The Power of Using Kickstarter to Fund Children's Books

Why We Use Kickstarter for Preorders

Jamie here again! I am the author of these glorious books!

I know that running a kickstarter can raise some questions. So let me explain!

My small team, and I, go through the process of writing and editing a children’s book. I come up with the idea and a rough draft, which is sent to our editor who we love, she works on it as we all wrangle our kids, and then she and I work together to get it to a certain word count and have it all make sense (all in rhyme too! Which is pretty awesome…). Then when it’s edited I find three therapists to read the thing and approve its contents. I get their feedback and work with the editor again, if I need to!

Stay with me. The book is then sent to a small group of beta readers! I send it to about twenty and they feed me with additional feedback. This is a group of men and women I’ve collected to give me a broad review of likability and usefulness of the book. If I need to, I take it back to the editor to tweak as needed.

Now it’s ready for illustrations! And here’s the kicker: illustrations for a full-color 32 page book are expensive. We’re talking several thousand - and he’s WORTH it… but I’m an average person who doesn't usually have several thousand laying around. Luckily my husband and I can pay a decent down payment of a thousand or two! And that gets our illustrator started, but then what to do with our time while he is working?

You guessed it! We need to go find the funds.

Morally, if possible!

And it is! Because there are so many parents like us pining for these kinds of books! We want to be having meaningful conversations with our kids. We want to help them process every feeling! And we want to protect them from being hurt like we were.

So why not ask the parents to buy their copy early?

They’re so happy to and they love watching our process.

It also has the fringe benefit of seeing if, when the rubber hits the road, people actually want this book! You know how you sometimes get in your comfy family/friends circle and they adore everything you write and then you go out in the real world and they’re unimpressed? That’s why we run the kickstarter.

Because on kickstarter you’ve got to believe in the project and work together to make it happen! Those are our kind of people. They are the parents that are like us. We want to do business with THEM and kickstarter brings us together.

So you could say, at bottom, that we do the kickstarter because we’re broke and curious if people like us! We know that kind of vulnerability is powerful and we are happy to wear our hearts on our sleeves.