KickstarterOne of the more interesting websites on the Internet has to be Kickstarter. This website is designed to allow you to build up a business idea by giving people a piece of the action (after a fashion – I’ll explain more in a moment). The idea is kind of like crowd sourcing for your venture capital, though your “investors” typically won’t get part ownership of your company.

Why This Could Work for Web Entrepreneurs

Let’s start by discussing you as a web entrepreneur. You have an idea for a business that you want to put on the web and you think it’s a really good one. Well, you need several things to make it successful. First and foremost, you need a great website which will attract people and get them excited about whatever product you want to sell them.
Second, you need a good SEO campaign which will allow you to get your website out there. Third and possibly most difficult, you may need some cash to make your project happen. Whether it’s for creating a software program you have an idea for or it’s for selling a physical product, testing and development does take time; and money. That’s where Kickstarter comes in.

What Kickstarter Does

In essence, Kickstarter is a place to share your idea for a new product or invention and get funding for it. Depending on the particulars of your situation, you may offer a freebie in exchange for helping out with funding (for example, if you were building a new kind of software program for viewing online TV, you may offer “investors” on Kickstarter a free copy when it’s done). You can also have tiered offering, including offering part ownership for those who have deep pockets to fund your business with large chunks of money.

How It Works

Basically, in order to get money on Kickstarter, you have to have an idea for a product which will attract people. Simply wanting to make a website is not enough. There must be an actual product being offered at the end of the road. You would then create a pitch for your product which describes what the product is and what you would offer to people. Browse through other Kickstarter projects to get some ideas for what you can provide.

Getting Funded

The fact is that getting funded at Kickstarter can be a challenge. That’s because they do not allow partial funding of any projects. If you want to get your project funded, then you must get all of your funding. That means that theoretically if you asked for $40,000 in funding and you only reach $39,897, you would not be able to get that $39,897.
After the funding period is over (you must specify how long you want to allow for funding to happen) you either get the money sent to you (if you reached your goal) or the money is returned to the “investors.” Note as well that there is a fee that Kickstarter takes off the top as well as a fee that Amazon takes for processing the payments.

Bottom Line

Kickstarter can be quite useful to internet entrepreneurs, however you need to have a clear plan for your business, a clear product you’ll be providing and clear ideas about how much you need to fund your project.