Kickstarter on Tuesday announced a new set of creator tools designed to breathe new life into the crowdfunding platform. Perhaps the most interesting of the bunch is “Late Pledge,” which represents a fundamental change to the service’s status quo. The new feature allows campaign creators to continue collecting money even after the campaign has closed.
Kickstarter began pilot testing the feature in April, noting that one participating creator was able to raise an additional 35% over their initial goal two weeks after their campaign closed. Late Pledge will only be available for those creators who hit their initial goal.
The new feature is now available to all creators. Prior to its arrival, those using the platform had to rely on third-party services to continue raising funds. Late Pledge is another piece of Kickstarter’s goal of expanding into a one-stop shop, capitalizing on various peripheral aspects of crowdfunding that had previously found the site effectively leaving money on the table.
It’s part of an extended push that began when the company appointed Everette Taylor as its new CEO toward the end of 2022. The company notes, “The Kickstarter we’re building today is more than just a crowdfunding platform; we’re evolving into a comprehensive funding and launch platform that supports independent creators and innovators at every stage of their journey.”
These moves will spell trouble for some of the services that have emerged specifically to fill in holes in the crowdfunding process. This includes campaign marketing, which is now covered by the platform’s new Performance team. Like Late Pledge, the team has already been piloted with select accounts.
“We’ve been carefully developing and testing our in-house performance marketing service with a select group of Creators, and so far, our Performance team has helped creators raise nearly $1 million in pledges,” Kickstarter says. “As we support creators’ marketing needs before, during, and after their campaign, we’re reaching beyond the core crowdfunding model to help you drive pledges and bring your idea to life.”
The other change here is a more robust survey tool that can collect backers’ addresses, clothing size and color preference for reward fulfillment purposes. The ability to pay for shipping and tax via the Kickstarter mobile app is also on the way.
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