Feedback Wanted / OOTP Marketing

[JWay]

The facebook/twitter angle is the most cost efficient option. MLBtraderumors is a great idea as well. But facebook/twitter is free, and its nearly insane not to try.

[Neags23]

I don't obsess over Facebook as much as some, but I've seen where you can become "a fan" of certain things. Even non-tangible things like, "This person has become a fan of 'spending time with family'."

I'm in the "I play out of the park baseball!" group, but I've never seen anyone become a 'fan' of OOTP.

So... start that up or something. Viral marketing. It might not give you the exposure a banner ad on mlb.com would, but this is free.

[JWay]

Originally Posted by Andreas Raht

Most people find us through Google, searching for "baseball games". A good Google page rank would help us. To get a good page rank, it's important that many other sites link to our site (www.ootpdevelopments.com/ootp). So, anybody who links to our site, helps us

Classic Baseball Union BlogRolled!

[thehatfield]

JWay has some good points re: Twitter and online activity.

Having a dedicated OOTP blog that links up and interacts with other blogs in the gaming/baseball community would probably be the most cost-effective method of getting your name out there. Maybe you comp a copy or two to some of the major established blogs (make sure to review their site hit numbers/individual ISPs), do a Q&A, etc.. If you could time it for the playoffs it could almost be like a second launch.

If you're trying to tap that ESPN meathead market, there are probably reduced rate programs available (like web-only advertising, an email blast to their email list, etc.). I assume there's some sort of partnership with OOTP & Baseball America, and BA's website states they are an ESPN partner. Maybe there's a mutual contact that can be developed there.

[JWay]

A blog is a great way to interject yourself into google much further...

[Nutlaw]

That diagram made me giggle. I want to hang it on my refridgerator or something.

I, for one, enjoy OOTP and fantasy baseball quite a bit. I'd posit that many fantasy baseball fans would be more likely to get into an MLB Roster set league than a fictional one, for certain, but there is definitely crossover interest.

Clearly, however, OOTP will never have the simple and easy game experience that fantasy baseball provides.

Other than getting fantasy baseball review/tip sites to start talking about your game, I don't know how to draw in that crowd.

[jar2574]

If I was you, I would start sponsoring pages on baseballreference.com.

You can sponsor individual players, teams, or various stat pages.

From their website: The prices are roughly set to match an advertising rate of $1.25 per 1,000 page views with a minimum charge of $5.

I think this would hit your target audience at a very cost effective rate. Guys looking up baseball stats on baseball reference are the sort of statheads that enjoy OOTP.

I also think your diagram is spot on. I disagree with other posters who think fantasy players are unlikely to play OOTP. Fantasy players are (1) comfortable with computers, (2) comfortable with numbers, and (3) like to pretend to be GMs. Those three characteristics seem like prerequisites for enjoying OOTP and many baseball fans don't share all three. So you've got the right idea.

There, I would start by advertising on the cheaper fantasy websites, perhaps CBS Sportsline or Yahoo rather than ESPN.

But I do think that one or two well-placed ads there might increase traffic to your website.

Good luck.

[AndrewG]

First of all, let me say that most game developpers DONT have a marekting department as most others selling anything have.

I was heavily invovled in one particular game where a group of us went from modders to actually step in and develop new versions. I found out first hand there and subsequently after that marketing for gaming industry, ESPECIALLY PC GAMING, is a different animal.

It was also at this one gig in particular there that I say one MASSIVE mistake that compnay made that OOTP HASNT. is the way the OOTP developpers really work to listen to what the community asks for to keep tried and trusted clients hooked on it and thus keep buying it. I am sure many of us can say we have talked others into buying the game. Which is of course a good thing.

As far as where OOTP can go to grab a bigger slice, well. Thats the 64,000$ question.

But as mentioned before in this thread, you DO want to nail the Fantasy crowd. And yes, alot of them use thier computers for tracking and running thier leagues, so natrually Twitter, Facebook and fantasy blogging can be one place to hit.

There are plenty of website that review games that accept reviews form everyday users. We can promote the game. And even when OOTP has a professional review done, we can comment on the game in follow up comments on these sites to drive the point home.



Now something I have been involved in a few times, but woudl need tweaking for OOTP. Its often GREAT promotion to hold a tournement. Now, this is easier said than done with OOTP. Sure, in a FPS you simply sign up, hold a round robin roudn then knock out playoffs and the last man standing is the winner. You give prizes and you normally hook new fans.

The trouble with a OOTP tourney, is that its not a game thats played as easy as a FPS. It takes time to draft a team and set them up for a tourney. Any given season takes a while to do.. and for people like me who loves OOTP, I always build a team slowly, so a wham bam tourney may not be my forte.

However it colld be interesting.

You could do something general.

This is stirctly off the top of my head:

1-You narrow it down to say 8 types of teams. There are strict templates.

Example: Team with great power, but low basespeed. Or Poor power but great contact. Or a balance of everything.

You just have to come up with different templates that in an overall gerneral evaluation are even. (A team with great hitting and no pitching could beat or lose a team with great pitchign and no hititng if they are built correctly.

