Kickstarter has done a great job of setting itself apart as a platform that provides a way to get crowdfunding for creative projects. Lockitron founders Paul Gerhardt and Cameron Robertson were very excited about using Kickstarter to get funding for their own hardware oriented start-up. The two entrepreneurs applied to Kickstarter to raise capital for their new technology for that lets people use their smartphones to lock and unlock their doors. Kickstarter initially rejected the project the very next day the duo applied for funding; however the team did not lose hope and launched their project on their own, following the footsteps of App.net.
The two co-founders hit the jackpot instantly, as their original $150,000 pre-order goal was achieved within a few hours of their launch. The momentum carried forward to give Lockitron an impressive $1,500,000 in just five days after launching. When people achieve this sort of success they often criticize all those who rejected them, but this has not been the case as Lockitron’s founders adapted the crowdfunding model of Kickstarter and tweaked it. The move went a long way in helping Gerhardt and Robertson make their product successful.
Talking about how Lockitron overcame their probelms, Robertson told the people at TechCrunch that, “Our solution was to create a customer-focused system. We decided to collect payment information using Amazon Payments, batch Lockitron shipments for customer transparency regarding delivery dates and only charge customers when their unit is ready to ship. This drives us to make the best product possible rather than overpromise what we can deliver on.” He went onto adding that, “This approach also lets us know how many units to make and qualifies our backer as willing to put money down for the product when delivery time comes due, all while removing risk for them.”
Robertson also spoke about another interesting topic, mentioning “Since we only earn our keep once a customer’s Lockitron is ready, we are incentivized to use faster, low-volume/custom-quality production methods that may cost more initially, but will ultimately help us to compress our timelines.”
Today by following the same approach advance order bookings of Lockitron have crossed the original $150,000 goal by one thousand percent. This has made the co-founders of Lockitron extremely grateful to Kickstarter, who have helped make crowdfunding a mainstream solution. However, Robertson also admitted that, “Our crowdfunding method isn’t perfect. It requires that you have some resources to be able to kick off production of your product and I believe that there is room for a new model of crowdfunding.”
Source: TechCrunch
Photo: AppAdvice
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