let's say i had a good sized budget for advertising - for arguements sake - 10K. What could i do and how much wld it cost me? 1. Facebook Ads 2. Google AdWords 3. Banner advertising on top 15 iPhone app websites. Anything else i am forgetting?
the more I learn, the less I think traditional advertising is going to do much to help any of us. Many have "fooled around" with Facebook ads but really, though it seems powerful, unless you know "exactly what you are doing" then it is very likely a big waste of money. As for banner ads, most people who've spoken on it regularly say that it's failure over and over again. Unless you can afford to advertise on a very huge site (to the tune of IGN or something) for a long time (to the effect that this will cost you millions of dollars, and no I am not kidding or exaggerating) If you intend to spend any real money on advertising, I'd suggest talking to some PR firm (do your research on who is appropriate, it ain't easy!) and letting those who have "the proper connections" take care of you.
What are the good "PR" firms out there? Some promise the world like ranking in top 25 and some say they can dish out great reviews. so who's to be believed? Any solid recommendations out there? i mean i would love to advertise on banners and such but even as i a consumer, ignore them straight away.
Ok I will give you 1 , PRmac.com. They will spread news of your game, only cost $20 and get you indexed by google. Now the ones who claim top 25 , thats bullshit. If company even sounds too good to be true , they are con-artist. Iam busy right now but later I will look for free press release services and post links. But go to PRmac now and get that done. It's the absolute cheapest with good results.
Yemi, the 'PR' in PRmac stands for Press Release. The 'PR' in PR Firms stands for Public Relations. They are two very different things. Free press release sites are rarely even worth the effort unfortunately. They are used by SEO's to spam links and just don't get read by many major industry types. www.PRMac.com has the extended release that is worth the money though, it's only $20, and you will probably end up getting your game covered in a couple blogs here and there if it's interesting enough. http://www.gamespress.com/ looked good as well, and is free. We got some nice coverage through them. The only other pr service that looked interesting was http://ispreadnews.com/ which we haven't used personally just yet, but it promises to reach international audiences which is cool. However, if you are looking to spend upwards of $10k to advertise a game, look for a Public Relations firm that specializes in games. http://www.triplepointpr.com/ is one, it looks like Pocket Gods uses them as well as a variety of other big name games. There's a big list of Game PR companies here: http://www.gamesindustry.biz/resources/directory/category/25 But do your due diligence and find out just how wide their reach is and what they offer. They will send big numbers and promise amazing results, but talk with former clients to get the actual story. www.9magnets.com (another decent looking PR company) has a free little ebook they give away for helping you develop a hook in your press releases and how to get media attention that is worth a read: http://www.scribd.com/doc/32354431/9magnets-com-s-App-Success-Guide For anybody who has less than $10k to invest in advertising, I'd say they are better off reinvesting that in their game and focusing on some grass roots marketing, community building. Get your game on www.Gamezebo.com, run a generous Kickstarter campaign, do the whole personalized email to each and every major game blogger out there, and spend it on plane tickets to get to the major game events to show off your product. That seems to be a great way to get some media attention these days. So that's my big list of sites and services we are looking into. I'm a professional marketer and run my own marketing company, so I do have a little experience in these matters.
