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Doing Things That Don't Scale - Counter intuitive marketing for startups...
The document discusses various unconventional marketing techniques that were used by the founder to promote Scoreoid, a gaming backend service he previously founded. It describes reaching out directly to individual game developers on platforms like Android to personally promote Scoreoid. It also discusses writing guest content, developing community partnerships, and creating SDKs and videos to slowly gain exposure over time through small, focused efforts rather than aiming for sudden virality. The document advocates for marketing approaches that are personalized and don't rely on mass advertising.
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Doing Things That Don't Scale - Counter intuitive marketing for startups...
- 1. 1 DOING THINGS THATDON’T SCALE Counter intuitive marketing for startups...
- 2. 2 Who Am I? Developer,MeteorJS/NodeJS Founder at Development Studio Almog Design Developer / Entrepreneur Almog Koren Formerly founder of Scoreoid (funded startup) Speak at events & meet-ups Casual Connect, Mobile Summit, ect.. Active in the community / Community Evangelist
- 3. 3 Scoreoid 5,000+ Game Developers Millionsof players Team of 3 / 5 $175K in Funding 01 02 03 04 Lesson's learned
- 4. 4 Scoreoid - Customers $75Kin unding Lesson's learned
- 5. 5 Scoreoid – Teir1 Games $75K in unding Lesson's learned Super Hexagon Featured iOS, Android and part of the indie bundle LIGA WorldTap Official Spanish Liga de Fútbol game Color Sheep Featured Android game by industry professionals Trinket Studios
- 6. 6 Scoreoid – Developers Lesson'slearned Our client wanted to create a worldwide online leaderboard for their app. The Scoreoid API was the best solution out there. It was super easy to implement and seamlessly worked across all of our target platforms within the Unity framework. Andrew Thompson, emberlab I’ve been searching for a proper solution for my leaderboards without the need of servers or a database, Scoreoid was an instant hit and its no-API approach made it compatible with any platform! Kenney Indie Game Developer Scoreoid is great! It has saved me countless hours of coding and given me the ability to focus more on creating a great game without having to worry about how I’m going to handle all the “other stuff” Scoreoid Rocks! Mark Hemingway Indie Game Developer
- 7. 7 http://paulgraham.com/ds.html Paul Graham’s Essay Afterclosing down Scoreoid now having some free time, I enrolled startup class. Part of the reading was Paul’s Graham’s do things that don’t scale. I realized what I did for Scoreoid in the being was exactly this, and it really works….
- 8. 8 The Goal ForThis Talk?
- 9. 9 Guest Content Writing guestcontent not only works but really helps you get your message across and bring in new users (signups). While it does take a lot of time and does not bring a big amount of users (don’t expect double digits signups but single digits) over time it makes a big difference.
- 10. 10 Guest Content -Take Aways • Always follow up on comments • Always follow up with the website / author • Send a thank you note to the website / author • Track everything - Google Analytics is your best friend
- 11. 11 One on One It’smanual labor intensive but it works. I would each day look at the top 20 and lower (you want the mid tier first, as your not yet recognizable and just starting out) on the Android Play store I would contact each game developer and send them a personal message, I would also try to play each game and it 100% personalized. This is the most important thing.
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- 13. 13 One on One Themessage I sent out
- 14. 14 One on One Ialso did this for meet ups, uaergroups and anywhere that had game developers
- 15. 15 One on One IfI developer did you use Scoreoid after a one on one message I would then post about it on our social networks and interview that developer.
- 16. 16 One on One- Take Away • By playing each game or most of the games I was able to give really feedback and make my email / message personalized • Making your email / message personalized is the most important thing • Don’t send out mass emails and marking emails this does not work, fact.. • If they use your service make sure to follow up and get their feedback
- 17. 17 Community SDK’s I wentto GitHub and other game developer communities looking for developers that have developed SDK’s and components. They just asked then to develop some for Scoreoid. It was hard to find developers for this but after 2 components other developers were doing this on their own without any contact from us. It grew by itself.
- 18. 18 Videos, Videos For eachfeature release we upload short videos showing what were working on, don’t expect viral videos or double digit signups but this works and over time we received an increase in both social media and signups.
