Hey Kickstarters and developers, 

I had actually forgot about this article. Since I started on preparing the new Burning Suns campaign I've probably unconsciously tried to block out the negative feelings or vibes from the first failed project. 
But this is no good - you need to stick to the lessons learned, if you're going to move on successfully!

I want to talk about the "cancel of Kickstarter pledges". There's a lot of good articles out there about how you should price your pledges etc., so I'll stick to the "cancelling" part of it. 

Hope you'll enjoy it :)

How many will cancel their pledge and why?
The percentage of backers cancelling their pledges is affected by many factors, after all, most of us have tried the same thing in a store where we in the last minute cancelled a purchase. 
I've read on other blogs that the usual percentage is about 3-7%

When I started to experience backers cancelling their pledges for my first Burning Suns campaign (see old campaign / see new campaign), I was of course puzzled - "Who in the world would want to cancel their pledge for my awesome game?" :D 


After some days it simply became too much of a headache for me - I had to know what people were thinking about my game and why they cancelled. 

So I started to contact each and every one of the backers that had cancelled their pledge again. 

This is the numbers I came up with. 

• Total amount of backers: 357 (272 / 76% stayed)
  
• Backers that cancelled their pledge: 85 / 24%
  
• I contacted 80 of those backers and got 39 answers (49%). 
  

The percentage of answers is pretty high when you think about it - which is definitely due to the fact that people feel a strong attachment to Kickstarter projects, compared to a regular product from a store, they want to help you succeed. 

The 39 persons wrote me many and long answers to my questions, which is why I've combined and simplified the answers into the following:

1. Can't afford to back at the moment > 13
   
2. Want the plastic minis in the base game > 7
   
3. The money is needed on other Kickstarter campaigns > 5
   
4. Already have similar games / won't get it played > 4
   
5. Need more info (game play, reviews etc.) > 4
   
6. Price is too high (compared to other games) > 2
   
7. Caught an Early bird offer (after closer look, not for them) > 2
   
8. The campaign didn't seem to succeed, so therefore a cancel > 1
   
9. My plans was not what they wanted for the game > 1

This is of course hardly something to base a complete statistic on, but it still gives you some clues. Let me try to go through the here, so that we can share some pointers on what to do and what not to do. 

(1): With 33% of the answers this is by far the most common explanation, but unfortunately also the only one of the explanations that you won't be able to affect or prevent in any way. 
- People told me about their lost jobs, new additions to the family and so on. This is life - and things changes all the time.

(2): A mistake by my part, placing my butt between two stools (read my blog post about that here).

(3): It's not fun to get the "your project is not as interesting as this other person's project", but this is the essence of the explanation, and with soooo many Kickstarter campaigns being launch every week, it's just part of the business like any other product out there - fighting for survival. 

(4) + (7): Although these answers are different, the occurred more often than this statistic can show. The "early bird offer" I had on my game was on fire. Which was good in the beginning, when people where arriving at the campaign and the 100 early bird offers where gone within 1½ day. 
BUT, here's the catch! People jumped on an early bird with the "just in case" attitude, which meant that people also cancelled their pledge again when they looked closer at the game and understood it wasn't for them - which thereby had a negative impact on the momentum of the whole campaign. 
In short: Don't use early bird offers (there are many other reasons I might go through in another post). 

(5) + (9): Something you can avoid to a certain extent. You can't please all, but you should do your best. 

(6): A problem I particularly face because my game company lies in Denmark. In general our game prices, salaries, shipping and production costs are higher and therefore the game will be a bit more expensive than many counterparts. But of course, this is closely related to (2), it's much easier taking more for a game when it comes with great minis. 

(8): An unfortunate snowball effect when people are speculating in the outcome of the campaign and base their pledge decision on that (You can find the Kicktraq stats here). As you can see, I had 3 days in a row with -$200 as the biggest setback. This is a significant psychological setback for all involved, and though I don't want to sound dramatic, I believe such days can cost you the campaign!

Ask for feedback!
If you want to understand your backers you have to get in touch with them, also the ones that for some reason left you. 

Just remember

• Get to the point. 
  
