E2A 050: Take My Money! Crowdfunding Your Book with Lisa Ferland 

Publishing and distributing a book can be quite expensive, but that doesn’t necessarily mean you have to foot the bill yourself.

In this episode of The Entrepreneur to Author Podcast, your host Scott MacMillan speaks with creative crowdfunding expert Lisa Ferland about crowdfunding your book and how authors can think beyond their books to offer unique and engaging rewards that their readers will love.

EPISODE LINKS

Free Mini-Course on How to Crowdfund Your Book and additional videos: https://lisaferland.com/crowdfunding-lessons-101/

GUEST BIO

Lisa Ferland has a 91% success rate getting authors to their fully funded goals on Kickstarter, IndieGoGo, GoFundMe, and other crowdfunding platforms. She teaches authors how to think beyond their books to offer unique and engaging rewards that their readers will love.

CONNECT WITH LISA

Contact email: admin@lisaferland.com
Website: https://lisaferland.com

Facebook: facebook.com/lisaferlandconsulting

LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/lisaferland

Instagram: @crowdfundingforauthors

CONNECT WITH SCOTT

Episode Transcript

Please note: The transcript is produced by a third-party company from an audio recording and may include transcription errors.

Scott MacMillan:

You're listening to the Entrepreneur to Author podcast.

Announcer:

Welcome to the Entrepreneur to Author podcast, the podcast that brings you practical strategies for building authority and growing your business. And now, here's your host, Scott MacMillan.

Scott MacMillan: 

Lisa Ferland has a 91% success rate getting authors to their fully funded goals on Kickstarter, Indiegogo, GoFundMe, and other crowdfunding platforms. And she teaches authors how to think beyond their books to offer unique and engaging rewards that their readers will love.

Lisa, welcome to the Entrepreneur to Author podcast. Thanks so much for being here.

Lisa Ferland:

Thanks so much for having me.

Scott A. MacMillan:

To begin, could you share a little bit about your background and how you got into helping authors with crowdfunding their book?

Lisa Ferland:

Yeah. So it was back in 2016, I was looking to publish my second book, and I wanted to pay the authors who were contributing their stories. It was an anthology and I wanted to pay them for their craft, and I just simply didn't have the budget to do so. So I needed $10,000 and I said, okay, how can I generate funding for this? And Kickstarter was there. The only downside was that there were no real resources for authors at that time because most of the crowdfunding campaigns were for comic book authors or gaming. So there was no real specific, if you are just a memoirist or a personal essayist author looking to generate funds, what to do. So I was using strategies from all different types of other areas.

I successfully crowdfunded. It was a ton of work, but I did reach my goal. And after that I had a lot of people asking me how I did it, could I help them? And it turned into the typical entrepreneurial journey of, okay, there's this problem. I have these skills and all of this experience, and have just taken it from there. So I've been doing this since 2017 for other authors, which has been really a very interesting journey and not something I ever anticipated doing with my authorship career.

Scott A. MacMillan:

That's often the case. We all come to where we are by circuitous round.

Lisa Ferland:

Exactly.

Scott A. MacMillan:

I want to make sure that we cover the foundations in case there are people listening who aren't familiar entirely with crowdfunding. Can you share what is crowdfunding, and are there any meaningful variations of different types of crowdfunding that listeners should be aware of?

Lisa Ferland:

Sure, yeah. There are different types of crowdfunding. So Kickstarter and Indiegogo represent rewards-based crowdfunding. And that is where someone gives you a pledge of money and they get a reward in return. So your book, your book plus the ebook, audiobook, any type of reward that you can offer in exchange for a pledge. There's also GoFundMe, which is more ... it's donation-based crowdfunding. And that I wouldn't really recommend for authors. Some authors do take donations, especially if you have a book that's more geared towards a nonprofit. That area tends to do really well with donation-based crowdfunding.

And then there are other crowdfunding, like equity-based, that's another large one. That's more for starting up a small business or even a larger startup. So if you have a book plus games plus maybe a toy line or something else that you're going to need significant funding for, equity crowdfunding might be the better choice.

Scott A. MacMillan:

Okay, good. That's a really helpful foundation, I think. And so when it comes to books, I think a lot of people when they think about crowdfunding, they're thinking about products that are launching. And of course, a book is a type of product. But are there certain types of books that you feel are better suited to crowdfunding than others, or are there types that really aren't good candidates at all?