2-You have an initial sign up. You might have 16 teams, you might have 160. This has to be guaged to lay out the next step.

3-You then allocate players into divisions. This is random. Now.. managers either select what tempalte of a team they want, or perhaps again this is allocated by random by those running the tourney.

4-You then give a period of time where the manager ajusts all his/her team settings. This is where a good manager will show thier stuff. Imagine if you have 50 teams using the same template. Techically its all luck if the settings are all degfault, chnaging these to what you have for your staff is key.

5-You then have a round robin round to rank your teams in each division. Then depending on the amount of teams you have and decide can advance, begin a kncok out playoff of best of 1, 3 or whatever. Really, it shoudl be a one game series, tis a tourney, anything happens in a real life weekend baseball tourney, why not with a similar OOTP tourney?

YOU CAN HAVE:

Managers reajust thier settings at certain times in tourney. Although this adds lag, you have to give a certain period for people to dl and reupload file. I am not a fan of this but others may be. As organizaer of tournaments in real life and online games, its a pain in the ass.

You could base divisions around different countires or geograpihcal areas for rivalries.

Allow injuries, or not.

You can have tournies avery 3 months or whatever.


Yes, there is a huge elelment of luck on knock out tourneies, but hey, I guarantee you it will still hook some players even more.

If you have prizes, and Im not saying money, but free dls of other games ect... people will join.


At worst, why not just try it?

I would love to help...

[AndrewG]

Oh forgot to mention one thing...

A tournament usually costs very low, if nothing but just time... well and a few promotional prizes....

[rem]

The six million person fantasy number is misleading because many people play fantasy baseball for the first week of the season and then stop. Also, that crowd would rather the game know names and not ratings.

[Eddd]

I just did a Google Search, computer simulation baseball, baseball computer simulation and several other variations and never did OOTP come up. Diamond Mind, Pure Sim and other did come up. I would like to seeing how to get OOTP to come up on a Google Search. Operation Sports is a good more thoughtful computer game website.

[tajoumaru]

What about offering two versions of the game, the current in-depth "hardcore" one, and a second, much simpler one that would appeal to a more casual set? The "casual" version of OOTP could be sold for around $5 less and be far easier to set up and maintain--remove many of the options, etc.

[satchel]

Originally Posted by JWay

The facebook/twitter angle is the most cost efficient option. MLBtraderumors is a great idea as well. But facebook/twitter is free, and its nearly insane not to try.

Facebook and Twitter aren't going to help you grab new people who've never heard of the game before. Those sites aren't vehicles for extensive learning about new things. Forming communities on those sites is great, but people who make up those communities are already fans, and they band together.

[SteveP]

Originally Posted by Malleus Dei

Your market really isn't fantasy baseball players. I know a large group of them, and none of them have shown any long-term interest in OOTP or even BM or a console game. They like the ties to real baseball too much.

The console audience is lost from the start.

So what you are left with are hard-core baseball gamers and hard-core strategy gamers (and calling that audience "geeks" is demeaning, Steve, many of them are not geeks). There's your potential customer base: people who like extremely complicated baseball strategy games and people who like extremely complicated strategy games of any kind and who will play a baseball game - or, for another example, a soccer game - even though they are not baseball or soccer fans, but simply because the game is rich, detailed, offers numerous opportunities for significant decisions and rewards good decision-making.

Therefore you guys need to be selling OOTP as two things:

1. The most complex computer baseball game of all. Get some kind of slick advertising phrase behind that to tie to the game, like "OOTP, the king of baseball computer games" only better.

2. A complex and feature-rich strategy game. Puresim forged a relationship with Matrix Games, one of the biggest online marketers of strategy games, which helped sell games to new customers; maybe you should look in to affiliating yourself to either them or, say, Shrapnel Games or such, as that will get you strategy gamer eyes on your product. Or find some other way to do that.

But going after fantasy gamers will not pay off. They don't do and don't want to do complicated games like OOTP.

FWIW, I agree with much of this. In order for fantasy league fans (and their group of friends) to switch to playing OOTP instead (and I think it would have to be a switch), it would be because there is something unsatisfying to them about their fantasy leagues. No evidence of that.

OTOH, hard-core sim fans are ALWAYS dissatisfied to some extent, so they will be more likely to try OOTP to see if it's better than whatever they're playing now. And when they look at the forums and see just how interesting the complaints are, they're likely to stick with it. At least that's what happened to me.

[rem]

Originally Posted by satchel

Facebook and Twitter aren't going to help you grab new people who've never heard of the game before. Those sites aren't vehicles for extensive learning about new things. Forming communities on those sites is great, but people who make up those communities are already fans, and they band together.

Do you have an account on either of those sites?

[kashman]

Originally Posted by Andreas Raht

Most people find us through Google, searching for "baseball games". A good Google page rank would help us. To get a good page rank, it's important that many other sites link to our site (www.ootpdevelopments.com/ootp). So, anybody who links to our site, helps us

I dabble a bit with SEO and it's a bit more than just having other websites link to your site.

