Is a kickstarter campaign good or bad for your brand?

Yesterday I was in my class for the Goldman Sachs 10,000 Small Businesses program and one of the women from our group announced her good news. She had launched her kickstarter campaign, just the day before, and had already raised over $10,000!

When she said it we gasped.

Unbelievable success, and so I thought, great! What an amazing tool to help her achieve her mission, which is to revive a hat making factory that she recently bought. This got me to thinking, is crowdfunding good for branding? It’s definitely proving good for my friend Satya.

I’ve seen crowdfunding campaigns go well, and I’ve seen them fail, so I figured to answer this question I should investigate a bit deeper. Looking on wiki it notes that as of 2012 there were over 450 crowdfunding platforms. When most people think of crowdfunding they call it a “Kickstarter” campaign, but Kickstarter is just one platform. There are others (and I love how term Kickstarter campaign is now a verb, like google).

I called my friend Patty Lennon from Mom Gets a Life and Crowdfund With Ease to have her take on Satya’s campaign and weigh in on why she thinks it’s so successful. Patty was able to raise thousands to host a conference she held here in New York City earlier this year, and because she had such great success she is becoming the go-to person for crowdfunding advice and insight.

Here’s what she had to say as we discussed Satya’s page:

1. She holding the viewers attention by having a clear and short (less than 2 mins) video.
2. She has a strong call to action and has tied her brand to it
3. The perks are easily tied to the brand, to exactly what she’s doing.
4. She’s providing an intimate and exclusive setting to give an amazing brand experience for people who can invest more
5. Her core perk (at $97) is a high value perk that gives people who have a true interest in saving the hat factory an affordable way to invest.

Clearly, crowdfunding can be good for branding. In this case, Kickstarter is great for branding. People who had never heard of Satya will find her and get great value for their money, while also getting a tangible return on their investment.

If you’re wanting to launch your own crowdfunding campaign to success check out Patty’s site Crowdfund with Ease for free and low cost resources.

What about you? Have you tried crowdsourcing? Ever did a kickstarter campaign? How did it go? Share in the comments below. I wanna know!