Having passed the 100,000 project mark this week, crowdsourcing site Kickstarter today announced a new feature to help out the next hundred thousand: project preview. Creators can now share their project before launching it with select individuals, such as their friends or colleagues, to get some early feedback and make changes before the big day.
Kickstarter says the addition comes as a result of recurring suggestions from creators, as well as “from our own experience.” Friends can tell you if you’re ready to launch, if your rewards are intriguing, and help you avoid a disaster (or maximize a success).
Here’s what a previewed project looks like:
With a preview link, your friends can see exactly how the project will appear when it goes live: they can watch your video, check out your rewards, and read your description. To generate a preview link for your project, just hit the blue “Get Preview Link” button.
After doing so, a new section for feedback will appear (anyone who has access to the preview link will be able to see this section, but it will disappear upon project launch):
Kickstarter suggests feedback can consist of anything from helping you brainstorm new rewards, to advising you to add more media content, or even fixing typos. Notes left by friends will result in an email and push notification on your phone.
In short, Kickstarter seems to have added a very useful feature for creators. While it’s too early to say how it will impact project success, we would assume it will improve the number of funded projects. Whether that’s a good thing or not depends on what side of the crowdsourcing line you stand.
See also – Kickstarter introduces Video Mode, lets you discover projects in full-screen view of all live project videos and Kickstarter founders say Zach Braff film, Veronica Mars have brought $400k to other projects
Top Image Credit: Gary Scott
