Good Morning! How are ya’all doin’? I’m hoping every last one of you are rockin’
it and rollin’ through life today with no obstacles…nothing but clear skies and
roses everywhere.
Okay, now that the
formalities are out of the way, apologies are in order. I was supposed to have blogged two days ago,
but I’m on a wild roller coaster ride right now and drinking from a fire hose
as I learn how to put together a Kickstarter campaign for the Butterscotch Martini
Girls. So, my Friday blog turned into my Sunday blog. Forgive me, and
let’s just go with better late than never.
😊
Anyway…no, I am not really
kicking starters (or asses), but I am putting together a Kickstarter
campaign. (See what I did there?) Well, in all actuality, the BMGs are putting it
together, but Dani Petrone and I are doing the legwork.
The go-live is still a
little way off, but you should be seeing a pre-launch page showing up in
Kickstarter sometime in late June or early July. I promise to keep you posted
as I try to bring ya’all along for the ride.
But there are a lot of
moving parts to a Kickstarter campaign. Which means if we are to put together
the most kick-ass campaign we can, there is a lot of up-front work to do.
A
LOT!
Over the last few weeks, we’ve
been learning the platform…well, 3 platforms, actually. It turns out that while
you can do Kickstarter all by itself, there are other products/services that
can be paired with it to simplify the process, increase revenue, or reduce
cost. This turns out to be a good news-bad news scenario where there is assistance
available, but it comes with a LOT to learn.
Given the steepness of
the learning curve, I managed to convince Dani Petrone that she was just dying
to help. (She may never forgive me for the lies I told her.) LOL
Anyway, Dani and I have
been researching process, graphics, costs, merchandise, vendors, promo, shipping
methods, shipping rates, and a million other little things that tie into a
Kickstarter campaign…not to mention that we are trying to wrangle nine authors
so we can come up with a single, comprehensive and fun solution.
(Sorta like herding
lizards. Those little suckers are fast, and they can get away from
you in the
blink of an eye…much like lizards.)
Over the past month, we
put together some surveys to see what this group of authors would like to do…what
they love, what they hate, what they don’t give a flying rat’s ass about. Good
thing we did because there were some surprises in there that gave us a few
things to sidestep and others to do a workaround for. But we have now nailed
down our theme and our tagline…which I cannot yet reveal. But it is freaking
awesome! So much so that it makes me almost giddy every time I think about
it.
The core of the campaign
will be a special edition box set of five pre-published cowboy stories in the
sensual to sizzling heat range. While most of these stories can be purchased separately
online, we will be doing some special formatting and some really cool stuff that
is exclusive to this Kickstarter campaign.
We will NOT be making
this box set available at online retailers. Those of you who have been fans of the BMG
box sets in the past should plan to back a tier in this campaign if you want
this special edition set with some of the fun extras we’ve never
offered anywhere before. Wait and you will miss it.
As I said earlier, we are
digging deep into merchandise and goodies we think our readers will love, which
means lots of late nights on the internet looking at things I’d give my eye
teeth for and things I wouldn’t bury with my worst enemy. OMG, some of the
stuff that is available is mind-boggling.
Here are some of my top
contenders for the WTF award…
That first one I don't even know what it is. The bendy pens are cute, but no one can concentrate with those weird-ass dudes waving and bobbing all over the place...no. And those teeth...sometimes you just have
to ask yourself…WHY?
Well, I promise you we
will NOT be including crap like this. We
are gonna offer really cool stuff. So,
you gotta stay close and watch for us to post the link to our campaign
pre-launch page sometime in late June or early July.
In the meantime, go set
yourself up a Kickstarter account…free to all…and look around out there at book
projects, which will be listed under publishing / fiction. It might take a little bit to figure out how
the site works, but I promise you it will be worth it. There are some really
cool projects being worked out there and I heartily encourage you to find one
you love and back it. I’ve backed about a dozen in the last month and it's so
much fun when you run across one you can really get behind and you back a tier,
then watch the process and cheer them across the finish line.
As a backer, you end up
owning a little bit of their success. It’s
fun.
Remember, we indie authors
work very hard and are often paid pennies on the dollar for very good books
simply because our marketing skills have not yet caught up with our writing
skills. This means that good books often go unnoticed or unwritten because the
funding simply never comes.
Kickstarter is a
relatively new approach to marketing books. It allows us to involve our readers
in the process by sharing with them and by offering special bonuses and spiffs
along the way in exchange for their help in bringing these special projects to
life. This is your chance to spend your reading dollars in a way that
directly supports creators, a way that enables creators to bring new and
deserving stories to life.
Set Up An Account Today
I thank you for getting
on the Lassiter Express (😊) and taking this little
ride with me. Stay tuned for more information on this project. Just as a little
glimpse inside the workshop…I’m looking today at the possibility of sourcing
leather bookmarks with the BMG logo on it.
How fun would that be if
I can make it work?!
Well, that’s my story, ass-kicking
and ass-tounding, and I’m stickin’ to it. Hang on tight now ‘cuz we’re gonna go
real, real fast!
Love ya,
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