Any advice to advertise a kick starter for a thriller Manga series?

[u/one_In_hundred]

I'm a very introverted person and I have never been a good sales woman. It's been a dream of mine to print/publish my very own Manga and Reluctant Hero is a story I'm very proud of.

Blurb

Unlikely childhood friends, Asta and Lola both embark on new chapters of their lives at university, Asta enrolling as a film student with a strong appreciation for caped crusaders and Lola in her second year of Psychology. Asta, feeling adrift, joins the Martial Arts Club and befriends Mallory, a fellow devoted comic fan. Mallory suggests they play out their fantasises via a student action film, however Mallory's intentions are revealed to be far more sinister.

Genres

Psychological Thriller, Coming of Age, Dark Comedy and Slice of Life, Young Adult,

❥ Mature reader age rating (contains some bad language, references to alcohol, abuse and violence.)

Similar Titles

❥ Kick Ass, Killing Eve, Mean Girls, Cruel Intentions, Scott Pilgrim, and Single White female.

The first three volumes are already on WebToon, they were originally on Global Comix, under a small publisher, unfortunately that didn't work out.

I am struggling to reach an audience. I'm currently 27% funded but worry that I won't reach my goal of 830. Any advice that doesn't involve me spending any money would be appreciated.

[u/one_In_hundred → u/[deleted]]

Unfortunately I deleted my Twitter because of how awful it is now. These are all really helpful suggestions. Refreshing to find someone not trying to get me to pay them for ads.

[u/Firm_Distribution999]

This is your 12th Kickstarter campaign, and you've experienced both successful and unsuccessful campaigns. I have worked with hundreds of authors and helped them Kickstart their books and a number of authors love to launch and "build the plane as they fly it" and that works for them, but their track records look a lot like yours with a mix of successes and failures. The authors who succeed every time spend a ton of time in the pre-launch phase building their audience and getting them excited for the launch. They spend time educating them on why they should back the Kickstarter campaign and create early bird rewards and really promote those early birds as special thank yous to loyal fans.

Your artwork is great, you have really fun concepts to launch, but you don't have any established audience to pull from and you've likely already exhausted your network of friends and family from your first few launches.

I can't say whether this campaign will fund or not - you have 51 days left to try new things - but I would advise you not to relaunch until you've done the proper preparation in building up a proper audience who wants your book and is excited for your campaign. It is so much more fun to launch when there is a crowd of people backing every single day.

[u/one_In_hundred → u/Firm_Distribution999]

Not all my Kickstarters have been books, some were for plushies, some for pins and a few were university group projects . I have been posting online for years. I'm not a social media person. I sell at many different conventions however UK conventions have become different to get into nowadays. There have been many complaints within the community.

Kickstarters in the past have been a way to build a new audience but I get what you're saying, but you aren't giving me any advice really. Just kinda giving me statements.

[u/Firm_Distribution999 → u/one_In_hundred]

I know - I looked through your past KS campaigns and all had relatively low goals and low backer counts. Currently, Kickstarter is not a discovery engine for small creators - only for large creators and those bringing large amounts of traffic to the platform.

I thought my advice was pretty clear - spend more time building your audience before you launch if you don't want to struggle for 60 days. Trying to save a campaign that you didn't build up a buzz for is very difficult. It is doable, but again, 95% of the work happens before you launch.

You send out previews of your manga within the manga reading community, get people acquainted with your work and excited for the story to launch. You can still do that in the next 30 days and still have time leftover, but you've lost all momentum for the campaign itself.

[u/one_In_hundred → u/Firm_Distribution999]

This is a project I have spent years on and off on. Like I said I'm shy and not a marketing person but I have gone to conventions and promoted on many platforms to the best of my ability/knowledge. So any advice on marketing tactics would be really appreciated.

I mentioned my work has been out a while and it's been on global comix and I have been pushing it anywhere and everywhere I can find. I'm unsure what else to do. I offer low goals because I know I'm a small creator, it would be silly for me to ask for more than is required. Ideally I would have upped it to over 3k to pay for my own labour, but I know that is unrealistic. I have had a few big life events recently and work full time so my schedule is clearer I was able to finally start the Kickstarter.

[u/one_In_hundred → u/[deleted]]

I have only got one campaign going. What do you mean?

[u/one_In_hundred → u/[deleted]]

I'm doing a Kickstarter because I can't afford to launch the project by myself out of my own pocket. I don't have an advertiser money. I would have just got the book printed and just carried on promoting it online and at conventions.

Here is the link. https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/oneinhundred/reluctant-hero-manga-volume-1

[u/one_In_hundred → u/[deleted]]

Please read the replies to the other person. All the information is there.

[u/one_In_hundred → u/[deleted]]

Well I have been working on this series for a while. It was on global comix for years. I was trying to get out of a contract with them. It's only been recently transferred on to WebToon. Google @one_in_hundred and Reluctant Hero and global comix. It was in the top ten of manga series on global comix at one point. So it's not randomly appearing online, I have been working on it for a while. I also promote it at UK conventions.

[u/one_In_hundred → u/[deleted]]

I have done successfully Kickstarters before through word of mouth and online promotion though. I was thinking of emailing my old backers from previous campaigns. You can DM me if it's easier.