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I am looking at my kickstarter campaign account and while reward levels are automatically and clearly implemented, stretch goals seem not to be. Do I simply place stretch goals in the Project Description and as soon as one is reached, I manually modify in the Project Description to show that the stretch goal has been reached?

Thank you in advance.

Yes - or in updates. See how these guys did it in their page and updates section: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/65 ... ration-rts

Thoughts on adding stretch goals via Kickstarter blog: https://www.kickstarter.com/blog/think- ... ou-stretch
Lessons on Stretch Goals: http://stonemaiergames.com/kickstarter- ... tch-goals/

What are stretch goals?
A stretch goal is a funding target set by the project creator beyond the original Kickstarter goal. Stretch goals as a term and a practice emerged from the Kickstarter community as a way for creators to "stretch" beyond the initial, official goal of the Kickstarter project and raise more money (and often make cooler stuff!). Funds are collected whether stretch goals are met or not, as long as the project has met its Kickstarter funding goal.

What happens when a project is overfunded varies depending on the project, and stretch goals are not right for every project. If you are thinking about stretch goals you should consider:

Project complexity: Stretch goals can make a project more difficult to complete. Fulfilling rewards can be demanding, and any time you add new stuff (more songs on your album, better materials or options on your creation) the demands increase. More costs to consider, more things to ship — things can get complicated fast. It can be tempting to add stretch goals — especially if a project goes orders of magnitude over funding — but this shouldn't be done without careful planning.

Communication: If adding stretch goals, think carefully about how to announce them to your community of backers. Take the time to explain your intentions, your motivations, and your plans. Any changes made midstream should be accompanied by an assurance that you are honoring your initial promises to backers. Simply proclaiming, “New goal!” without recognizing what you’ve achieved together can rub backers the wrong way.

Source: https://www.kickstarter.com/help/faq/cr ... #faq_50035

Thank you. This information was more than usefull. Is there a rule of thumb of how many stretch goals one should start with? I am thinking of 5, but I am not sure if that is already too much to start with. Any opinions?

There aren't any rules really, just be sure that you can accommodate the cost of the stretch goal at the reward tier you assign it. I'd check out similar campaigns and see what kinds of stretch goals they include and how many.

Can you add stretch goals AFTER the initial goal is reached?

Yes - you can. Just beware:

"Communication: If adding stretch goals, think carefully about how to announce them to your community of backers. Take the time to explain your intentions, your motivations, and your plans. Any changes made midstream should be accompanied by an assurance that you are honoring your initial promises to backers. Simply proclaiming, “New goal!” without recognizing what you’ve achieved together can rub backers the wrong way."

Thanks! What I really meant was: If I'm luck enough to reach my goal, can I add stretch goals for any amount that goes over the goal? But I understand what you're saying. Thanks!

I just found this forum so not sure if my addition to this will be too late but I also had the same question before I launched my campaign. The answer to your question is dead on but I would like to add to the "communication" aspect. My campaign has about a week to go but a week ago decided to add a stretch goal thinking that I covered all bases before doing so. I added a limited edition copper version of my spinning top as a stretch and it was gone in less then two hours. Problems...the money didn't change much because I simply had folks changing their original pledge to copper instead of brass or stainless steel. That was fine because it opened up early backer slots that I knew would get picked up. The bigger problem was that I added the new copper tier and sent the update out at the same time. This meant that a ton of people didn't even get the opportunity to grab one when they received the update a few hours later. I had so many complaints that the next day I sent an update stating that I would be adding 50 more to the edition at 6pm the following day. Everyone was thrilled and the 50 were gone in an hour. I've had backers still asking if they can get copper but they aren't upset because I dished out the last batch fairly. The lesson learned...don't add a stretch goal without giving some warning to your existing backers. Obviously, if the amount of products in the stretch are unlimited there is nothing to worry about.

This is my first campaign so maybe my insight seems obvious but I was surprised at the amount of hiccups I've had to deal with so figure laying it all out there will help some folks.
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/jl ... ua-tree-ca