Hi board game developers and enthusiasts :)

I hope you're all doing great today... I was going to do a different post for you today, but unfortunately I caught a cold yesterday which made me think of my Kickstarter campaign where I also caught a cold during the fund raising period. 

I therefore figured out, that I should talk about the "force majeure" aspects of a Kickstarter campaign. The idea behind the force majeure paragraph in a contract is to make sure none of the parties involved will be responsible for losses connected with events out of their control, like hurricanes, volcanoes, war and similar. In this article I'll cover the minor factors that probably will affect your Kickstarter campaign, but still is somewhat out of your control. 

Making room for unforeseen events
It's of course impossible to foresee the future, but planning on a few events will certainly help you when you want to start your own campaign. Some of the following things I experienced during my Kickstarter campaign

• Increased working hours on your daily job.
  
• Illness, yourself, in your team or in your family.
• Technical difficulties (fx with your machine or internet connection).
• Job loss or similar. 
• Though these are not unforeseen - don't forget to include the following in your plans - moving to a new place of living, family trips and holidays.

There's a wide variety of events you can't control to the fullest extent - and of course these will have an impact on your campaign proportional to the experience, size and flexibility of your team/company. 

Some of the things I did to reduce the impact of these events was: 

• Had enough people on the team to ensure progress in production even when 1 or 2 people were sick or busy with other things. 
  
• Added 10% more days to the campaign than I expected to need. 
  
• I made frequently backup of my work on the campaign (the game itself is of course backed up as often as possible). 
• I was completely honest during the campaign about what was going on - and I always informed people and backers before the events occurred, if I had the chance. 

But as I learned through my campaign, this was far from enough if I wanted to keep my head above water during the entire campaign. 

What I hadn't taken into account was the impact of things like:

• What would happen if I got sick, and couldn't really update the Kickstarter campaign? 
  
• What would I do when I was completely cut off from the internet - lurking around in the underground of our armies' training areas somewhere in Denmark? 
  
• What would I do when I was locked down with over 18 hours of work 4 days in a row? 

For my next campaign I'll have addressed these potential challenges beforehand - and I hope you'll do the same :)
  

Final pointers
I few things I'll be planning on for my next Kickstarter campaign and that you might want to listen in on. 

• I'm expecting to add 20% more days to my Kickstarter campaign than needed. 
  
• I'll be launching it while I have a downtime concerning workload on my job. 
  
• Furthermore it'll be planned with my better half at home, meaning that she knows when I'll be busy and when I'll be very busy ;)
• I'll keep 1-2 people close to the project that can help me update and keep people informed if I should get sick or otherwise having trouble reaching out to my backers. 
  
• The Kickstarter campaign has to be complete when launched, meaning that if I'll have trouble adding new content during the campaign, it won't hinter the whole process (this will of course have to correspond to the need of refreshing the campaign once in a while with some extra content).

I hope these inputs have thrown down some new items on your "to-do-list" before launching your own Kickstarter campaign. My list has certainly expanded since my last campaign :D 

Have a great day - and happy gaming guys! 
Best regards Emil

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...