Kickstarter Advice – Creator vs Backer
There are many types of Kickstarter users but as a creator I often wonder if the way I look at a Kickstarter page is the same as the way a backer looks at a Kickstarter page?
So today I’m going to answer this question by splitting the scores we looked at in our summary between creator and backer.
HOW I MEASURED IT
I had nearly 9 backers for every 1 creator so I had to normalise the data and decided to compare the difference between the two as a %, showing how much more or less important the item is for a creator to a backer.
Items with a positive percent are more important to a creator than backer and items with a negative percent are less important.
| ITEM | SCORE | |
| Social goals | +6.67% | |
| Third party review | +5.82% | |
| Recognising third party reviewers | +4.11% | |
| Artwork | +3.14% | |
| Project video | +3.73% | |
| Creator has a social following | +1.62% | |
| Access to digital prototypes | +1.48% | |
| Original game mechanics | -0.73% | |
| Early bird option | -1.99% | |
| A short overview of the game | -2.08% | |
| Photos of playtests | -3.3% | |
| Miniatures | -5.15% | |
| Exclusives | -5.24% | |
| What’s in the box | -5.78% | |
| Access to the rule book | -6.79% | |
| Stretch goals | -7.2% | |
| Kickstarter price is less than MSRP | -7.29% | |
| The game is on Board Game Geek | -9.09% | |
| Creator has run previous projects | -9.25% | |
| A detailed explanation of the game | -11.39% |
SOCIAL GOALS
Personally, I dislike social goals, I understand why creators do them but I have always felt they are more beneficial for the creator than the backer. Looking over these stats they are 6.67% more important to creators than backers, and having received the worst combined score in the summary I think it is safe to say you can leave them off your page.
THIRD PARTY REVIEWS
Wow am I surprised to see this one in second place! Third party reviews were already a lot further down on the overall summary list than I had expected and this surprises me further. Showing creators value third party reviews 5.82% more than backers do.
A DETAILED EXPLANATION OF THE GAME
This one surprised me for different reasons, as a creator it seems logical to me that putting a detailed description of your game on your Kickstarter page is an important thing to do. However, the stats show that creators generally think this is 11.39% less important than backers do. So this looks like a quick win for a bunch of creators out there!
CREATOR HAS RUN PREVIOUS PROJECTS
When looking at the summary I was pleased to see that the requirement to have run previous projects wasn’t that important, but it turns out that was wrong. It seems creators value this as much less important than backers do, with backers seeing this as an important thing.
It surprises me that creators have such a different view of this to backers, perhaps it’s just wishful thinking?
THE GAME IS ON BOARD GAME GEEK
Adding a game to Board Game Geek is a relatively simple task, it can take some time but it isn’t hard. The 9.09% difference between creators and backers here goes to show that some creators are still unaware of how important Board Game Geek is.
The biggest take away from this?
Add your game to BGG!