An Introduction to Games Marketing

The go-to-market guide that instructs you on how to plan and execute marketing activities for your game.

Created byLauren Clinnick, Katie Gall

Last updated 10/2015

English

What you'll learn

Understand some effective methods and tools to market their game.
Understand basic games marketing theory and practice.

Course content

6 sections • 6 lectures • 49m total length

What is Games Marketing?5:53
This lesson will introduce students to some basic marketing activities that can help grow your audience and market your studio or game successfully.

Topics include:

An explanation of 'marketing' as a concept

Discussing the value of a high-quality marketing plan

What makes marketing unique in this industry

When to start marketing activities

Why marketing makes a difference
What is Games Marketing?

Pitching Your Game9:14
This lesson explains the concept of pitching. This lesson covers what your pitch is used for and how to deliver it. We explain how to communicate your game concept to a variety of audiences including: players, publishers and the media.

Topics include:

An explanation of pitching

Definition of a value proposition to a variety of audiences

How to get players to to play

Telling the media what they need to know

How to pitch to a publisher
Pitching Your Game

Marketing to the Media vs. Players7:32
This lesson covers how marketing to or for the media is different to marketing to your potential players.

Topics include:

How to define your goals when talking to media or players

Understanding the media and their needs

How to get the media interested in you and your game

How to handle an interview

Understanding Currency, Significance, Proximity, Human Interest and Prominence angles
Marketing to the Media vs. Players

Social Media and Video Marketing9:53
This lesson covers content creation and marketing methods for social media and video marketing.

Topics include:

Assigning social media roles within your team or studio

Types of content to post on social media

Tips when creating video content for coverage on YouTube and other video platforms

Designing game content that is shareable
Social Media and Video Marketing

Communicating with the media7:23
This lesson covers the marketing documents and assets you'll require to support media coverage and audience engagement.

Topics include:

Ensuring your documents are easy to find for the media

Trailers and how to share them

Presskits and where to put them

Press Releases and understanding media email etiquette

Boilerplates: what are they and where do they go?

Images: what kind, how many and where to put them
Communicating with the Media

Building Your Marketing Strategy9:32
This lesson summarizes how to combine individual marketing activities into a basic plan that you can scale to fit your development cycle.

Topics include:

What is a marketing strategy and how to create one

What is a marketing plan?

Assessing your game type, business model, target market, platform, geographic considerations, marketing channels and analytics.

Step-by-step walk-through of a basic games marketing strategy
Building your marketing strategy

Requirements

Be involved in the games industry
Have a mindset that marketing can help you sell your games more effectively!
You should be familiar with games terminology e.g FPS, Roguelike, RPG, MMO, GAAP, GAAS, Point and Click etc.

Description

An Introduction to Games Marketing is an expertly designed course aimed at students and independent game designers who want to understand how to market their game. This course is designed specifically for games by industry professionals. You should take this course if you want to gain a better understanding of what marketing activities you should do and how to do them. Our course includes a pack of 5 resources including, a social media handbook, a media briefing template, an example coverage report, an example social content calendar and a press list template for you to use for your games.

This course should take 2-3 hours to complete and is structured in a series of lectures followed by a quizzes. You should take this course if you need help starting your games marketing, you have a game in development or you want to gain a greater understanding of the impact and value of marketing in the games industry.

This course is perfect for you if you are:

Midway through your games development
Are about to attend a tradeshow such as PAX, Indiecade, Fantastic Arcade, GDC, TGS or others
Are about to send out press releases to the media
Ready to set up your social channels to start advertising your game
If you are studying game development

Who this course is for:

This course is appropriate for, but not limited to: developers in the games industry, hobby developers, students of game design, and stakeholders in the games industry.
This is a basic course intended for games developers and students that have limited or no marketing education.

An Introduction to Games Marketing

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