Marketing an Indie Game Part 3 – Possible Learnings

In part 1 of this series we looked at the marketing techniques carried out to promote the indie game Xbox indie game Gerbil Physics, and in part 2 we examined some of the results of these efforts.  In this, the final part we summarise what we learned.  In no particular order, then:

• Set aside a marketing budget.  We allocate 10% profit per quarter to go to the marketing pot.  This could fund entering competitions, promotional material, and a personal goal is to eventually be able to attend a trade fair.
• Set aside marketing time.  Although most marketing methods detailed in part 2 are free, they can take a significant amount of time.  This is time that is not spent coding or designing or doing art, so there is still that opportunity cost to consider.
• If something seems too good to be true it probably is.  Be wary of emails from “game marketing consultants” offering to market your game.  Imagine our surprise when we got an email from a “company” who boasted Valve and Activision amongst their clients yet whose website consisted of a single page and a domain that had been registered the week before!  We’ll steer clear of that thanks.
• Don’t give away all your promo copies right away.  You only get 50 and when they are gone there are no more (although there is a clever way to find out if your codes have been used or not and re-use them).  We’ve missed out on a couple of chances by not being able to offer promo codes to what looks like great marketing opportunities.
• CafePress offer a good service.  It is expensive, but considering CafePress deal with everything from taking orders, creating the goods, packaging, shipping and dealing with money, it’s a good deal.  This allows your team to focus on making games rather than running a mail order business.
• Game Sales and Website Traffic are Unrelated.  Game sales don’t seem to drive website traffic, nor does website traffic seem to drive sales.  Perhaps it’s a mixed two way flow with a variable time lag.
• Leafleting is hard work.  To get into shops is hard, and to do it yourself is also hard work.  Even in a city like London it is slow going and a lot of walking to do this yourself, plus for cheap games like the Gerbil Physics series it isn’t financially viable.
• Players Ignore “Other Games” Screens.  Suggesting players try another title on an “Other Games” screen in-game had zero measureable impact on trials of the other game.  Either the game didn’t look attractive or nobody pays attention.  Either is possible.
• The internet contains hate.  No surprises here, but no matter how great your game might be, someone will hate it and will be delighted to share their views (without any prompting needed) in comments on forums etc.
• Re-entering the Xbox Charts is possible.  It is worth reiterating the point that at present, you don’t need to shift an insane amount of copies to make it into the top 20 downloads.  It seems to me easily possible that with a concerted marketing effort, all focussed on the same time period, that any game could make it back in to the top 20 downloads and so get a new lease of life.

We’ve just started the main marketing effort for our latest game, Gerbil Physics 2, which has just been released.  Let’s see if we can practice what we preach .  If anyone has any great marketing ideas, let us know!

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