Marketing that doesn't work

[Roman Budzowski]

Hi
Well, I am not sure if title describes it well, but I would like everyone to list their marketing actions that didn't work, so we all don't have to do same mistakes.


Stumble Upon:
You pey per page view (it's like PPC) - $0.05 (so it is cheap)

I paid $10 for 200 page views of www.runesofavalon.com, targeted to US, males and females, 30 to 65 years old, category video-games.

Only one person downloaded the game (average for this site is 30%). So it is very disappointing.

best
Roman

[princec]

Just tried Stumbleupon myself. Will let you know if it works. And Facebook.

Cas :)

[Adrian Cummings]

Same here :)

[stanchat]

I actually got a decent boost in traffic from this web ad place.

http://www.ultimateinc.net/ttraffic.html


I paid $40 for 10,000 targeted vistors.

[Roman Budzowski]

@stanchat: that sounds very interesting! but do they buy or download your products? or just browse the page like stumble upon audience?

cheers
Roman

[stanchat]

@stanchat: that sounds very interesting! but do they buy or download your products? or just browse the page like stumble upon audience?

cheers
Roman

When you go to setup what target audience you want it is very specific so the quality of traffic is better. It actually has a category for "Games for PC".
I used this mainly to boost my affiliate game site and the number of actual sales increased significantly for a 3-4 week period and sort of leveled off. I used for 2 mos and it was worth the investment IMHO.

They have 162 listed categories: http://www.ultimateinc.net/traffic_us.html

[Roman Budzowski]

So I will have to give it a try, though pop-under makes it feel "low quality".

cheers
Roman

[bignobody]

So I will have to give it a try, though pop-under makes it feel "low quality".

cheers
Roman

They use pop-unders? I didn't see that mentioned anywhere. I did see where you're not allowed to use pop-ups/unders/Exit Ads or background music on your site, but no real detail on how they actually get the traffic to your site.

[Roman Budzowski]

Go to
http://www.ultimateinc.net/trafficfaq.html

First answer says it all.

cheers
Roman

[bignobody]

Thanks, not sure how I missed that.

[Spore Man]

I'd post an example that didn't work out, BUT the problem with doing this is it makes it too easy to dismiss the effort itself, when the problem could be:

- Bad ad targetting
- Bad ad content
- Bad site design on destination page
- Bad navigation on destination page
- Weak call to action
- Weak design
etc....

[Roman Budzowski]

@Spore Man: Post your example with URL to advertised site, so we can jugde. If you, just like me, have numbers to compare, you know what can be the problem. If for one source of traffic your site has 1/200 effectives and for other 3/10 then there is something wrong with traffic. Of course you can redesign your page, but it may be not worth it.

Targeting can be a problem, so if you can, post what you targeted, so we will know that it ain't work. We all have game sites, so if something works for one indie, there's a chance it can work for other one.

best
Roman

[Spore Man]

OK well, I don't want to cast a bad light on this particular PDA software portal, in case the ineffectiveness was our own fault (very likely):

One year ago, we sponsored the Pocket PC puzzle games category (http://www.handango.com/SoftwareCatalog.jsp?siteId=1&jid=FC9F32C3X9AD4D64BC3C84DA4B472D61&language=english&platformId=2&N=96806+93282), as well as the Palm puzzle games category (http://www.handango.com/SoftwareCatalog.jsp?siteId=1&jid=FC9F32C3X9AD4D64BC3C84DA4B472D61&platformId=1&N=96804+93266) on Handang0. "Sponsor" means that when someone browses the category, a small thumbnail and blurb appears at the top of the main content area.

We made our money back in PPC sales, but no profit. And did not make our money back on Palm side.
PPC link (http://www.handango.com/PlatformProductDetail.jsp?siteId=1&jid=FC9F32C3X9AD4D64BC3C84DA4B472D61&language=english&platformId=2&N=96806&Ntt=spore&R=178091&productId=178091)
Palm link (http://www.handango.com/PlatformProductDetail.jsp?siteId=1&jid=FC9F32C3X9AD4D64BC3C84DA4B472D61&platformId=1&N=96804&Ntt=spore&R=178092&productId=178092)

Potential problems:
- PPC game is too similar to the free one that ships with Pocket PCs.
- Palm version doesn't have enough features and game modes.
- Palm version has no trial demo.
- Name just doesn't "pull" people in the way "Bejeweled" and "PacMan" do.
- Site or category just doesn't have the traffic to justify the cost they charge

What did work:
They let you have special sales, which would get posted and linked on a "specials" page. (ie: You would email them and request to post a sale, such as "20% off for month of January"). This generated some sales, and cost nothing other than emailing them. However I can't find this on their site anymore.

