Anyways, He’s the owner of Cozy Phones. So again, he went in, he did some very innovative product research and he came out with this really cool product that started a new category. So on something like that, he’s got this incredible product. There are headphones, there are bluetooth. Yeah, out there wireless content, but nothing like what he had. Would that be something that he had come over? There’s no category on Amazon and that’s why I’m asking this. He has to be the groundbreaker to be the innovator for this. Can you bring a product to that? Product like that over to you. Do you have to have your audience following you? What do you need to do?
Khierstyn 25:06
So he ended up doing a Kickstarter campaign, I think a couple years back. But is your question, can he just bring a product like that to Amazon with no audience?
Norman 25:16
No, the question is, so you were talking about, it has to be a proven product. So this was not a proven product. It was a product that was really cool but there was no category on Amazon. So, for so to pick up on the sales for Kickstarter.
Khierstyn 25:37
Okay, so proven product. When we launched, so jam stacks launched last week was a version two. So we have like, we’ve launched the company three years ago on Indiegogo with their Gen one product and at the time, when we launched that Gen one product, no one was attaching guitar amplifiers to the base of their guitar, like it was a whole new thing. So we did have to validate and test the market to make sure they wanted it first and Chris did that offline. With First off, he just got this, Chris is the founder and he got this idea for this guitar and he was really frustrated by current solutions. So he rigged up this really ugly prototype that had the speaker built onto it and then he forgot about it for a bit and then he ended up like a couple years later bringing this thing to a friend’s house, and just jamming out with it and he hangs out with a ton of guitar players and there’s like, Dude, what the hell is it? Like, what is this? This is incredible and he started to get validation from some serious guitar players he hung out with, that’s when he started to take it seriously and look at different ways to develop this. So he market tested the product through guitar players and knowing people in his nation starting to go to like communities and starting to talk about it. So it was a proven product, because he got the validation from people who are like, Can I invest? Can I buy this? How do I do this? Versus like, and so that, for me is like a tested product. We didn’t take it so far as to do the traffic tests, like I talked about earlier in the show. But we did it through real people and demoing it and offline testing, kind of like play testing. That’s popular on board games. But what if Paul had just kind of thrown up per page and was like, Look, no one I haven’t talked to anyone but my mother about this product, because I’m scared of someone ripping it off. That’s a not tested product and that would be risky and I wouldn’t do that. But I don’t know what Paul did to bring Cozy Phones to market. But he proved interest in, he’s now a very successful seller because of it.
Norman 27:50
Yeah and we’re gonna get to questions in a second. I got one last one. When you do bring it to market, should you have a patent pending, a provisional patent in place?
Khierstyn 28:02
Yeah. So, I think you should not patent something before you bring it to launch because you don’t even know if it’s worth patenting at this point. So I am of a belief that you should wait until after launch, see what the traction is like before you patent. However, in saying that, I believe that you should seek legal advice because I’m not a lawyer.
Norman 28:25
Right. Big disclaimer right there.
Khierstyn 28:27
Big disclaimer, I am not a lawyer, no legal training. But what is popular that what I have seen is I would suggest looking into patent pending and at the very least, copywriting your images with watermarks and stuff like that to protect your assets, images and video prior to launching something because you have to look at what people are going to copy if it goes well and what they’re going to copy are your images. So I’d start with that. I’d do a very basic patent pending if you can, because that’s a couple grand and then if you want to invest in a full patent, then the patent pending kind of holds that spot for you and it gives you I think 12 or 18 months to file for the full thing after the launch when you have capital.
Norman 29:12
Perfect. Okay, let’s start on some questions.
Kelsey 29:14
We have lots today. So first, we’ll go to Doctor Koz. Hey, my buddy is a massive Kickstarter machine. He tells me the secret is having a mailing list. Would you agree? If so, what are some novel ways to develop a mailing list?
Khierstyn 29:32
Yeah, so we’ve covered the first half of that. So yes mailing list. Don’t bother launching without a list. That’s my professional opinion here. Ways to build a mailing list, that depends on how big of a launch you’re looking to have. The traditional way is to build it through paid Facebook and Instagram ads. I believe that a list needs to be built through a collection of friends and family, needs to be through word of mouth and referral. It needs to be through posting on social media to prove that their social media is a really great way to build a community around a product. So that by default is a must, as well as paid Facebook ads.