- 19. 19 Community Partners On ourmain website we created a community partners section were we promoted in our partners in return they listed us and their site and promoted out services. We were small noting more then a startup but over time were able to build this into a great tool with partners from Microsoft to ATT&T increasing signups and our exposure.
- 20. 20 Doing More We alsodid developer interviews, spoke at events and anything we can think of. We did not look for crazy signup numbers or exposure but just going other there and doing the small stuff. • Don’t worry about exposure or how long something might take • Focus on little steps, doing things that are small • It’s hard work no way to avoid that so go other there and just do it • Ads when your starting out and bootstrapping is a waste
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- 22. marketing techniques thatuse pre-existing social networking services and other technologies to produce increases in brand awareness or to achieve other marketing objectives… Wikipedia The Ultimate Gaming Backend-as-a-Service for Game Developers! Video clips, images Games, email Incentive based Trendy based Viral?
- 23. VIRAL = YOURMARKET REACH The Ultimate Gaming Backend-as-a-Service for Game Developers! Market Segments Incentive size Networking potential Initial impact Time frame Viral Reach?
- 24. Social Media Adding alike button isn't going to get you users Doing social media isn't marketing it’s part of marketing Sharing and posting is not social media Remember your network isn't scalable
- 25. Goals: • Increase Scoreoidbrand awareness and awareness within the game developers community. • Increase social traffic and website traffic. • Increase referrals and SEO? • Testing the waters out. • Can it go viral or pick up traction? The Promotion
- 26. The Ultimate GamingBackend-as-a-Service for Game Developers! Outline: • Gather 6 game designers, sound artists and developers from the community. • Provide assets via landing page and “PayWithATweet”. • Low budget and organic marketing. The Promotion
- 27. 8,159 Unique Views 10,000 Visits 1 MILLION Impressions(Twitter) Over 5,500 Tweets Over 6,000 Social Referral 13,831 Page Views First 24 to 36 Hours
- 28. 18,231 Unique Views 23,000 Visits 1 MILLION+ Impressions(Twitter) Over 6,500 Tweets Over 10,000 Social Referral 39,836 Page Views Within A Week
- 29. The Ultimate GamingBackend-as-a-Service for Game Developers! Brand Awareness
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- 31. The Ultimate GamingBackend-as-a-Service for Game Developers! Brand Awareness
- 32. The Ultimate GamingBackend-as-a-Service for Game Developers! Brand Awareness
- 33. The Ultimate GamingBackend-as-a-Service for Game Developers! Brand Awareness
- 34. Follow up afterinitial spike Target influencers more Incentive based is key Update hash tags constantly Brand awareness is key Be more prepared to measure Direct follow up was missed Closing and wrapping up What We Learned
- 35. Social engagement Brand awareness Segment WHAT TODOSocial research Find a good incentive Be genuine Post, Post, Post Social mechanics Use a designer Your Promotion?
- 36. What can yougive away or provide that has value? What does your target market need or would want? What can I show to my target market that would interest them? What platforms can I use? Brainstorm with everyone THINK OUTSIDE THE BOX Ideas
- 37. Examples Dropbox Michigan Race Dropboxshare for free space
- 38. Examples Dropbox invite friendsfor free space Copy Tweet for extra storage
- 39. Examples Twitter promotion (in2009) - "Tweet Seats" sold domestic tickets through its Twitter account for just nine bucks a pop, selling 1,000 tickets in just three minutes. 33,000 followers to its Twitter account.
- 40. Grasshopper, The NewDork - bit.ly/bCFPNJ Dollar Shave Club - bit.ly/x1RILs Examples - More than 1.3 million views since March 2010 (Startup, USA ). - 2 million views within the first 48 hours, today 5 million. Used video to raise $1 million USD and gain 12,000 new subscriptions within the first two days of debut.
- 41. Will It Blend?- bit.ly/efO3A The Blair Witch Project - bit.ly/GWXa Examples - 530,000 subscribers and over 220 million views - budget of just over $500,000, gross almost $250 million at the box office
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- 43. Wrap Up: Toolsthat can help
- 44. Almog Design @IsAlmogAlmog Design Website: www.almogdesign.net Blog: https://medium.com/@IsAlmog E-Mail: almog@almogdesgign.net Contact
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