Summary: <br><br> <a href="http://feeds.feedblitz.com/-/60127656/0/ibmaudioblogs.mp3">http://feeds.feedblitz.com/-/60127656/0/ibmaudioblogs.mp3</a><br> Natalie Sisson's tale about launching her writing career via Kickstarter was inspiring, but it might leave you wondering how to succeed with Kickstarter if you don't have a following yet. You might conclude that if you don't have a following, Kickstarter is probably not for you.<br> Well, I'm here to tell you otherwise. I launched two successful Kickstarter campaigns and nobody was following me when I started my first one.<br> If you're like me, you have probably watched enviously as one Kickstarter campaign after another kicked off and ultimately found funding.<br> "Damn, that was my idea" you might have thought to yourself. Or worse, "I could have done that!" Sound familiar to you? Ultimately, it was the latter sentiment that got me off my butt. It was the Kickstarter project Practical Python: Learn programming for the real world! by Fletcher Heislerthat finally motivated me to get off the sidelines and do something.<br> Take a moment and check out his pitch. I watched in stunned amazement as he raised over $21,000 on the promise to produce a PDF file that he would email out to his backers, once he wrote it. Are you kidding me? $21K for a PDF file not yet written? He had set an $800 goal.<br> "I could do that", I thought to myself. But I hadn't.<br> So why hadn't I? Ultimately I decided that there was nothing holding me back, except for the fact that I had never tried. I decided to try. I'm writing this guest post to encourage you to try too. If I can do it, you can too.<br> I called my pitch "The Joy of PHP" and told the world that I would write a book about programming PHP that was not just fun to read, but it would actually be a joy to read. Why not aim high? Then I waited to see what would happen. <a href="https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/287976447/the-joy-of-php-programming-e-book-and-course?ref=live" target="_blank">Check it out</a> on Kickstarter if you want to see how it turned out.<br> Common Fears<br> Let's address fear first. We all have fears and the idea of posting a video of yourself pitching your idea for the world to see is sure to bring out a closet full of fears. Let's work through some of them so you can get over it.<br> The most common fear you are likely experience is to worry too much about what might happen if your Kickstarter campaign fails. I'm here to tell you, so what? If your Kickstarter campaign fails, it is not the end of the world. Nobody will think you are some kind of loser just because your Kickstarter campaign wasn't financed. The easy way to think about this is to imagine it is someone else's campaign instead of yours.<br> If a casual acquaintance of yours made a pitch on Kickstarter and it failed, which of the following are you more likely to think about him or her:<br> <br> * That person is a total loser who never should have tried something so bold or,<br> * That person has a lot of courage to attempt something so grand, and I wish them success in the future.<br> <br> I'm guessing that you are more likely to think along the lines of #2. Do you really think everyone else is so different? They are not. Most people will admire your attempt, even if you fail. Don't let fear of failure guarantee it.<br> The second common fear is the fear of looking stupid. I know I had this one. There is nothing quite so horrifying as seeing yourself on a video as you um and aah, lick your lips, or compulsively repeat whatever your annoying habit is while trying to convey your idea.<br> I'm not going to tell you what bugs me about myself … maybe I'm the only one who notices it. What I will tell you though, is that we are not perfect, and we are never going to be perfect. To succeed, this is something you just have to get over. Personally, I thought my first video was so bad that I didn't ...