Norman 30:14
Right and also, I know that we’ll be talking with him afterwards. But Paul Baron, like with getting a ton of influencers to push out the product and you could do a referral program, a loyalty program and there’s lots of ways to drive traffic to build a list.
Khierstyn 30:33
So I didn’t mention influencers because I find that founders are 50-50 with pre launch, they either have a ton of products to give to influencers, or they don’t. So I would say like influencers are on a micro influencer level, really awesome. If you can get prototypes into their hands for product reviews, influencers pre launch, and even when you’re just getting your product launch have not been a huge driver of sales, but they really help on the conversion side because it’s social proof.
Norman 31:08
Okay, next question.
Kelsey 31:12
I think we covered this one. But how unique should my product be to work with you? Can I do it with a me too kind of product?
Khierstyn 31:22
I think we talked about that already. Yarrow, just in case you missed that. You don’t want to bring a white label product to crowdfunding, you do want to customize it in some way to make it unique.
Norman 31:34
Okay, what did Darwin, Darwin was talking about something too.
Kelsey 31:40
Yep. So he had a comment first, and then a question, I would pay 2000 for a strong one month test all day.
Khierstyn 31:48
So that’s not our price to do the test. That’s the budget for ads. Just FYI.
Kelsey 31:53
Okay, so to follow up with the one one test, would I be able to access these people that were interested or did I totally get the one month test wrong and the test is more for you to see if you would continue with the process?
Khierstyn 32:04
Yeah. So we had one of our recent clients sign on to do the test. She’s like, so we basically have to audition to be your client. I was like, Yes, but let me explain. The one month test is for both parties. It’s for us to assess whether you’re a good risk to invest in to take to launch. But second for you, before you go too deep into the process, making sure that this is something that you should bring to market. When you do a one month test with us, you get full access to everything. So you can keep all the Facebook ads, copy the assets, the email list, the landing page, and all that stuff. So yeah, so you have access to everything at the end, we don’t keep that information at the end.
Kelsey 32:59
David, how do you find the creator of these products? Are you creating the funding for them so they can become your supplier?
Khierstyn 33:10
Do you understand that question Norm?
Norman 33:13
I think it’s doing the product research.
Khierstyn 33:17
Yeah. In terms of developing the product yourself, that’s actually not really my area of expertise. Norm, I feel like you’re better suited to answer that.
Norman 33:28
Yeah, hey, Dave, probably the best thing to do is if you do have a product or an idea that you could go to a product development company and just kind of give them some ideas that they could start to do the research. Just to give you an idea, though, if you are looking at going out and finding a company, like Ghimba is one we do some of that, but it’s not cheap. So it’s not like going white label where it costs pretty much nothing to do. You’ll probably get, you have to put up a retainer, maybe 1500. Be prepared to spend 50 or sorry, 5000 bucks easily and then if there’s any other costs involved, it’s not so much the research, it’s getting all the drawings done and getting it, put into place. It could be a lot of money, like I was saying Amy Wees was on here just the other day and she spent 60 grand developing this really cool product and just that was for the molds and that was in China. So if the molds were over here, they would have been double triple that price but just expect that and Dave, you can contact me afterwards that I can give you either Zach over at Ghimba’s info. Or if you wanted to talk to Afolabi, go ahead and do that as well.
Kelsey 34:51
Okay. From Darwin, is there a type of product or category that will not work?
Khierstyn 34:57
So Kickstarter, keep it B2C products. B2B products don’t do that well, because that’s just not the demographic on there. I’m the type of product I honestly, like there’s any kind of product is going to work. If you’re going to assess what platform you should launch on, or whether your product does well on crowdfunding, all these projects that have ever been launched, there are thousands of them. Hundreds of thousands, do research on like, just type in, for example, if you’re launching a planner, you can type go to Google type planners Kickstarter, see what comes up, or even just go to Kickstarters discovery tool, and find similar projects that were launched and do a bit of research into, like a track record for that to see if it’s worth that. But honestly, almost any product goes. The scope for what you can raise varies greatly. Like if you’re releasing a personal memoir, that’s a very different scope, then a drone that gets launched, right, because you’re looking at a drone can do 3 million versus a personal memoirs like 20,000. So I would just do a bit of research on your category and product.
