Core Marketing

Word-of-mouth (or keyboard) is the best marketing strategy for small companies. If you have a message that can go viral, you'll get it seen by thousands of people without having to pay for those impressions. How do you get this seemingly magical audience?

You might get lucky, but you should try to improve your odds.

Find the core. Do you already have a core audience for your products? Customers who know your stuff and love it, and talk about it? Great! Make sure that your newest products connect to them, and that they talk about your products. Find out where these customers hang out... is it Facebook? Discussion boards on some web site for fans? Your own discussion boards? Once you've located where they are, talk to them. Tell them what's coming up and why they should care. Maybe it's more of what they already like, or maybe it's a change of pace. Give them some back story, some hints or tips, maybe a special offer. Ideally, drop this info a bit at a time leading up to your release, and then regularly after. Some additional content for free will help move the buzz along.

Create the core. Ah, you don't already have a fan base. You need to create one. Find out where fans of games like yours go; at least, find the most enthusiastic fans. Maybe it's RPG.net for RPG fans, or Touch Arcade.com for iPhone games. Somewhere, there is already a group of people who are interested in your type of game, and fanatic enough to gather online to talk about such games. (Maybe there are multiple places, depending on the theme or genre of your game.) Find those places and start talking. Ask for their help. Solicit their feedback. Many are happy to talk about games and what they like and don't like. You can pick up some good pointers on how to improve your game. Yes, sometimes you'll disagree with people's opinions, and they may even be hostile. You'll be judged on how well you keep your cool in difficult online situations, so try to avoid a heated response.

If you have crafted a strong marketing message for a good game, the word will get around when you talk to the enthusiasts. Make sure you have new things to add to the discussion on a regular basis, and you can keep the buzz going. Even if you never make this game a huge seller, you're laying the groundwork for the next one.