This is exactly why I've been writing "The Hacker's Guide to User Acquisition" (first chapter: http://www.austenallred.com/the-hackers-guide-to-the-first-1... , next chapter will be about getting press). I would point out a few things. 1. The notion that you "build a better mousetrap" and people will beat their way to your door is true maybe 1% of the time. Many more companies have had to fight a little to become suc…
Exactly! Well said austenallred.
Most startups fail because they aren’t hitting their target growth rate, not because they failed to build a product that works.
You have to fight to grow. Evaluate how much time you spent building your product, and then invest just as much time in growth-related activities.
This is exactly why I've been writing "The Hacker's Guide to User Acquisition" (first chapter: http://www.austenallred.com/the-hackers-guide-to-the-first-1... , next chapter will be about getting press). I would point out a few things. 1. The notion that you "build a better mousetrap" and people will beat their way to your door is true maybe 1% of the time. Many more companies have had to fight a little to become suc…
What changed to suddenly make all users jump on board?
Came across an insightful video and presentation given at the Konsoll 2013 conference on "marketing indie games on a $0 budget" that might be of interest to folks. It was given within the context of indie game development but its really addressing a common problem.
Nice. So one of the things that happened to me when I came to the Bay Area was I was working at Intel and I had to talk to a lot of marketing folks (who were talking to 'the public' about Intel's chips). I realized I didn't have a clue what they did. I set out to correct that before I started my own company and looked for a job that would let me work closely with marketing but still be engineering based. I found one…
A few notes... Marketing for large enterprises is a different challenge than promoting a product on your own, so insights from working at SUN might not translate into street level marketing. 1) marketing is not sales - This is absolutely incorrect. Marketing is any communication that touches a prospect or customer. Copywriting is salesmanship in print. Sales is absolutely a key ingredient of marketing! 2) Marketing i…
I feel like this comment might sum up the difference between high traction B2C and slow and steady B2B. At no point do you mention the closing or cashing the check. Your approach is perfectly valid for most B2C stuff, but as a B2B guy, this looks completely foreign. Definitely a learning experience for me at least. As a B2B, this approach would IMHO fall on its face miserably, but I can totally see how this would be effective when more users == more value and sales-guy-on-a-phone is not scalable. That said, for B2B people, I would be highly skeptical that this approach would work. When your market is small, you had better have closers on the line to ring the bell.
This comes from an AdWords guy. Seriously, work on marketing to the community and with content, not with paid ads. Paid ads come in when you've identified a market, medium to reach them and what your message is. Have that nailed before you spend a dime :)
If anyone knows some good iOS game marketing techniques/tips, please drop me a line--My email is in my profile. I'm trying to market: http://appstore.com/xo9
This looks like something I could actually use. I've just downloaded it. My take from the website, there is no price on the main page. I have to click 'Buy Now' with no idea whether I want to actually purchase. Which is a commitment (in my head) that I'm not prepared to make without knowing the price.
I didn’t even realise it wasn’t free until reading your blog listing 'sales' separately to 'downloads'. Price needs to be way more obvious up the top. Only now just seeing it’ll cost $50, is a disappointment after thinking it was free.
$50?? Wow. This person needs to learn more than just marketing.
Try hitting up Reddit. The Reddit community is one of the most active and engaging communities out there. The only challenge is that they are brutally honest so only use Reddit if you're ready to hear the truth.
You could also try getting a promotion from apple in the App Store.
Another thing you should do is incorporate some sort of analytics in your app. Most users wont tell you ANYTHING about your app. I'm running Google Analaytics and I can tell that the average user spends ~7 minutes in my game which lets me know that each session is pretty engaging. That's also 7 minutes that they are getting hit with iAd's if they didn't upgrade. Metrics are key, so add something to track app usage.
Your application is niche so you need to target spaces where people that use your the services that your app integrates with hang out.
Nice. So one of the things that happened to me when I came to the Bay Area was I was working at Intel and I had to talk to a lot of marketing folks (who were talking to 'the public' about Intel's chips). I realized I didn't have a clue what they did. I set out to correct that before I started my own company and looked for a job that would let me work closely with marketing but still be engineering based. I found one…
I'd add that Marketing is about value creation ultimately. You have to start with the right mindset, i.e. that you product has no value per se, and that marketing is everything you are going to do around your product/service to create the perception of its value. Your customers don't know how time you spent on it, they don't care how complex it is, they don't even want to know how it works (at least not until they ar…
This is true, some of the best marketing was made around making people want stuff that they wouldn't really have a use for.