Making a game is the ultimate way to make money from your passions.
That’s what I believe after this game creator’s $555,283 Kickstarter launch.
Here’s his story.
Meet Ross Bruggink – creator of Vicious Gardens.
Ross loved design, gardening and games – three things that usually don’t occupy the same sentence. But he found himself dreaming of a way to merge them together.
So in 2021, he decided to start designing his own game. It’d be on the side though, since his full-time gig was being a designer with his design studio, Buddy-Buddy.
In his spare time, Ross poured his heart and soul into developing his game – spending countless hours refining the game mechanics, creating stunning illustrations, and playtesting with friends… or as he puts it, “[forcing] my friends to play several very, very bad versions of the game.”
And after three years, Vicious Gardens was complete – a tabletop game that combines the joy of gardening with the thrill of being a total jerk.
On May 7, 2024, with the help of my team at LaunchBoom, Ross launched Vicious Gardens on Kickstarter.
The campaign took off like wildfire. He raised $67,473 in just one day. And by the end of the campaign, Vicious Gardens had made $555,283 from 9,466 backers.
This wouldn’t have been possible without a well-executed pre-launch marketing strategy.
Let’s dive into what that was.
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Vicious Gardens’s pre-launch marketing strategy
Ross made $67,473 in one day. This was only possible because he understood the importance of pre-launch marketing. And not just any pre-launch marketing, but building an email list of Superfans before he launched. Here’s how it worked.
1. Vicious Gardens drove traffic with Meta Ads
Meta ads are the first step to build a pre-launch email list. This is how Ross drove traffic. They tested many different variations of copy and imagery, but here was his best performing ad.
2. Vicious Gardens collected email addresses on a landing page
The landing page is where they explained their product and collected email addresses. The landing page looked like this:
By the way, this is a screenshot from our LaunchKit software that all LaunchBoom Creators get access to.
3. Vicious Gardens Landing Page collected $1 reservations
This is an optional step that creators can take if they want to understand who on their email list is most likely to buy. It requires creating a “VIP Offer” where you give something valuable to the backer in exchange for a deposit in the pre-launch.
Here was Ross’s VIP offer:
- Metallic Winner’s Token Upgrade
- A guaranteed 20% discount
The most important thing to know is that people who put down the reservation were way more likely to buy.
Vicious Gardens got funded on day one
Leading into the launch, Marcus had 1,302 people to put down a deposit in the pre-launch. We’ve found that “number of reservations” is one of the best predictors of how successful a launch will be. And just as predicted, the campaign took off.
On the first day, he made $67,473.
By the end of the campaign, he had driven $555,283 in revenue from 9,466 new customers.
This was possible because he followed the LaunchBoom system, which is laser focused on getting creators the highest return on their investment.
Because at LaunchBoom, our goal is not to launch a successful product, but to launch a successful business.
And Ross was pretty happy with the results.
Want Even More Details?
Check out this Masters of Crowdfunding podcast we recorded with Ross.
Do you have a game idea like Ross?
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