Lisa Ferland:

I don't think so. I think absolutely any book can be crowdfunded. I think it's the type of author who is better suited for crowdfunding or not. Because crowdfunding is marketing, it really is a more aggressive, high-intensity, time ... short, limited duration marketing blitz. So if you are not the type of author who wants to cram three months of marketing into 30 days, then it's really not for you. It is much more intense and there's pressure.

It's very public. So sometimes if you're nervous about failing or failing publicly, that may be a concern. If you're an anxious person, maybe it's not the right solution for you. There are other ways to market your book, and so I would recommend that. So I think any book can be crowdfunded, that's what's great about it. It's just more, is this suited to your personality as an author?

Scott A. MacMillan:

That's a really good distinction because I think a lot of people who write are probably a little bit more introverted. Not all of them, but there can be some hesitation to get out there and be promoting and marketing. But whether you're crowdfunding or not, that's a critical part of finding your audience. So I think that's an important point that you made.

Lisa Ferland:

Exactly.

Scott A. MacMillan:

So what then are some of the ways that an author can leverage crowdfunding to launch their book?

Lisa Ferland:

Well, like you said, it's a great way to really get your readers organized first. So crowdfunding is the last thing you do. So you want to build up your readership beforehand, get them super excited. I've seen some people do audience building for over a year before they launch their campaign. And by the time they launch, everyone is just really excited and they go for it. And so you want to organize your readers to take action during your campaign, as soon as it goes live. The way to do that ... I mean, there's millions of ways to do that. But a lot of people are doing it on social media and getting people excited and teasing out the rewards.

And then in terms of leveraging it, I mean, not only are you raising money, but you're getting a ton of market research at the same time. So a lot of my authors will test different marketing messages to see what works and what doesn't work, because you get real time feedback. When I said this message, I got a ton of engagement and comments and backers. When I did this strategy, I ended up with nothing. So you can get real boots on the ground feedback very quickly and hone in on your marketing message that works.

So it's a great, just feedback session, in a 30-day campaign. And you get a lot of really valuable feedback that you can take and go once your book is published. You know exactly, okay, my audience loves short videos, or they love reading blogs. Or they love a funny meme and they'll do anything ... and they engage with that. So you learn a lot about what your audience likes and doesn't like. So that's really valuable information to have moving forward.

Scott A. MacMillan:

Yeah, it really is. Really helps validate the concept of the book, I would imagine. Now, a lot of people, I think when they're thinking about the types of things that they can offer as part of a crowdfunding campaign, I think a lot of people maybe struggle to get creative and think, okay, it comes down to I'm going to offer a copy of my book,. Or I'm going to offer five copies of my book, or maybe 10 copies of my book.

What are some of the crowdfunding techniques that you've seen that work especially well for authors of non-fiction books? I think in the fiction area, there's a lot you can do with characters and settings and bonus content and things like that. But in non-fiction, I think people often struggle to think about, how can I be creative and how can I offer something of value that goes beyond the content of the book itself?

Lisa Ferland:

See, I think non-fiction is almost easier in a lot of ways. A lot of my non-fiction authors, they're also, maybe they have a service, a service-based business on the side, or they're in a network with other service-based people. So if you are not an expert, but you have someone who is an expert, you can offer a webinar, a workshop. Anything that's digital is really great to offer because you can ship it worldwide and make it widely accessible. So really putting together a panel of people on your book topic, on your book topic area. That's really interesting. One of my authors did this for her children's book. She gathered the world's nature experts to have a virtual summit and then sold digital tickets so people could access that information.

So there's a lot you can do. If you are a service provider yourself, you can offer coaching sessions, or any type of service that your readers want. The key is to deliver what your readers want. It may be something that you have or don't have, but really the key is delivering what your readers want. If your readers don't want it, they're not going to go for it in the crowdfunding campaign. Even if you think it's the best thing, if they're not interested, they're not going to go for it. So you need to do that market research beforehand and query them, do surveys. Find out what it is that really gets them excited, and then deliver that in your campaign.

Scott A. MacMillan:

Yeah, that makes a ton of sense. So everybody listening, readers first. We always have been reinforcing that, reader first when it comes to writing your book, when it comes to making decisions about your publishing path. And it sounds like the same thing applies for crowdfunding and how you structure your rewards and how you engage with your audience. So that's really great.