Content is very important to get your ranking higher on the search engines as well as optimizing the website for certain keywords. The good news is that OOTP falls into a good niche and already has a pretty decent ranking for the keywords baseball simulation (4th) and baseball simulation game (3rd). I'm guessing the keywords you would like to go after are baseball sim, baseball game, and just baseball? Looking at the meta keywords, it looks like a couple edits can be made to target different keywords there.

As someone else mentioned I think some kind of OOTP blog would help with google page rank as well as spreading the word about the game. One of the most powerful marketing tools is word of mouth... maybe offer some kind of referral bonus. Say I refer a friend to purchase the game, I get a discount off my next purchase or something along those lines.

E-mail marketing is also a useful tool and if done correctly can be very cost effective. I work in the business and there are ways where you only have to pay out on the sales made. For example, you rent a list manager's list and they pay you on a CPA (cost per acquisition) basis. Basically you pay the person sending the e-mail a certain amount for each copy they sell. OOTP costs $30 bucks and you will pay out $7 for every copy sold coming from the sender's link. So you only get $23 per sale, but you are tapping into a lot more users. Some list manager's databases have millions of e-mails (although they are not all targeted to your ideal demographic).

[Stu]

Unfortunately I think to bring in Fantasy Baseball players and "casual" fans you'd need to make OOTP Online a reality and dumb down the game to a more casual level. However, I think that would be a tremendous step backwards and you would risk alienating a good portion of your current customer base.

I think rather than trying to capture the fantasy baseball market you should focus more on the market of hardcore baseball fans. I'm a die hard baseball fan and have been PC gaming for years but just found out about OOTP around 6.5 /2006.

Focus more on sites that either attract hardcore baseball fans or more sophisticated gamers than fantasy baseball players. Sites like mlbtraderumors for baseball and sites like operation sports for gamers.

[satchel]

Originally Posted by remangiii

Do you have an account on either of those sites?

Yes I do, and I don't want to take up space here with a debate on this, but if someone is a Facebook or Twitter user who's never heard of OOTP, then how or why would they join the an OOTP group? Would you join a Facebook group, or listen to tweets, about a game you'd never heard of, or played?

Then again, maybe if the people are baseball fans to begin with, that would motivate them to join, to find out more.

[endgame]

The fantasy players' degree of being a conversion audience is probably overrated, IMHO. However, if they are targeted, it's senseless to adopt anything year long. Annually, the Sporting News (I think one of the first to hit newstands every year) and others publish their fantasy issue, e.g. one list: Fantasy Baseball Magazines

Even the casual gamers like myself or the casual fantasy player usually pick up between 2-4 copies of various issues for comparisons and info. So, a small ad in 2-3 or even 1 larger ad in one of the more premier sellers (in numbers) would probably net 100X the investment of any one regularly appearing ad in any one issue. Preseason is the time to roll out marketing and opening day is the time to have the game ready for those who may potentially come aboard.

[blueturf]

kingcharles and others have touched on many great topics.


An official page on Facebook is a good place to start. Most of us have friends with similar interests and the low/no cost of Facebook is a good venue for "word of mouth"
Facebook is good for virtual word of mouth, but blogs are the gateway to the masses. (a few ideas that I have here, I will post separately)

The complexity of the game can be daunting for newcomers. There needs to be more "plug & play" options and quickstarts that come with the game. The modding community is great, but newcomers don't often consider the mods when buying a brand new game.
With that being said, OOTP's depth is a great strength and that is a selling point.

If targeting the Fantasy crowd, the MLB rosters need to be solid and a focal point of the advertising.

There should also be relentless focus that any historical season can be played without the additional costs of season disks. There is still a market to gain crossover interest from SOM, Pursue the Pennant, APBA, etc and the ability to play historical seasons without an additional cost is a huge plus.

Banner ads can be effective and mlbtradrumors is a great place to start. Perhaps some type of banner exchange can be agreed to with some smaller sites that fit the same "geek" (no slight taken) target group. Most web sites that I frequent daily, I learned about from other users on the OOTP boards.

Hardball Times
Fangraphs (implement their Win Probability Graph in addition to box scores and game logs using their logo within the game similar to Baseball Prospectus in exchange for some banner space) I would love it if this was a widget on the game broadcash screen.
Uniwatch - In addition to possible ad space, a user could do a write up of uni/logo customization availble in the game.
Baseball Musings and Ballhype would also be good locations.

Any banners should direct the potential customer to a well designed and informative home page. (the OOTP X page is a huge improvement over past incarnations)

Most OOTP users now go straight to the boards and never visit the main page. The amount of unfiltered content (which is a good thing) on the boards could be a detraction for a potential purchaser.

While the fictional aspect and customization are part of what sets OOTP apart from the competition, most new users are looking for a simulator of MLB. My guess is most OOTP users were looking for a real roster or historical simulator and later came to love the fictional aspect of the simulation.

Most OOTP users now go straight to the boards and never visit the main page. The amount of unfiltered content (which is a good thing) on the boards could be a detraction for a potential purchaser.

Most importantly the release (and demo) of a new version must align with the start of the MLB season.