Sliding into Home for Austen Admirers!

As many of you may already know the talented and amazing Angie Kroll has developed and designed a SMARTPHONE APP for us AUSTEN ADMIRERS. (For more about her awesome app, watch this video).

....And this past month she has been running a Kickstarter campaign to get the app funded (so it can be FREE for anyone who wants to download it!)  WOOT WOOT!  Well three days ago (just 5 days before her deadline) Angie reached her campaign goal of $3300!  HUZZAH!  And she is stopping by Austenesque Reviews today to share the stats and numbers from her campaign.

I always love looking at breakdowns and numbers like this (it's the math nerd in me) and I'm so elated that Angie's campaign was a success!  (I don't know about you, but I really need this app!)

It was so incredible to see all the support the wonderful authors in the Austen community gave Angie and the kind encouragement and support she received from readers.  It just furthered my belief that the Austen community is filled with some pretty awesome people!  :-D

I hope you enjoy Angie's post today, dear readers!  And be on the look out for her amazing app, Austen Admirers, due to be available May 2013!

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I'm humbled.  Truly.  But we'll get more to that next week with another one of Angie-asks-her-online-friends-to-guest-post-on-their-blog hop.

Today is all about the stats for Austen Admirers Kickstarter Campaign!  Note:  the numbers are from 4 pm yesterday afternoon.  I don't expect them to change too much.

My DH says that Kickstarter campaigns only succeed if:

A)  There is a specific need in a community.

B)  One entity has an idea to fill that need.

C)  The community rallies to fulfill that need.

Janeites came, saw and conquered.  Would you like to know how?

Dollars pledged via Kickstarter come from those who happened to be searching through Kickstarter.com's website, found Austen Admirers and pledge directly.  Kickstarter also breaks down the referrers, much like Google Analytics does for a website.

What did I learn from the breakdown in referrals?  Every link is important.  Leave no stone unturned.  Every bit of outreach, whether from blog posts, tweets, Facebook, etc lead to pledge dollars.  Most of those dollars came from supporters like you sharing the message!

Let's go back and look a little more at Facebook.  After the Austen Admirers Facebook Page hit 50 'likes,' Facebook sent me a coupon for $50 in free advertising.  As of February 15, Austen Admirers was only 40% funded.  It didn't look promising.  Only 42% of projects launched on Kickstarter actually fund.  I decided to take a chance and create a Facebook ad.

Guess when I started the ad.  

The stat to note here is 0.668% CTR.  CTR means 'click through rate.'  You get this number by taking the number of people clicked who clicked on Austen Admirers Facebook ad, 305, and dividing it by the people who actually saw the ad show up on the side of their Facebook timeline, 45,673.

My DH used to work in marketing.  He says that a successful marketing campaign is when 2% of your target market is reached.  Combine this with incredible author support, and a target group of Janeites and you've created what it takes to fund the campaign.

The other breakdown of note that may interest you are the number of people who donated on what level.

Please note the two $5 levels.  This wasn't really supposed to happen.  It is why every author needs a good editor, and why after staring at the screen for 10 hours, my DH and I completely missed the fact that this was occurring.  Once the project went live and both levels were funded, I just let it go.  Technically, the $5 level was the second most popular donation level after $25 dollars.  No one chose the higher tier levels; I didn't expect them to.  These levels are pretty common on other campaigns, so I included them.

Speaking of $5 campaigns - don't forget the one last addition to the amazing offers by JAFF authors.  As a personal thank you to those who give at the $1 or $5 level only, I am adding the opportunity to win a 3 month membership to Audible.com.  You can use the certificate to download books by P.O. Dixon, Abigail Reynolds and more!  Why just the lower levels?  As you can see from the stats, this would not have happened without everyone's support.  I appreciate it more than you know!

I'll see you again on Tuesday at candy-m.blogspot.com with a complete list of winners and March 8th at bookshugback.com with one last epilogue post covering the events of the campaign.  Then, the work begins!

Thanks to Meredith for allowing me to take up her normally engaging posts with boring stats.  She's the Jane to my Lydia, except I'm wayyy older than her.  

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BTW - the campaign is still up for two more days!  So those of you interested in contributing and being a part of this awesome endeavor still can!  Check out all these awesome items you can receive for your contribution!