Kickstarter, Zoop and Indiegogo: what the three platforms actually do differently

People ask us why we bother watching three platforms when Kickstarter is the one everybody names. The short answer is that a comic book campaign behaves differently on each of them, and the difference is not cosmetic — it changes what your money buys and what the creator has to do to get the book printed.

Kickstarter: all or nothing

Kickstarter campaigns set a funding goal and a deadline. If the campaign does not reach the goal by the deadline, nobody is charged and the creator gets nothing.

That sounds harsh and it is the best thing about it. A comic that funds on Kickstarter is a comic that had, on the day the campaign closed, the money it said it needed. A backer is not paying into a project that is half-funded and hoping.

It is also still where the comics audience is. A reader who backs comics has almost certainly backed one on Kickstarter, follows creators there, and gets the platform’s own recommendations. For a first book that reach is hard to replace.

Zoop: comics, and only comics

Zoop runs comic book and graphic novel campaigns and nothing else. Campaigns are managed rather than self-serve: you talk to people who have shipped books before yours goes live.

For a backer, that usually shows up in the boring parts of a campaign page — the reward tiers, the shipping estimates, the schedule. Those are the parts that go wrong on a first-time campaign, and the parts a reader cannot easily judge from the outside.

The trade is audience size. A smaller, comics-only platform is a smaller pond.

Indiegogo: flexible funding, and what that means

Indiegogo offers two funding types, and the campaign page says which one is in use.

Fixed funding works like Kickstarter: hit the goal or nobody is charged.

Flexible funding means the creator keeps whatever is raised, goal or no goal. That can be exactly right — a book that is already drawn and needs a print run part-funded does not need an all-or-nothing bet. It can also mean a campaign that raises a fraction of its goal and still takes your money.

So on Indiegogo, read the funding type. It is on the page, and it is the single most useful thing there.

Indiegogo also runs InDemand, which lets a campaign keep selling after its deadline. Useful if you missed one.

What we actually look at

Whichever platform a campaign is on, the same handful of things tell you most of what you need:

• Has the creator done this before? A completed campaign with a shipped book is the strongest signal there is.
• Is the book finished? “Fully drawn, ready to print” is a different risk from “script complete.”
• Does the shipping make sense from where you are? International postage has broken more comic campaigns than anything else on this list.
• Is there a schedule, and is it specific? A month named is better than a season named.

None of that requires you to like the art. It only tells you whether the book is likely to arrive.

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