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E-Marketing   URGENT - Need Help Fast!  
 
This question has been closed, and points have been awarded.
Push Sales For Award Winning Online Game...?
Posted By: jongreechan* on 11/20/2004 4:23 PM (CST) 2750 Points
I work for an online gaming company, and we have a game that was awarded the Web Game of the Year by a very prestigious organization. However, sales have been incredibly slow. We have the game on several distribution channels, but they wont put the game on their premium placements because sales have been slow. We have already redesigned box art and copy to reflect the award, but that hasn't helped. I desperately need a marketing plan to help drive sales of this underachieving game, and it must be extremely low budget. The target audience for the game is women, 25-40. We are also offering the game soon on single player tournaments that can be played for cash (small amounts). Any ideas please???

Posted by: W.M.M.A. Accepted Answer
11/20/2004 4:29 PM (CST)
Welcome to KHE: Congratulations on your game award.

I have a few questions.

jongreechan, is there a particular country you are targeting?

I know your target demo is F25-40, what type of studies have you done, to demonstrate that this demo spends a lot of time online and/or plays games?

What type of psychographics have you done?

Can you tell me a bit more about the game and studies you have done. Will be glad to help if I can. And, there are many other marketing experts in this forum.
Thank you,
Randall
WMMA
 
Posted by: jongreechan* Author Response
11/20/2004 4:44 PM (CST)
Thank you for your quick response Randall- I appreciate it. As per your questions: we are targeting the United States mostly. We know that this demo (F25-40) plays a lot of casual online games through previous studies that we have done, as well as many well documented studies in the up-and-coming casual gaming industry. As I said before, our budget is extremely low, so we do not have any psychographic profiles of our target audience.

For privacy purposes, I would rather not describe the specifics of this game though this forum, but I would be glad to send you a link to your personal email. It is the type of game where people can take a non-stressful break to play- it is part strategy, part puzzle, part action, as is easy to learn but hard to master. Thanks again....
 
Posted by: W.M.M.A. Member Response
11/20/2004 5:09 PM (CST)
Please send it to me. If you have non-disclosure agreement, I will gladly agree.
I have some specific thoughts about your most recent statements.

Randall
WMMA
 
Posted by: W.M.M.A. Member Response
11/20/2004 5:36 PM (CST)
I am sorry, click on my name: W.M.M.A., and it will take you to my business information.
Randall
WMMA
 
Posted by: mgoodman Accepted Answer
11/20/2004 10:28 PM (CST)
I'm always a little skeptical about "low budget" challenges. That's not because I am insensitive to financial realities, but because it suggests that the value of a really effective solution isn't very great.

Obviously, if this were a big money issue, there would be money to solve the problem. The fact that the money isn't there suggests it may not be worth a lot of effort.

Am I misreading this? Is there some other explanation?

If you can dollarize the value of increasing traffic to the game site by, say, 50% or 100% or more, what would that do for your revenues? If it would increase them by hundreds of thousands of dollars, then why isn't it worth, say, $100,000 to solve the problem?

It has been my experience that you get what you pay for. Good marketing costs money. I'm also willing to put in some time/effort just to be helpful. But when the "low budget" words are as prominent as you've made them, I have to wonder if the challenge isn't mostly academic. If we come up with a great solution to your problem, how will you pay for implementation?

Just my initial reaction. I would be willing to look into this further, but expect that there won't be any free lunches on the road to solving your problem. Really effective marketing costs money. It may be very cost-efficient, but it probably won't be "low budget" if you're looking for dramatic results.
 
Posted by: ASVP/ChrisB Accepted Answer
11/21/2004 2:23 AM (CST)
I have about 10 years experience marketing coin-op video games and one thing I am very sure about is that you need to clearly understand a range of concise but detailed operational statistics on your game before deciding whether to bother trying to market it, or whether to just move on.

Distilling the essence of a successful video game is almost impossible but launching onto the market, assuming you achieve distribution OK, will soon tell you if it's a performer or not.

Critical factors are:

Length of game time (should be reasonable, but not too long per "play" - with arcade games 2 -30 minutes was considered optimal)

Level of plays per day - depends on location and web-based obviously is different to location-based games

Trends over short time intervals - game play/no of plays.

What statistics are you monitoring?

Is the game amusement only, or a gambling game (to which some different parameters apply)?

What makes you think a F25-40 market target is a good assumption?

How long have you been testing or operating the game?

Has it changed during the test period (level difficulty, win rates, etc?

Does the game have any kind of story line? Is it interesting enough?

I'd like more info and invite you to send me details off-line - click via my profile name above to obtain contact details via my website.

Look forward to hearing more.

ChrisB
 
Posted by: michelletrex Accepted Answer
11/21/2004 2:36 AM (CST)
Sorry to say I'm not a expert in E-Marketing but I could give you a point of view from your target market.

I do play on line games but once I start one I tend to keep playing that one until I master it no matter how long. It is not often that I will change.

I was wondering how you would go if you targeted games rooms of known women friendly games like Yahoo's Literatti, Spades and that type of thing and seed the chat areas.

You will get instant feedback anyway.

