Crowdfunding for Filmmaking Masterclass

I'll go through the basic elements to all crowdfunding projects, to give you the foundation of knowledge with which to build your entire campaign.

Kickstarter is the big crowdfunding platform. Kickstarter was launched in 2009, is based in New York and 10 million people have backed on of their projects so far. They run an all or nothing funding model. What are the ethics of Kickstarter? What types of project are allowed on Kickstarter and what are the criteria? We’ll also look at the conditions for becoming a Kickstarter. What are the fees and financial considerations?

Indiegogo was the first crowdfunding major site and was founded a year before Kickstarter. They’re based in San Francisco and they say, they have about 15 million visitors every month. Indiegogo’s criteria for a campaign are a little bit looser than Kickstarter and we’ll see what they are. We also look at their two funding models, namely fixed funding and flexible funding. We’ll also learn how Indiegogo’s fees work and compare them to Kickstarter.

An introduction to other crowdfunding platforms. For each platform, I'll show you their overall performance, some of the major features that are unique to that particular site are highlighted and mainstream aspects like fees are explained in comparison with typical standards. These platforms include, Seed&Spark, Ulule, Tubestart, Pozible, FundRazr, FundAnything, RocketHub, Slated, Seedr, Crowdcube.

Before starting a crowdfunding campaign, you are going to need a strategy. You should consider whether crowdfunding is right for you or not. In this lesson, I've put what you’ve learned in the previous ones to work and come up with a right strategy. You’ll learn the 5 “Ps” that need to be done in the pre-launch phase: The pitch, the people, the plan, the process and how to promote. I’ll also look at what an ideal campaign is, the reasons why people spend on crowdfunding.

One of the important things that has to be decided in the pre-launch phase is the ideal length of you campaign. In this lesson I’ll go through the different options available to you on several major platforms. You’ll also learn how long typical campaigns are and how long people normally expect them to be.

One the most important things when planning you campaign is the budget. In fact, there are two budgets to create: One for the eventual film and one for the crowdfunding campaign. In this lesson you’ll get to know the different aspect that need to be covered for a successful budget plan. The costs are grouped into 4 categories: Set-up, Marketing, Process fees, Rewards. Then we’ll come up with an example of how the math works in Kickstarter and try some scenarios.

In this lesson, you’ll learn who your audience is going to be and how to define them. According to my recent research into recent Kickstarter film projects, we don’t necessarily need many backers to reach our goal. We’ll also learn ways to research our audience, how to reach them, how to convert them into a community and how to empower them to promote us.

Planning ahead and having a timetable at the start of a campaign is critical. It takes a lot of time and energy to put together a campaign. Therefore, it’s really essential to foresee the upcoming events, instead of just reacting to them. In this lesson, I'll walk you through a break up of a typical 30 day campaign. We’ll also learn what we should take into account when planning the most important dates of your campaign: The launch and the deadline dates.

It’s very hard to run an effective crowdfunding campaign on your own. Every area of your campaign needs to be loved by someone. In this lesson, you’ll learn what you have to take into account, when it comes to deciding what tasks need to be farmed out. You’ll also learn the types of people that we need in every crowdfunding campaign. They are divided into three categories: Your experts, your helpers and your champions.

The main concept behind your whole crowdfunding campaign is the pitch. Everything you do, from text, images, conversations and marketing, should echo this central idea. You'll have to shape your messaging around our main story. In this lesson, you’ll learn in detail what we have to include in your pitch and how to do it. You’ll also learn how they could benefit or damage your campaign.

Crowdfunding campaigns for films need to be visually interesting. Both because you attract people’s attention, but also because you need to convince them, you are able to make a beautiful final film. In this lesson, I’ll go through some of the type of imagery you probably are going to create for your campaign and we’ll take a look at real examples from crowdfunding campaigns. You’ll learn all about the hero image, the logo, the poster, production stills, illustrations for the pitch, the mood board, pictures of the team and more.

As a filmmaker who has decided to raise money for a film project, you surely can imagine how critical the video at the top of your crowdfunding page is. In this lesson, you’ll learn the importance of the main campaign video and go into details about what to consider when making one, how to approach it, and how to deliver the main video message best, the sound, the length and more.

