How Seth Godin Made 232K In 7 Days w/A Headline Test

[Dien Rice]

Originally Posted by Glenn

Got An Idea for Ya' Dien,

Kickstarter.com - is a website where individual investors GIVE YOU
Money for your idea, project or - in Seth Godin's Case - BOOK TITLE.

Yup.

No book yet.

Just the HEadline.

Hi Glenn,

Thanks for the "heads up" on Seth Godin's test on Kickstarter!

I "googled" it and found an article here...

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...246426550.html

Kickstarter www.kickstarter.com (and other websites - another big one is Indiegogo www.indiegogo.com ) seem to be great places to "dry test"...

"Dry testing" is selling something before you have created it. It used to commonly be done by direct marketers - that is, promote a product, take orders. If you get enough orders, make the product (and tell buyers there will be a delay, offering a refund if they are not willing to wait). If you don't get enough orders, give an excuse to buyers, and refund their money.

However, this was made much more difficult a few years ago with the 30-day rule - you had to be able to ship your product within 30 days.

Denny Hatch has a great article on dry-testing - and a way to do it which may be legal...

http://www.targetmarketingmag.com/ar...ect-marketing#

However, crowd-funding sites like Kickstarter and Indiegogo are another model for "dry-testing"...

Why is it legal their way?

It's because technically, you are not actually making sales. Instead, you are asking for donations (to fund your project), and in return, you are offering "rewards" to the donors, if you reach your funding goal...

If the project doesn't reach the goal which has been set, nobody pays anything (and the credit cards of "donors" are never charged).

People are only charged if the goal has been reached. That amount of money should be enough to fund the project, so the "rewards" can then be distributed to the "donors" or supporters of the project...

It's a fascinating model for dry-testing...

Best wishes,

Dien