Norman 36:07
Are there any saturated categories?
Khierstyn 36:11
I mean, yeah, but they just, it’s based on trends, like fitness products are big right now. At home fitness products, for obvious reasons. Fashion, not fashion, but like functional fitness, functional fashion. Those are big. Yeah, I don’t know if they’re saturated, because people just keep coming up with like, a different twist to it. So.
Norman 36:42
But if I came, and I said, Oh, I have this CBD product. Oh, I have this supplement product. Is vitamin C.
Khierstyn 36:51
Good point. Yeah, supplements, I wouldn’t do them on crowdfunding. So stay away from any ingestibles. But no, like just tech in general. But that’s the weird thing about Kickstarter is like, you could just keep launching similar-ish products, and they’re going to keep doing well because they always like the new person comes up with a different spin or an improvement on that product. So.
Norman 37:17
Okay, yeah.
Kelsey 37:19
We got maybe like three more questions, I think coming in. Okay. Marcia says, fascinating episode. Thanks, Khierstyn. From Simon, so first, would a licensed product work? With all the fan pages of the license help build a mailing list? For example, a Lunch With Norm beard comb opposed to just a beard comb?
Norman 37:40
There we go.
Khierstyn 37:41
Yeah. Okay. So another, onto the What Works with Kickstarter, you have to launch products that don’t exist yet. As in, you’re not selling them on Amazon and then you go to Kickstarter. So Kickstarter needs to be the first sales channel for a new product that you’re launching.
Norman 37:58
Okay, so I’ve got a question about that. Simon, you were watching that show with Paul the other day, we’re talking about licensing. So if I came to you, and I had a Batman or Superman product, not a coffee mug, let’s say it’s a mirror or something that’s a little bit different and I went to Facebook, and because Facebook, you have the interests of people who are DC Comic enthusiasts, or Batman enthusiasts. Yeah and I was able to gather a ton of people that way, or emails. Could I put a licensed product like that on Kickstarter, and then start targeting all these people who love Batman or Superman Or DC?
Khierstyn 38:45
I mean, yeah, it’s more have you sold this product before or is it a new product?
Norman 38:51
It would be new, I’m actually thinking of a product right now that somebody just came to me and said, hey, what can you do with this?
Khierstyn 39:00
Yeah, so, let’s say, Paul with Cozy Phones decides to launch a Disney Princess version, right? But he has all those licensed products already. He wouldn’t sell the licensed products on Kickstarter. But the new like Disney Princess version is game for Kickstarter and then yes, you can then use Facebook ads to build up a mailing list by targeting people that are into Disney or DC or whatever like that specific interest is.
Norman 39:33
So Dr. Koz, that is another way. It just hit me that that might be a great way to get a ton of emails. Just enthusiasts of a licensed product.
Kelsey 39:47
Okay, Simon just said thank you Norm. That’s exactly what I’m asking. Oh, and Khierstyn, do you have a cut off time?
Khierstyn 39:54
I mean, one o’clock, but I budgeted the hour.
Kelsey 39:58
Okay. Perfect. All right. So we have Nathan. Nathan Clark, out of one month, what is the kind of percentage that determines if you should go forward or not?
Khierstyn 40:09
Yeah, so we have four metrics we look for. As mentioned before, for anyone who’s just coming in, we do a one month test, that will first ask someone to subscribe to the waitlist and then on the thank you page, it asks them to upgrade to $1 if they want to join our VIP program and unlock exclusive perks. So at the funnel level, we look for our cost per lead, our cost per email address, we need to see that below $2. For anyone that subscribes to the mailing list, and then puts down $1, so they upgrade to $1, we need to see that at least 6% of people upgrade to $1 in order to show a good or an high enough intent to purchase at that price and then we look for email open rates to be 35% or higher and we look for landing page. Our landing page conversion rate when someone lands on it from Facebook, and then subscribes by email, we need to see that at least 20% to start and of course, that’s just after a one month test. So after that, we can only see the numbers get better with further optimization.
