Kickstarter Unsuccessful

[u/fixedmark]

Hey all,

I just finished a Kickstarter campaign for my series The Mask of Silence issue #1. Ultimately that campaign was unsuccessful, but I want to put out this book into the world anyways. I have posted the comic in a high-quality digital download on my website travisvandervelden.com if you want to check it out.

If you like indie books, wrestling, or crime fiction then this is the book for you! Check it out if you can.

Edit: just updating to say thank you to everyone for the support, kind words, and advice. I'm definitely going to keep writing the series. And I will have a better game plan for Kickstarter in the future. I appreciate this community a lot!

[u/barrelofagun]

A couple things to consider if you decide to try to crowdfund the next issue:

• You provided no information about the creators. When backing a comic, I always want to know who's the artist, the writer, the letterer etc. This is especially important with potential backers who are very anti-AI - they need to see there are real people working on the project.

• For a comic about wrestling, you didn't show enough action.

• Early backers are very important to build a momentum (and most likely to show the Kickstarter's algorithms that this is a project to recommend, too), but you gave them no incentive and as such they had no reason not to wait. If you don't want to make a discounted tier for early-bird backers, you could offer something like an alternate cover for example.

• There were no stretch goals. This doesn't need to be something huge, and many people make the mistake of coming up with things like posters, stickers and whatever, which is often pretty useless with a new comic that has no fan base yet. A few extra pages with work-in-progress sketches, a very short side story, an extra splash page illustrated by a guest artist... these don't change the logistics when it comes to distributing your comic to your backers.

Hope this helps!

[u/ElCreeblue87 → u/barrelofagun]

Hey I have project coming up. Could you help me with some feedbacks of my launch page? I can dm the preview

[u/Parking-Let3432 → u/ElCreeblue87]

Yeah, I concur. I want to do a Kickstarter too. I would love your advice. I would even pay for it. If it's moderate, of course. :)

[u/Parking-Let3432 → u/[deleted]]

But where do I get this knowledge? For info, I will start a small Kickstarter on my own local market in France to learn, and then I will do it in the US.

[u/nmacaroni → u/barrelofagun]

1) Nobody cares about the creators. Especially if none of them have any track record.

2) Didn't show enough of the comic period.

3) Early birds a double edged sword, but even more problematic was the 40 day funding period. OP should go half the time, not double the time.

4) Stretch goals are neither here nor there. But only 2 tiers is a killer. This is really difficult for small indie publications that are just trying to put out a comic... gotta get creative.

[u/FunnyFigs-Artist → u/nmacaroni]

They may not know the names, but they will want to see them. I definitely don't back books that can't be assed to credit their creators.

[u/nmacaroni → u/FunnyFigs-Artist]

It is standard to acknowledge them, but the reality is nobody really cares. And a big blunder lots of indies make is talking about themselves and their goals in their videos.

Most people are not like you. Most folks don't need to verify creator identities to purchase a book that looks interesting to them. The vast majority of indie comic backers, verify through "backed projects and # of created projects" to avoid the scammy campaigns.

Sure some folks do need to know who made the book, but like I bought Lama socks the other day, and I didn't need to know the people making the Lama socks. I needed to know about the actual socks and the cost. I could care less about the team making the socks.

A better approach is to use an "about the team" as an update, since most indie projects lack actual update content. PLUS, delivering the about the team as an update has a captive audience AND allows you to go into greater detail on personal points that would just clutter up and detract on a main campaign page.

[u/nopalitzin → u/nmacaroni]

-1) You don't have a strong established following.

[u/SaltierThanAll]

The art looks great. Shame it didn’t meet the goal. How close was it?

[u/oldg17]

The artwork is terrific

[u/ElCreeblue87]

Unfortunate man. I hope the next issue does well! The art style is great.

[u/incogvito]

This looks like Michael Lark art and no one bit???

Can I see your Kickstarter page? I gotta see where I can help with advice because this should have been a no brainer.

[u/fixedmark]

Link to site: portfolio

[u/motorjed]

Purchase made.

[u/lefthandtrav]

Would have backed it if I had seen it. Sharing this with my friends, we love Lucha stuff!

Art is legit

[u/Parking-Let3432]

I just bought it because the art is just too beautiful, excellent colors. I haven't read yet, but for the info on your website, you should tell it's a PDF file you're buying. It's not obvious.

[u/Parking-Let3432 → u/Parking-Let3432]

Well, I just finished reading it. It was really well done. Lettering is really top. The story is interesting, great art, great everything. One thing I didn't like, too many lines in Spanish. It's okay because I can understand, but for many people, they will miss out on a few lines. I will buy the next issues for sure.

[u/nmacaroni]

People think "If you make it, they will come..." but the reality is you did just about everything wrong in your kick.

The pinup art is great.

If the story is solid and well executed, there's no reason you can't find a market for this. And a $2000 fund is nothing.

Take heart that I've seen A LOT of indie comics miss their funding lately. Even quality comics. Economy still hasn't recovered and folks are playing their wallets really close to their chest. So don't take the unsuccessful fund as a bad creation, but rather poor crowdfund execution in a hostile economic environment.

Write on, write often!

[u/CalCarver]

Sorry to hear you didn’t hit your goal. Ezequiel’s art is amazing.

[u/Less-Excitement-692]

Really awesome artwork!

[u/krushgruuv]

Live and learn. You will get it next time. Don't give up, just up your game. Or shop it around? Take some of the feedback and rework some pages. Give it more action. Looks like you have a great concept and the artwork to match. Good luck.

[u/Nightmancer]

So sorry, man. This book looks beautiful! I'm definitely going to check it out

[u/JBuchan1988]

I'm sorry

[u/ankaracommunity]

Your art style is terrific. I like the cover page.

[u/xinillus]

This deserve more love, when I do my KS I pre-launched for two months and shout out as much as possible on social, it helped a lot.