IGDA Game Developer Group meetup happened just last Tuesday, April 27 in NYC. Organized and lead by Tam (thanks Tam) and held at Large Animal Games studio.

Focus: “Getting Your Game In-front of Eyeballs” or simply marketing/ promotional strategies for games.

We, at Miharo games attended this event and even shared our strategies. I would absolutely encourage developers to attend meeting as such. Most valuable thing you get is yet another fresh perspective on marketing.( I meant that in positive way)  In Miharo’s case, strategy was validated (to some degree) and areas for improvement were clearly exposed.  We were both influenced and motivated by presentation given by Tina Shih, representing Arkadium, and Sherry Adams (Sarbakan).  Both studios are much bigger and more accomplished than Miharo, yet much of strategies are shared. Most important being: marketing is more than just advertising. It’s a combination of SEO, SEM, PR and SOCIAL MEDIA. I guess I should reverse it: SOCIAL MEDIA etc…

Marketing budget dictates how far you can push and what you can get.

We can talk about ROI all day long but first one needs the” I” in this formula to undertake what Arkadium and Sarbakan are able to pull off.  That said, even a tiny budget (or none) allows to replicate efforts larger studios. Granted, it would be with much smaller share of voice but still enough visibility to boost traffic and sales. Just have to be consistent and creative.

Miharo Games Low Budget Marketing Plan:

Covering basics

When you got to start somewhere start with standards.

• Optimize all your channels for SEO, even if site content  is not updated very often you need to ensure all you got is solid. Relevant keywords and phrases, good original content etc…
• Have a blog (just like this one), facebook, youtube, forum etc… all adds up.
• Must track: web data, traffic etc… it will only validate your efforts but most importantly help you understand your customers/visitors.  Another bonus is tracking direct response from external campaigns. We use Google analytics but there are many options out there to choose from.

Social Media Focus:

• FOLLOW, INFLUENCE and then LEAD. Not an easy formula but attainable. Social Sites are SOCIAL (DaDa) and demand human interaction.  Be human. Be genuine and leave your sales pitch for distribution companies.
• Keep it fresh and up to date; share your opinion, even better if edgy J
• “Nothing to write” – total BS. Write up review of games you play, like, dislike. Be honest. I assume if your’e into gaming you do play games.  Share a link to competitors’ site.  I believe this will pay off:  better traffic, search visibility.

PR efforts

• Reach out to all critics, reviewers – both small and big fish. The pond is large and it takes few (or more than few) baits to catch something.  Every back link, mention counts.
• Miharo is not branding any promotional efforts; we focus on the games not the company.
• Send emails daily if you’ve got time. You really do not know what will make it online.  Our strategy; short email with a pitch plus attachment containing screenshots, descriptions etc… That’s how we’ve got our profile on GameSpot and few other large and well known sites. True, it’s hard to find us there but it counts for SEO.

Special promotions:

• High score contest, funny survey or a dare – be creative/ be different.
• Miharo repeats all efforts: Social Media, SEM and PR

Now, that was before the meetup. After Tina’s and Sherry’s presentation we’ve added few points:

• Start marketing early in development stage! (stressed by Sarbakan)
  • have a plan
  • figure out what’s your target audience
  • make sure you’re choosing right platform per your target
  • Generate interest even before beta testing; share a soundbite, a trailer etc..
  • always test your game with new “set of eyeballs”
    • Tina shared that ‘if you don’t know who your prospective player is, try to get a very diverse audience to test a game’
    • Collect data during game testing.  It might very well happen that after stage 2 good percentages of testers hit the “wall” of difficulty. It will be way easier to adjust setting before game is release than after.

If you like to join this meetup and meet myself and bunch of other great people, don’t hesitate.You can find IGDA on  http://www.meetup.com/igda-nyc/

Here, I would like to thank:

Tam, for organizing the event. Tam just ported Scrambler to ipad with much success. Check the game here http://www.neuronicgames.com/skrambler/

Large Animal Games  http://www.largeanimal.com/ for having us over and giving us a little tour of their studio.

Tina Shish (Akadium), for great presentation http://www.arkadium.com/game_library.aspx

Sherry Adams (Sarbakan),for sharing good advice.  Check their site at www.sarbakan.com . They’ve just released really cool game, Lazy Riders. Super nice concept, where a player guides a character by manipulating/controlling outside word. REAL NEAT.

Thanks for stumbling upon this blog entry.

Monika



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