Norman 41:18
Very good. Yeah.
Kelsey 41:21
RB, Hello all. Not an expert, but in the US an individual can get a provisional patent for $70. That does allow you to claim patent pending, but it really offers no legal protection, cheaper though and so it’s more just a comment and I think that’s all the questions for now. Yeah. If you guys, if anyone does have questions, throw them in the comment section.
Norman 41:47
Okay. I still have a bunch of questions.
Norman 41:51
Okay, so we’ve got crowdfunding platforms. Yep. Pros and cons of each platform.
Khierstyn 41:59
So there are hundreds. I only work with Kickstarter and Indiegogo. Okay. They’re the VOG’s. So, I’ve been using that term a lot lately. But Kickstarter is great for design projects. Kickstarter is great for publishing projects. Kickstarter is like the Kleenex brand of the industry. So the pros of using it are, it’s a legitimate platform, there’s a lot of trust, there’s a lot of repeat buyers. Okay. The downside, as a creator coming into it, launching a product is it’s a lot more competitive. Okay. Indiegogo is really good for tech products. So they’re really trying to carve out the niche in the tech space. I wouldn’t go to Indiegogo for much else outside of tech, though, to be honest, because you are relying heavily on their community to help you get more momentum and more sales, right? So you do have to match the product to the community that’s on that platform. That’s part of what goes into a choice between what platform to go with. But yeah, I love both Indiegogo and Kickstarter, it really depends on what you’re looking for and it depends on the track record of the product you’re launching. So
Norman 43:15
I was thinking doesn’t matter if the products are in Canada, US, Europe?
Khierstyn 43:22
Yes and no. Indiegogo will list the currency of the country that you list your project in. So that’s like your business banking information. So us running jamstack out of Canada, everything’s registered in Canadian dollars. Downside to that is, it’s not an internationally recognized, start, wow, it is an internationally recognized currency. But US dollars is more recognized. So ideally, we’d love to see this in US dollars. So if at all possible, I would love to have a US Corporation and we launched the campaign and have that out of the US as opposed to Canada. Of course things showing Canadian dollars, it will convert in the company that you are in. So we’ll show like 167 Canadian in the US, 126 US dollars, or in Hong Kong dollars, it’ll be this like so it does auto convert, but that’s really the only downside to being outside of the US is you can’t natively choose US dollars. Unless you’re residing in the US.
Norman 44:33
All right. I don’t think we’ve covered this, but I think this will be very, how far in advance should you plan out a launch?
Khierstyn 44:42
Depends on the goal. Again, I would recommend three to six months.
Norman 44:46
Okay. All right.
Khierstyn 44:48
Whether you are managing this yourself or you’re hiring an agency to do this.
Norman 44:53
Right. Okay, I see a couple more questions there Kels.
Kelsey 44:55
Yep, two more from Rad. Well, crowdfunding except an exciting product available on Amazon if we improve the product to the next level?
Khierstyn 45:04
Yep. So if you’re releasing a new version of the product where you can obviously sell to Kickstarter why it’s different then Yes, you can go to Kickstarter for a version two.
Kelsey 45:18
Last question from Simon, I have a product that I used to sell a few years ago, wholesale in Europe, no longer available. Could I relaunch it on these platforms?
Khierstyn 45:27
I think so. Yes. One thing I would say for Kickstarter is be sure to submit your project for approval first before launching. They’ll do a full review and give you a yes or no, it should not be a problem as long as you’re not actively selling the product anywhere else online.
Norman 45:48
Okay, I think one of the things that we’ll do too, is we’ll post your four metrics that you had, I thought that was really great. Oh, Michelle. Hi, Michelle. How much, sorry, Kels, can you read it? It’s so small here.
Kelsey 46:04
Yeah. I also have a friend with me too. This is Dallas, everyone. He’s usually at Norms.
Khierstyn 46:15
I will get my puppies.
Norman 46:15
Your puppies, right?
Khierstyn 46:17
Yeah. Two of them.
Norman 46:19
Two big puppies.
Kelsey 46:21
All right. So from Michelle, how much do you budget to have someone launch a product line?
