Marketing: A Free game for marketing a premium game

Hello guys!

I wish all of you are doing great, I have some ideas playing in mind for several days, but I'm not sure if the ideas sound too spammy or it is fine.

I have a free game, upcoming to iOS App store very soon (Waiting for Apple Approval), as well I got a premium game I'm working on in the time being with expected time to release this year (Properly Q2-Q3)

So what I'm thinking on is to show one pop up every 2-3 weeks, let user know about my new blog post, or some kind of news about my game development, if they want to read more, take them to safari for them to read the blog post, maybe a new video on YouTube, or they can just click ignore.

Also, the second thing is that I'm giving users free gold for clicking on my social network profiles (If they want to follow) including Twitter/Facebook and YouTube (This is in the "Gold" menu, not a pop-up, only if the users goes to the menu and needs extra gold in the game)

Let me know your opinions about this idea.

Here is the free game to be release:
(100% free, no iAP, no Ads) as it is my first game.

 

One ad every 2-3 weeks? You know the industry standard is closer to 2-3 an hour. Some push the limit far more then that, showing ads every time the user dies. That can be as frequent as every two or three minutes.

 

I'm not showing an "Ad", maybe you missed my point, I'm sharing my other game, into my free game, the development progress, to get more attraction on my upcoming game.

 

An ad is an ad. Users will not distinguish between types of ads.

 

If you want to make it look "special", and not like usual Ads, then I would recommend you to make the button in the main menu of your game, says "Coming soon". And once the user will click on that button, it will give more information about the upcoming game. Finally, once the game is on, you will activate that button and rename it to something else(game's name?). So, whoever has your game will see it.
At the same time it doesn't look like the Ads, and also you will play on users curiosity and make them to actually click and pay attention on your upcoming game.

 

Sure, but I think he is distinguishing because his new game isn't out yet, and he's not releasing new content about it every few minutes. He only wants to draw attention to his other game when there's (probably) something new to show, otherwise even interested people will probably not bother following the links. Is that right, @Shbli?

On one hand, it could definitely be worth a go. On the other hand, my hunch is that you'd want something more timely. Except where they get a good critical mass I think games are most popular immediately after release, and then have a "long tail". The long tail might be useful for residual income, but is it useful for advertising? Plus, will the average person playing your free game play it now and in three weeks? (I play most mobile games exactly once.) And if they see adverts a few times now will that result in enough salience that they download your other game in six months?

So - and this is completely unvalidated - I think you might get more mileage out of more aggressive advertising but timing both of your games to release at once.

 

Thanks everyone for your feedback!

@BoredMormon I don't agreed here, I think it makes a difference for me as a user, an app asking me to download their other app (With a simple text pop up), is different than daily ads that appear with lots of graphics, force me to watch video or intentionally want me to click on it's ads, though I agree both are ads, not the same ones.

@DalerHakimov Thanks for the great idea, the issue is that users may not open my app everyday, sending them a push notification and displaying a text pop up at app start-up (Only when there's news) guess will have more attention, also through the menu I offer people free gold for following me on social media networks

@angrypenguin Thanks, exactly my game is story based (Even the free one), so properly if the user liked it, he will forget about it for sometime later, but even if he opened it the app the second time, I will show him a basic pop up (Within the game main menu), he can either click decline and play the game, or he can click on "Take me there" to read more or something similar. Also I'm thinking to send a push notification each 2-3 weeks to keep my users engaged, and keep my free game updated with new content regularly (Each free time I get) to keep users hooked to it (I just though about this because of your comment, thanks)

@limitless3662 Thank you for spamming my thread!

 

Extremely sorry for that, I take my post back.

 

It is different from your run of the mill monetisation ads. Sound less irritating and more tasteful. But it's still asking the user to do something fundamentally unrelated to the app they have opened.

I guess what I'm saying is don't ignore conventional marketing wisdom on this. Two to three weeks is a long time between ads, and it's entirely possible this won't generate the hype you need for your new app.

 

I'm worried if I put too much of posts, people will get used to clicking the "Skip" button every time. I'm giving them 100 Gold for clicking on the link to watch a new update once.

 

You realise the major flaw in your plan right?

Assuming your game is like 99.9% of other games released on iOS, after 1 week and maybe a few hundred downloads, the downloads will stop, and you will be advertising to maybe 10-50 people who still play your game.

 

Well, I understand your comment really, I have been into the App Store for over 2 years now, I know my way around this issue, specially as my game is 100% free (the first one), and it's quit big original game (not another endless runner)

Though I agree 100% with what you say, it's true a lot of the times, I have been able to get thousands of downloads of another free game but its transferred to another person now.

Nothing can be guaranteed for sure!

I'm still waiting for Apple review and I already have an update, if someone want to keep in touch guys you can reach me privately and I'll happily share results.