You really need Chicks to promote it to other Chicks so you need PR. Use any money you have on a good PR agent to get news stories out there.

Good Luck

Michelle

 
Posted by: SRyan ;] Accepted Answer
11/21/2004 4:39 PM (CST)
I know a local investor who told me that he had investigated the gaming industry and decided to stay far, far away from it because it's so difficult to get a real hit into the market.

You're in a business where product uptake really grows through word-of-mouse communication. PR and blog appearances are the places to start.

Does your system let you track player performance? Who are your high-scoring champions? Give them some incentive to start talking about the game (or even challenging others) via online sources.

If possible, email me a link to the game so I can have a look. It might help me generate other ideas. And I could always use a non-stressful break. ;]


¤ Shelley ¤
 
Posted by: night_butterflz Accepted Answer
11/21/2004 4:55 PM (CST)
I agree with the comments above. I would like to specifically how your target audience will buy the product. Can you only buy it online? Downloadable online? Do you ultimately want it sold in stores like walmart? Once those are answered you can further think of ways to market. How about using PR. The ultimate question is where is the WOW factor with your game. Figure that out and angle your proposals to distribution channels that way.

PS: I was really surprised when you said your target audience was 25-40. I hope your guesstimation of the audience is exact. Are you sure you are not covering too much of an age group. I'm in my twentys, my mom is in her late 40's and I know we do not play the same games unless its cards. Anyway, hope you get your project going, I'm sure it will sell if its a great product.

jen
 
Posted by: Deremiah *CPE Accepted Answer
11/21/2004 10:24 PM (CST)
jongreechan,

You've received some great advice from our experts panel. (Great advice Shelley).

PR...ON-LINE (Low-Budget) WORKED FOR ME?
A great press release initiated a few times over a month will create some eye attention and you can leverage the campaign through that platform. Word of mouth really travels fair when you initiate this kind of campaign on-line.

SYSTEMATIC PR DONE PROPERLY CAN WORK FOR YOU...
You must systematically create a special interest story. Layout the Release to appeal to your target audience and again put it out on www.prweb.com at least once a week for two or three weeks straight.

I BOOT-STRAPPED IT AND IT PAID OFF...
If you choose a more highend package through them your cost should not run over $80.00 to a $100.00 per week.

GO FOR A REAL CAMPAIGN OR DON'T GO...
This is about all I can recommend at this point. If you want to know how I leveraged an amazing campaign on-line or would even like to run a trail campaign using my techniques(click-on) my profile name, shoot me an email and let's talk. Is there anything else I can do for you?

Your Servant, Deremiah, *CPE, (Customer Passion Evangelist)
 
Posted by: SRyan ;] Member Response
11/22/2004 12:52 AM (CST)
Jonathan,

I didn't download your game because this old laptop of mine can't limbo through the system requirements. That being said, here's my feedback after seeing the promo page...

Are you SURE you've got the right target age group? My impression is that it would be fantastic for girls in the 8-16 range, NOT their moms. I'll bet you'd have a much easier time attracting much younger players!

Your pricing of $20 seems fair, but have you tried a "short-term special of $6.95" to see what impact it has on sales?

Who in the world told you to offer a free trial period of ONE HOUR? Smack that guy in the head! Then change it to a period long enough to get your player hooked. I don't know if that's three days or ten...

Consider getting a copywriter to help you describe the game features.

That's it!

¤ Shelley ¤
 
Posted by: ASVP/ChrisB Member Response
11/22/2004 3:09 AM (CST)
Jonathan

I didn't know people were still playing (or buying) platform games... And I'm really struggling to "get" a target audience that is F25-40.

Have you done any real research? If so, I bow to that assumed knowledge. In the absence of anything empirical I would guess a true likely target market F8-16 as per Shelley's guess.

It said the trial was for an hour. 90 seconds later the download completed and I had 45 minutes left, what the...??

My guess is people aren't hooked after the trial. I'm guessing they're bored. I think the world has moved on from Donkey Kong, and this game is little more than a million other platform games from the late 80's. It's 15 years out of time.

I know the wireframe and CG character sprite and movement development is much more more costly, but games with some better control and story like The Sims definitely attract Mums and other more mature ladies. (Oh gosh, I hope that doesn't sound as bad as I think it might...)

I'm trying hard to find something good to tel you here... In the old days (ie.e late 80's, early 90's) we would have suggested the maker puts a collar and lead on a game like this, because it looks like an absolute barker.

Frankly, and I don't want to sound like a cruel Idol judge, but I think if Google.com diverted all its traffic to the game, I'm not sure the revenues would be anything to write home about.

I think you have two separate problems:

1. Lack of traffic, a PR - Advertising -Budget problem

2. Lack of conversion of meagre traffic to actual sales, a product-value-proposition problem. The market isn't seeing the entertainment value, and can't commit to parting with their greens for what they see. Which causes and worsens the budget problem, doesn't it?

Really sorry, but my advice is to fold tent, move on. Make the next widget biggerbrighterbetter and more fun.

Nothing worse than throwing good time/money after bad.

Hope this helps you make a sound business decision.