Khierstyn 46:26
I mean, it could be a lot. What kind of product line? Is this like a clothing line? Or? Actually, you know what? I can reasonably answer this unfortunately. Like, I think the thing with the product line is start with one product, get that selling, launch a second product, reinvest the profits from it, to build out a product line around what your customers want. That’s what I would say, unfortunately, there’s no, even if I quoted you 200,000, I could be way off. It could be 10,000. I could be way off.
Norman 47:05
Yeah. One thing is for sure Michelle, it’s not like launching on Amazon. It is quite a bit of money. Yeah, it’s not something you can do for 2500 bucks. Yeah and it’s so and I’m so sorry that it really is how long is a piece of string? It’s a tough one to answer.
Kelsey 47:30
Okay, from Marcia, I heard you say that you do a 30 day trial first, after the trial and after the actual launch, prep and launcher complete, how long is the actual launch campaign’s stay active? When are the funds available and who keeps that percentage? What’s the actual net to the company?
Norman 47:51
Great.
Khierstyn 47:53
So let’s unpack this. I think I’m understanding timelines here. So you do a 30 day test. Let’s just say what we’re booking for January just to give like a timeline. So let’s say we book you in for a 30 day test in January, and it passes after that point, that’s January gone. We then will have two months of building an audience after that point. So that’s February, March, we’re building an email list. In April, we do a launch and so a crowdfunding campaign can last anywhere from zero to 60 days. On average, we do 35. Okay, 35 days, so we’ll say like another month, so the month of April is the launch. As soon as your campaign ends, the platform will take 14 to 21 days to give you the money. Like faster if you’re in the US, around 21 days if you’re International, because of wire transfer and stuff. So say end of April, your campaign finishes by the middle of May, you have money in the bank, and then you go and manufacture, do whatever you need to do, right? So that’s the timeline start to finish to do a proper launch if you’re working with an agency, and this will apply if you’re looking at raising 50,000 or higher, right? At that point, you can do it faster if you want to raise 5000. But that’s on average what we’re looking at. Who keeps what percentages? So Kickstarter and Indiegogo take a matchmaking fee. So they take 5% of all funds that you raise as a matchmaking fee. So every dollar you raise, they take 5%. On top of that there’s about 3% payment processing fees for credit cards, whatnot, right? So that’s the percentage that the platform’s take, what is the actual net to the company? So you’re not gonna like this answer, but this is just what happens. With a product launch, our goal is to have you break even on the launch. That may seem ridiculous or really shit or whatever. But the reality is that when you launch a product on Kickstarter, you’re doing it to launch a company. You’re putting a lot of money into marketing, into building a list, into building an audience, into building a ton of assets that you’re going to then use to raise a ton of capital. So with jamstack, for example, like I think we’ve put in, we’ve raised 140 so far. We’re going to raise around three to $400,000. For jamstack, we’ve put in about 80,000 to the campaign to build everything up for a professional video for what not. So, for us, after all marketing costs, the reason we’re putting in so much capital is to break even is because everything we do after jamstack to is on the map, pre orders are going to continue rolling and we get free press, we get traffic, we have a larger audience. So when you really look at what goes into launch and why the numbers are not to make, like the goal should never with a product launch be to make a whole bunch of money, because you’re going to have to take that and reinvest it into building your business. So best case, you want to break even and have the campaign pay for inventory, have the campaign pay for marketing, pay for building that audience, because you’re building up an asset from this launch.
Norman 51:23
When you’re taking a look, let’s say on Amazon and you’re trying to do a medium sized launch, you’re paying usually huge dollars either setting up your PPC, setting up rebates, if you’re using rebates, press releases whatever you’re using to launch your product. So to break even, I would do that all day long. Okay. Is that the end of the questions Kels?
Kelsey 51:48
Yeah, we had one from Darwin, but he said it was answered already.
Norman 51:52
Okay. So is there anything else that you would like to add regarding crowdfunding?
Khierstyn 52:01
No, just not about crowdfunding. Is this the point where I give contact information?
Norman 52:09
You can do anything you want at this point. So how, Oh you gotta help us smash likes and ring bells a little bit later on. But how do people get a hold of you?