When is the right time to run a crowdfunded campaign? Should this be done before you write your book, after you've written the manuscript but you haven't published yet? What's your best thinking around the timeframe?

Lisa Ferland:

I've seen authors do it across the board, but I would say a lot of the more successful campaigns are the one where they have their manuscript mostly shareable. Where it's in shape enough to where you can share it or share a few excerpts or chapters to get those beta readers, to get a launch team of people who have read your book, understand it, and are 100% on board with your topic. Because with crowdfunding, it's not the same as buying your book on Amazon where it's just click-click. When someone's crowdfunding, they need to create an account and do a few more extra steps. There's just a little extra friction. So they really need to be 100% on board with your book or your concept or be passionate about the topic themselves to go through with it and convert to become a backer.

So you really have to get them on board. So if your manuscript isn't finished, but you have three or four chapters that are really well-polished, you can share that and get people on board. You have to have a book cover, absolutely. Or at least something that looks like it could be your book cover. It doesn't have to be the final one, just has to be attractive enough to get people to click over. Otherwise, your campaign is dead in the water. It is still a visual marketplace, and readers need to know, okay, I trust you with my money, and you do know how to create a book and get it out there. So they need to see something that looks more like a book. And book covers are key to that.

Scott A. MacMillan:

That makes a lot of sense. Because I think particularly with books, it's very easy for somebody to come up with a book idea and say, I would love to write a book on this topic. But to get people to part with their money and believe that you're actually going to write it and bring it to market, you've got to have more than just a short description, don't you? You can't just go out and say, this would be a great book idea. You have to provide some credibility that you're actually going to get it done.

Lisa Ferland:

Exactly. Exactly. And the more you have done, the more you're showing that credibility. And you can get people on board much easier if they fall in love with the characters and you've given them a chance to really understand what it is you're writing about.

Scott A. MacMillan:

Very good. In your experience, what's different between authors who succeed and those who fail in crowdfunding? And how can an author minimize the risk of failing?

Lisa Ferland:

Yeah, I see this a lot. I mean, I think the authors who rush through the audience building process. If you don't have a network, if you don't have ... we can get you to your goal in a lot of different ways. But if you simply don't have a group of people who are interested in reading your book, there's only so much we can do. We can't make people give us their money. So we have to entice people by really warming them up over a long period of time. I have seen people launch within two weeks, and I'm like, this isn't going to work. We need to do more audience building.

If you're starting from scratch, you have to give yourself plenty of time to warm up your audience, let them know this is coming. You don't want your crowdfunding campaign to surprise anyone, because again, it's not the same as buying a book on Amazon. They don't already have an account. They have to do some extra steps, and that little bit of friction can just derail the whole process. It's also time limited. So if you haven't done the work in the pre-launch and you launch with a page that's not visually appealing, with rewards that don't make sense, or they're too expensive, you're just not going to get people on board.

But the people who succeed are the ones who really do understand and put the time, effort, and energy into making it a professional campaign. The rewards are vetted. They've gotten tons of feedback from a lot of different people. So they've incorporated things. And again, they're delivering rewards that their readers want and are excited about. And then priced well. So there's lots of value in each reward, and then they just disappear. And you can zoom off to your goal, which is the main goal for all of my authors.

Scott A. MacMillan:

Yeah, that's the goal. So I can imagine there are a lot of people listening that would love some support in this kind of thing. How can people get in touch with you and learn more about the services that you provide and how they might work with you?

Lisa Ferland:

Yeah. My website, lisaferland.com, has a lot of resources and materials, as well as a description of my services. I have blogs where I interview authors on what worked and what didn't work. So there's lots of free resources, as well as authors are welcome to apply to work with me as well, 101.

Scott A. MacMillan:

Perfect. Well, we'll put that link in the show notes so that people can access it easily. Lisa, thank you so much for joining us today. This is such a fascinating topic, and it's one that I know is incredibly relevant for so many authors. So thank you for sharing your expertise with us.

Lisa Ferland:

Thank you. Thank you for having me.

Scott A. MacMillan:

As we wrap up this episode of Entrepreneur to Author, remember this, now is the time. Time to write, time to publish, and time to grow. I'm Scott MacMillan. Until next time.