[GolfHacker]

Don't announce the latest greatest version of your best-selling game... a year in advance. Potential customers see a better version "coming soon", and they decide to wait to purchase. Talk about a sales killer. :(

[Adrian Cummings]

Er... I gave up with this method of advertising this morning :P

'Video Games' and 'Puzzles' oh well perhaps not then.

Whatever?, dunno can't be arsed with it now anyway as I've lost interest :)

---

Hi,

We're sorry to inform you that one of your StumbleUpon advertising campaigns cannot be accepted at this time.

There are not a sufficient number of people to view your ad in the category you have selected. Try broadening your targeting and resubmit your campaign.

Please feel free to check our content guidelines or submit other sites for approval as well.

Sincerely,

The StumbleUpon Team

---

[KingAto]

Why don't you guys advertise on TV? Do you not think it's worth the investment?

[Adrian Cummings]

It's about £2K per second when I last looked I think in the UK - on regional network too :P

[KingAto]

I called G4TV the other day and they told me it would be around 700 ($US)for primetime fri. and sat. and closer to 300 for weekdays. I'm not sure how long a spot this would be. I didn't ask.

[Adrian Cummings]

Ah yes in the US it is no doubt much cheaper with all your networks on offer! - tho in the UK we only have 5 major TV stations (and 2 of them don't do adverts at all i.e. the BBC channels) and sub regional versions of them - the rest are freeview type affairs and Sky network which are prolly cheaper still (those I don't know what the rates are at all?).

Either way in the UK it's way off my personal radar as an indie :)

Here is some current rate card info for broadband ad stuff in the UK on ITV local network:
http://www.itvlocal.com/misc/ITVLocalRateCard.pdf

This is quite a good resource:
http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=738527

[Edit: KingAto: I just clicked on your site link to mySpace and the metal scared me near to death as I had my amp/speakers up pretty full! ooch! hehe :)]

[KingAto]

Mmm, hate it when that happens.

But uh, yea, must suck to live in the UK...

[papillon]

If I had more.... um, balls is the wrong word :) ... then clearly I should try to manipulate my way onto CBBC as a demonstration of growing up to make video games - and being a girl! But, er, I don't think I can pull that off.

[Qitsune]

I've been interviewed for a perspective for non-traditional careers for women, it was horrible:
-We want to film what you do for fun, but it has to be different than what you do at work.
-Dude it's winter and we are in the friggen woods, in winter I play videogames and draw, live with it.
-Then let's film you walking in the snow and playing pool....
-Whatever...

About tv spots, the thing is tv spots (aside for Superbowl stuff) needs repetition, so you can't take all your money and pour it into one spot, because it's not going to do anything. People are so numb they need to see it again and again and again.

[Adrian Cummings]

If I had more.... um, balls is the wrong word :) ... then clearly I should try to manipulate my way onto CBBC as a demonstration of growing up to make video games - and being a girl! But, er, I don't think I can pull that off.

I sent some Dweebs plush toys and boxed games I recall to CBBC years ago and it did'nt get anywhere - the production people prolly nicked em :P

I see you did Charm School - I did the dvd box art (amongst 100's of games whoose authors appear to be on here) for Xing in 2004 :)

[papillon]

Yeah - don't know if it ever was published anywhere and never heard from them again but didn't particularly care either, it was my First Game and it's kinda crap. :)

[Adrian Cummings]

I think it did the rounds so you missed out on some royalty perhaps? - I don't know for sure mind, I just did all the art/layout you see back in the day.

[Maupin]

The first I ever heard about StumbleUpon was when someone gave Natto-Cat a thumbsup and review in the "cats" category. Within a few days I got 2 or 3 thousand hits. Unfortunately I didn't track downloads and Natto-Cat is freeware so I can't say sales increased. (That was even before I had the Big Fish Games ad on the page.) Now I get just a few hits a day from SU, if that.

I think what happened is that the thumbsdowns eventually canceled out the thumbsups and SU stopped showing my page to people who just wanted to see cute pictures of kittens jumping. :rolleyes:

Since then I've signed up for SU as a member three times and each time I selected "online-games" as one of my interests, and was shown the same stupid Flash games. (There is no regular games category available to new SU members - just online games.) I really believe that if you have an online flash game of decent enough quality, you can get a steady stream of 100s or 1000s of hits a day from SU. I'm thinking of making a simple Flash game to test this out.

In fact, a flash game where you babysit and dress up a cat would probably break the internet.