Khierstyn 52:21
Yeah, so the best thing to do, if you want to send me a message directly, the best thing to do is email me. It’s k@khierstyn.com, my name is impossible to spell. So I’m just trying to see if I can, I’ll put it in a comment below. But it’s like it’s k@ K H I E R S T Y N .com and just shoot me a message, happy to get on a call or veter product, whatever it is that you have on your mind and the other thing is, if you just want to learn more about crowdfunding and our work, you can find me on YouTube as well as our Launch and Scale podcast.
Norman 53:04
Yeah, we also by the way, just put up your free training. Oh, I saw that go by and that’s khierstyn.com/free-training. I think.
Khierstyn 53:16
That should be.
Norman 53:17
Yeah. Okay and let’s mention this again, because you just whiz by it. You’ve got an awesome podcast, and it is called?
Khierstyn 53:25
Launch and Scale.
Norman 53:27
Launch and Scale. So you can get more, I was gonna call you Christian, Khierstyn.
Khierstyn 53:32
Damn works.
Norman 53:34
There we go. It’s an excellent podcast. I’ve listened to it a bunch. You do a great job.
Khierstyn 53:41
We have another pod. So long story short, my very first podcast focused on interviewing really successful crowdfunding creators. So if you want a full interview podcast dedicated to crowdfunding, you’re going to go to crowdfunding uncut. Launch and Scale is like the new version of that where we are having more general eCommerce talks and scaling brands after Kickstarter. So it’s a more holistic conversation versus just 100% the crowdfunding, okay.
Norman 54:14
Okay, so I think that’s it. You’re off the hook.
Khierstyn 54:16
Awesome.
Norman 54:17
There you go.
Khierstyn 54:18
Amazing. It was super fun.
Norman 54:22
Yeah. Thanks again for being on the show. Kelsey didn’t get to talk to you about this. But when the podcast stops, just hold on, and we’ll get right over to you. Okay.
Khierstyn 54:36
Sounds good.
Norman 54:37
All right, everybody. Well, thank you for joining us today. This has been great. It’s just another way of launching a product that you may not have thought about. So check it out. Check out Launch and Scale. It’s a great podcast. Khierstyn is awesome. But if you have any other questions, just throw it over into the comment section and we’ll get back to the message. As soon as we can, and I think this is where Kelsey comes in.
Kelsey 55:04
All right. Thank you, everyone. For your questions and comments. Today, we had lots of engagement. That’s awesome. Thank you guys really enjoyed this episode. Yes. So we do have a Facebook group, Lunch With Norm Amazon FBA and eCommerce Collective. If you have any questions about the episode, you can go over to that group, ask your questions, we’ve got a community growing. So if you want some input on like, maybe a product, that’s a great place to put a picture and ask if it’s a good idea or not.
Norman 55:36
Yeah, well, Hey, what about the other question that we have? So everybody who’s still listening. We were thinking about bringing people on live and asking their questions. So it’s in the group, we’ve got some interest, but we would love to be able to have live questions for anybody when our guests are on so I’m not sure who is next, who’s on Wednesday.
Kelsey 55:59
Next, we have Brian Johnson.
Norman 56:00
Oh, Brian’s gonna be on. So, if you wanted to ask Brian any questions, just let us know.
Kelsey 56:06
Yeah. If you have a question about your business or something, send me a message on Facebook. I can send you the link to our stream yard, and to send it over when the time comes and you can ask your question live, it’s the first time we’re doing this. So obviously, make sure you have a webcam and mic, because we’re just kind of seeing how this goes. But if that interests you at all, let me know. My email is k@lunchwithnorm.com, if you want to just email me.
Norman 56:36
I stole that by the way from Khierstyn, the K thing.
Kelsey 56:40
Okay, that’s where it came from. Yeah. But, yeah, we are a podcast so if you’d rather just listen to the podcast, not see our faces. You can go to Lunch With Norm. I don’t know why you would do that though. Because look at us. Just go to search Lunch With Norm, Amazon podcast or Spotify and Apple podcasts and yeah, I think that’s about it and fumble through my way here today. We made it.
Norman 57:10
Hey, I do that all the time. So alright, everybody. So join us every Monday, Wednesday and Friday at noon, Eastern Standard Time. Thank you again for watching. Hope you learned something and have a great day.
