The Canary team didn’t start their company with crowdfunding. In fact, they had been working on the idea for roughly a year before turning to Indiegogo. “We decided that crowdfunding would be a great way for us to validate the market a little bit,” says Jon Troutman, co-founder of the company, which offers networked home security systems. It took the team about a month and a half to plan and prepare the campaign, but Troutman notes that they had already developed a voice for their brand and a story for their product. They didn’t devote as much time to preparation as some campaigns because they could already picture the puzzle. They just had to fit the pieces together. And getting users involved in the process would be key to doing so. After working on Canary for a whole year, they needed an outside view. “What we’re building is so much about filling a need for people, that it felt weird to go too far into product development without bringing more people into the process,” Troutman says. One of the great things about crowdfunding is that it lets the market decide in real time whether or not to validate your idea. In Canary’s case, it did. In this episode you will learn: The right way to communicate your message to your audience Where to go when you're looking for expert help How to analyse the competition and what you can learn from doing so What questions you need to ask yourself before you launch your campaign How much time you need to devote to your campaign in order for it to be successful & much more!