So why not use Kickstarter? A few reasons:
- OWN. YOUR. NOOK. There’s power in owning your nook of the ‘net — your domain name, your design, your archives — and it’s easier than ever to do so, and run a crowdfunding campaign at the same time.
- The feel of the platform has changed dramatically over the last decade — from indie upstart with low-key projects, to a kind of machine used by big companies to pre-sell coolers with USB ports. There are still tons of inspiring self-made folk on Kickstarter, but it doesn’t quite have the “small village” vibe it once had.
- By building atop a platform like Shopify, you can save up to ~7% on platform fees when running a campaign.
- Kickstarter doesn’t allow for coupons
- Kickstarter doesn’t allow for multiple goals — stretch goals are kinda hacked onto campaigns.
- Design control is severely limited.
- A platform like Shopify has direct integration with all kinds of fulfillment options, dramatically simplifying shipping and customer service.
- Once the campaign is over, your project lives like a kind of museum piece on Kickstarter’s servers. Who knows if Kickstarter will be around in five years, or how their design will change.
The real change in the last decade, though, is that platforms like Shopify have become extremely capable. I am blown away. Shopify is one of the best pieces of "big" software I’ve used in recent years. It consolidates the entirety of a campaign and its extensive markup language (in-house designed Liquid templates, which are a joy to use, and local development tools like their “theme” software that auto-syncs with the server) allows for the base-functionality of a site like Kickstarter to be easily duplicated.
Would love your feedback / improvements. It's running live on a campaign now[1].
[0] https://github.com/cmod/craigstarter
[1] https://shop.specialprojects.jp/products/kissa-by-kissa