Most sites require you to offer something in return for contributions. In this lesson you’ll learn how to build our rewards. How to come up with exciting surprises that delight your audience? How many rewards should you offer? In this lesson you’ll learn the connection between the reasons why people give to crowdfunding and the rewards. We also look at the rewards levels form the financial point of view, how to budget them and the shipping cost calculation. Finally, we’ll to through some ideas for rewards.

If you want to raise a lot of money you are going to need some third party services. In this lesson, you’ll learn the benefits of these services, like solving the problem of having a small team or filling any skill gaps. Even if you don’t plan to use some of these services, it’s worth to look at the options that are open to you and use them as a last resort in your campaign, if you need. In this lesson we’ll take a look at some of these services, including fiverr, People Per Hour, Backer Kit, Amplifier, Green Inbox and CrowdFund Buzz

Marketing really is key to the success of your crowdfunding campaign. Because of the huge quantity of Kickstarter campaigns, you can’t just rely on your friends and family in your marketing strategy. According to Kickstarter, only 5% of traffic to campaigns are people browsing the site and Indiegogo says 30% of money raised, comes from the creators own networks. In this lesson, you’ll learn the importance of building a marketing schedule and how to do it. We’ll look at marketing opportunities, like Email, Social Media, Outreach and Paid Advertising. I’ll go through the first two in this lesson and in the following lessons, I’ll cover the other two topics.

One of the marketing methods is called outreach. This is where you spend time and energy to try and reach influential people who have an audience. You don’t pay this people but it may cost you money and time to reach them. In this lesson, you’ll learn who to reach out to and how and when to do it. I’ll also go through how to reach out to news sites and how to use online and offline live events for your promotion purposes.

Paid marketing is another option that you may consider and this lesson is designed to be an introduction to the idea. I’ll go through the importance of paid marketing, especially for larger campaigns, and take a look at different platforms, including Facebook adverts, YouTube pre-roll adverts, Google AdWords, Reddit ads and their options. I’ll also go over some thought through tips for paid marketing.

OK, so your campaign is now live. The first few days are going to be critical and here you need to gain momentum. In this lesson, I’ll go through the different phases of a launched campaign, structured into different categories, including the first week, during the campaign, updates, dealing with success, tracking your success, stretch goals and towards the end.

Now, after planning your strategy and putting together your elements, you are days away from launching. In this lesson, you’ll learn how to line everything up and get some last minute tips before we start. I’ll also go through the process of launching our campaign on Kickstarter and how to get approval for your project. And then we’ll review your final checklist before the launch. So take a deep breath, and get ready to launch.

Now that your campaign has finished, hopefully you’ve reached your goal. But even if you haven't, the madness is over. In this lesson, I’ll go through all the things that you need to do after your campaign ends. I’ll go over some of the things that are crucial, but are often forgotten or ignored. Whether it was a successful campaign, or an unfortunate failure, there are things that you have to take care of. You will also learn the importance of long-term relationships and communities and how to keep our audience engaged.

Filmmaker and bestselling author of The Guerilla Filmmakers Handbook, Chris Jones, talks about crowdfunding his film "Gone Fishin'" and it's journey to the Oscars.

Note: Udemy doesn't allow videos longer than 20 minutes so this is part one of two. The second part is the next lesson

Filmmaker and bestselling author of The Guerilla Filmmakers Handbook, Chris Jones, talks about crowdfunding his film "Gone Fishin'" and it's journey to the Oscars.

Note: Udemy doesn't allow videos longer than 20 minutes so this is part two of two. The first part is the previous lesson

Interview with Mark Kines, who has the honour of being the first filmmaker to use online crowdfunding to raise the money he needed to complete his feature film.

Note: Udemy doesn't allow videos longer than 20 minutes so this is part one of two. The second part is the next lesson

Interview with Mark Kines, who has the honour of being the first filmmaker to use online crowdfunding to raise the money he needed to complete his feature film.

Note: Udemy doesn't allow videos longer than 20 minutes so this is part two of two. The first part is the previous lesson