Business Models

[koipond]

Hey folks,

I thought I'd throw this up here and get some feedback from people.

The old model that I've been working on isn't working that well. I've put out a couple of books and got bamboozled by printers to print way too much. I've put out a PDF document and it's not moving all that great. I think I need to find a way to get stuff out a bit more.

So, this is my idea. Any game I print that's not a derivative, like a license or anything I work on for other people, will end up being a license. I'd still make a pretty PDF and POD book which will be able to be purchased and have art and make it worthwhile for someone to buy the book, other than to support the company.

The goal here is to get people playing the games that I make, and then maybe that might help me increase some sales.

What does people here think?

[Sanglorian]

As the admin of the , dedicated to open source games, I heartily approve! Your tactic has been used by others, including (author of Sufficiently Advanced). In the wider world, Cory Doctorow has had great success selling his print books after giving his ebooks away free and open.

If you do release your games under an open licence, let me know and I'll add them to the wiki! (Or you can add them yourself, of course).

[koipond]

Totally. I just need to get more testing done on one game and then it's ready to go.

[Rob Lang]

This is close to the model I'll be going with: Icar will always be free to download in PDF but I will be producing a POD version. I'm coming at it from the opposite direction, tho. I always knew Icar would be niche and not sell as a PDF well so I never worried about selling it. I was obsessed with the idea of people playing it.

When at GenCon UK 2008, the most repeated feedback I got was that people would play it if they didn't have to print it. They liked the look of the game and would buy it if there was a book. I decided then to start on 300DPI artwork and Version 4 began.

I think sales is not about the game, it's about marketing. You can't just put a game up online and expect it to be found - you need to be all over loads of big communities and advertise. You need to foster a community and support them. Furthermore, you need to keep the game fresh by doing new things.

[koipond]

That's the problem really, marketing and advertising ends up costing more than I can afford at the moment, especially after a couple of gaffs I made earlier when I had no clue what I was doing with CyberGen.

I'm going to be testing out Geasa out at Dreamation this year. I want to see how it plays out with people who aren't my friends. ^_^

[WittyDroog]

Most of the play-testing feedback I receive from house rules or game variants come from my local game store. Since I used to work there I'm more than welcome to drop off a packet of rules that people may take as they please.

Days later feedback comes rolling in, some people are requesting a mailing list. That request right there shows that the seed of intrest has been planted and should I begin marketing any of my games that's where I'll start.

tl;dr, grassroots marketing.

[Thought]

[Rob Lang]

As Thought alludes to, I'm a blatant self-marketer. It's less sinister when you realise that I, Mr. Dr. Lang Thankyouverymuch am a raving egomaniac. IT'S ALL ABOUT ME. ME ME ME. I find it easy to elbow my way into other people's communities and talk about myself and you have to be a bit like that. Unfortunately, unlike many hobbies, roleplayers are a canny lot and you have to be careful.

Marketing can be done purely with lots of elbow grease and a little money. It takes time and inertia to build up community, readership or followers. You need to be prepared to sit in silence, without feedback for extended periods of time. You need to create content people will actually want. I write about free RPGs and offer a couple of my own. You have to get involved on other people's blogs and communities, post to popular forums and reply to people in twitter. Take an interest in other things - enter other people's competitions and support them by plugging their stuff. You need to leave audio comments for the podcast community and whatever you do - do not stop. Keep going, plugging, having big ideas and ploughing on.

The money comes in when you put a competition together...

[kumakami]

(warning my spell check is off)

I've been toying with the idea of an amplifation company...basicly a POD company thats whole job is marketing and setting up a sales sorce. They do all the online, store catolog, and con pushing of a % cut of the sales.

As for ways of helping ones self if you have a bit of cash to spend theirs looking into Game publisher association or GAMA both give you marketing and con space as well as other handy tools...but they cost! GAMA is like $400us for a years full membership.

[Rob Lang]

Interesting - would you require that the PDF of the game was given away for free?