ChrisB
 
Posted by: night_butterflz Member Response
11/22/2004 8:50 AM (CST)
I think one of the problems is that you need to target more tightly. You are going on the age group that plays games in general. How about finding out the age group for you game specifically.

jen
 
Posted by: Sanjeev Kumar Vyas Accepted Answer
11/22/2004 11:32 PM (CST)
Dear Chan,
I am a bit confused. You said you are an online gaming company but then why do you want to sell your game in stores? (online gaming companies make games that can only be played online and these companies charge you for the time you have played, most of these companies are more than willing to give the game installers for FREE as they earn when people play game on their site)
So it would be helpful if you can clarify on this.
As I see from reading other posts you have sent them trials of the games and many disagree with you segmentation I think you should rethink that part.

Apart from that I think you will also need to find out as to why the sales as slow? It could be that the people who gave you the award liked your game but their liking may not necessarily mean most other people too like your game. Or it could be the pricing, or other things, once you find those problems it will help you to get better solutions (either by self thinking or posting it back here again)

Apart from that the cheap and easy way to get you game noticed would be to send to game reviewers of various game sites. If your game gets good review chances are people will notice.
Advertise on the game site, (better still if you can find gaming site for girls). These sites are more targeted and thus would give you a better ROI.
Use PPC advertising in search engines. Choose good targeted keywords; this is a cheap and good way to get your game noticed to ladies searching for games.

Hope that helps
Regards
Sanjeev
 
Posted by: mmprint Member Response
11/23/2004 11:36 AM (CST)
I am a marketing director with a good deal of experience in e-markting and business developtment. Also, I am and always will be a fan of video games online, networked, and stand alone. Please send me the link so I may have a better udnerstanding of the type of game you are speaking of so I can offer some advice.
 
Posted by: jose04 Accepted Answer
11/23/2004 3:14 PM (CST)
Hello jongreechan

You have asked for ideas...for the online game...already awarded..for young women...marketing plan

Games are for fun, leisure, relaxation, competition, achievement etc. Does your gamer target market get any or all of these from your game? If so it will be worth verifying/studying this. Call it stats for survival if you want. Do the research...its the way to go if you have not done so already.

You call the game as a stressfree one...why should a game contribute to stress at all? What does your target market thing about this...another reason to research.

You have developed your product painstakingly...and your research may tell you that the product needs to be modified, to help it be a potential satisfier from the young ladies. If this is the message from a couple of test samples you pick, then you would make the right alterations in your game. Consequently, you should see your sales graph going up soon.

ONCE THESE PRODUCT changes and the research phase is over, it's a question of intergrating the right mix of communication channels to suit the game market. You have already received lovely advice on this. You could explore seriously the PR opportunity. Your budget being low, a sensible and cooperative PR firm will reverse your sagging sales curve.

Hope these thoughts help!!

All the best!!
 
Posted by: telemoxie Member Response
12/3/2004 2:28 AM (CST)
You have a small number of users - are they enthusiastic users? If so, have you considered empowering your users to spread the work about this game? Could you offer a special deal or promotion or free trial, maybe something which folks could forward to their friends? Could you offer something like a free month or some in-game bonus or something for folks who bring in new players?

Could you, "sell them like bananas - sell them in bunches" ? I have not seen your game, I have no idea what it is like... but is there a way you could promote the game to or thru existing women's clubs or organizations?
 
Posted by: et3dotcom Member Response
12/11/2004 7:48 PM (CST)
Have you done any price sensitivity and optimizing?

Perhaps this is a good candidate for dynamic pricing

see http://www.sitesell.com/


http://www.sitesellinc.com/media-news/july21-2000.html
 
Posted by: Deremiah *CPE Member Response
12/12/2004 1:31 AM (CST)
jongreechan,

there have been a lot of great post and advice but I would like to hear your input. Could you please answer some of the questions so that we could better help you.
Could you also send me a copy of the link so that I can try the game among some of the kids I know and get their feedback.

Test...Test...test?
have you had an opportunity to test the game among other age groups? What were the results? Since Shelley suggests F8-16 how about taking a shot at marketing it to boys unless there are specific things that would exclude them

Chris B seems to think the game is outdated and needs to be upgraded. Well what do you think?

Once you forward the link I'll share more feedback. It sounds as if you have created a product that may not have much demand. That could also just mean you needed to identify what the need really is for that age group. Another thing that could mean is you need to listen to the market place tell you what the need is before you create your next game and be sure to implement the strategy before the need changes.

Read Thomas Alva Edison...Why?
He discovered a lot of things but one of the things he discovered early in his career as an inventor is ---that he would never create anything that people did not have a need for--- That's a great life lesson for all inventor types which we all should be (UNLESS) you have a whole lot of money and you're only creating your ideas for yourself. Is there anything else I can do for you?

Please send the link.

Your Servant, Deremiah, *CPE (Customer Passion Evangelist)
 
Posted by: Val (Moderator)* Moderator Response
12/28/2004 6:56 PM (CST)
Hello all. I am closing this question, since its more than 10 days old. We do this to make sure members' contributions are rewarded in a timely manner and to improve the visibility of newer questions. Thanks, so much, for participating!

Val (Moderator)
 


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