• Keep it simple.
  
• Say thank you! 
  

Here's the message I used, to get in touch with my "ex-backers".

Hi .......,

I hope it’s okay I’m writing to you - I’m the game designer of Burning Suns :) 
I’m of course watching my Kickstarter campaign like a hawk, and saw that you had cancelled your pledge for Burning Suns. 
As a new and small developer, I have to learn fast and be ready to react on situations, so I can stay ahead of the big companies.

I would love to ask you a few questions (it’s of course completely fine, if you don’t want to answer them): 
- What made you pledge in the first place? 
- Why did you cancel your pledge now? 
- What would make you go back to pledge anew?

Thank you so much for your time, I’m extremely happy with all the knowledge I can collect, in order to make my products, presentations and offers even better.

Kind regards Emil, SunTzuGames

Conversion - from cancel to pledge
What I haven't talked about yet - is the conversion from cancel to re-pledge. 

Out of the 80 ex-backers I contacted and 39 of which returned with an answer. 

• 2 of them re-pledged for a copy of my game. 
  
• 9 was considering to pledge again and was following the campaign. 
  
• 4 couldn't pledge now, but was eager to pick it up in stores afterwards. 
  

The two last answers could be "anything", but I believe that I still had their attention - and this is also important during your campaign. 

The really interesting part - is the 2 persons re-pledging! It's a conversion percent of 2,5% which might not seem like much. But every percent matters, plus those persons also have friends etc.! Both persons stated that they were thrilled to get a message from me, showing how much I cared about the project! This is what Kickstarter is all about :)

Until next time - happy gaming to you all! 
Best regards Emil

PS: Sign up for Kickstarter alerts here! 

Good day again board game creators, 

In today's article I want to address the importance of asking for and getting help from your backers. 
Though many people are starting to treat Kickstarter as an pre-order service, and many bigger companies on Kickstarter treat their backers as regular customers. I have to point out the importance of understanding how big a part of the project your backers really is. 

Backers are not simple customers waiting to get their package shipped (agreed, some are of course.. but the majority isn't). These people are getting on board your boat because they believe in your project and want to see it succeed. 
This also means that they are willing to help you where they can. 

Backers want to lend you a hand
While I had my Kickstarter campaign running, over 10 backers was writing me and offering to help with translating the rules into several different languages. In the end meaning that a successful Burning Suns game can potentially have a rulebook in over 6 languages (ranging from Polish and German to Spanish and Japanese). 

*pssst* I hope to see you guys for my relaunch of Burning Suns ;)

This is an immense help, especially because I won't be able to afford the translation into all those languages right of the bat. 
Though I don't believe people should work for free - there's no sense in that, I'm sure a backer would settle for less than a professional translator. And you can then hire a translator just for the proof reading.

Include your backers in your plans
One of the best ways to keep your project open and accessible for potential support is to let your backers in on your plans. 

• What do you plan to do while the campaign is on?
  
• How many languages do you plan to produce the rulebook in?
  
• Do you have plans for new pledge levels?
  
• What about further stretch goals?
  

In my experience, it's all about being honest and not keep secrets during your campaign. 
Also when it comes to your progress. If backers have a chance to see how much you're progressing every week, and maybe see where you're struggling, they will be more encouraged to offer you help. 

Don't be too proud or shy to ask for help
There's isn't anything won by being to proud to ask your community of backers for help. This is part of Kickstarter, just as you ask for support in your quest to produce a great game. Getting help from loyal backers is key to success and it'll make it easier to avoid loosing them along the road. 

Ask for their help

• Thumbing up pictures on Board Game Geek. 
  
• Giving you ideas how to create engaging contests. 
  
• Spell-checking your campaign. 
  
• Locate interesting communities or online stores. 
  
• In general spreading the word of course :)

Bottom line
Don't forget that your poll of backers is not just a mass of people who has pledge a sum of money - but a community consisting of many different people with many different talents, that might come in handy if you know who they are and what they can. 

A message for my backers out there > "You guys are awesome! Thank you for your support - we'll meet again, soon" :)

Happy gaming to you all out there...