Grass Roots Player Promotion of CoX
Perhaps then we can just focus on discussing the merit of having promotional posters made up as distributable PDF documents?
The grassroots movement would consist of players printing some out and putting them up around their respective neighborhoods.
-- Vivian
This is a different topic, involving design changes and development, and not what this thread is discussing. The posters I am proposing would be aimed at the general playing demographic of people who like the Heroic genre.
Hard-core Roleplayers have always been a minority in the gaming population of CoX, and from launch to today this has never changed. Any advertising effort, grassroots or corporate, should be aimed towards the widest possible playing demographic in order to generate the largest possible response. -- Vivian |
What does CoH have for players? It has excellent roleplaying elements and some good PVE elements. PVP has long faded as a factor, and raiding is there but it's also mostly irrelevant because the game itself is fairly easy on a whole and the game is very very far from being dependent on raiding to be "good".
If the game and it's development were having issues I highly doubt we would see the amount of future planning like we are in the incarnate system.
No amount of subscriptions is going to save a company from war if war is going to affect it, none (Specially a nuclear war, and that discussion really is not one I care to participate in).
You say you're not trying to create the attitude that CoH is falling but that's exactly what you are saying, so forgive me if I'm a bit confused on your position here. I don't think anyone here wants the game to fail, but going out and yelling to the world to try CoH because it needs to survive all willy nilly is not really the answer and as has been stated by a number of people before... this is not exactly a new game and many many people have already played the game at least once.
You say you're not trying to create the attitude that CoH is falling but that's exactly what you are saying, so forgive me if I'm a bit confused on your position here.
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Your mistaken belief that the game is "alive and well" is in direct opposition to the facts that are evident in NCsoft's own published corporate documents, which clearly show CoX has had a continually declining user base since 2008.
I'm not "creating" an "attitude". My concerns are based on NCsoft's own published revenue figures for the game.
Perhaps it would be best before you continue to deny there is an problem if you would take a few moments and review the NCsoft Stockholder Reports of the past few years, specifically looking at the CoX revenue figures, and then compare them to the published revenue figures and user numbers from 2008. It will help you understand what I am talking about.
going out and yelling to the world to try CoH because it needs to survive all willy nilly
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I am suggesting that the players can take an active hand in marketing the Free Trial Offer in their local, respective communities through the posting of bills which I would underwrite the cost of producing the content for.
My stated hope is that, if such an ongoing grassroots marketing effort met with success, it would increase the number of active subscriptions to CoX and help avoid the problems and consequences that invariably arise (in any MMO) from a steadily declining user base.
-- Vivian
Your mistaken belief that the game is "alive and well" is in direct opposition to the facts that are evident in NCsoft's own published corporate documents, which clearly show CoX has had a continually declining user base since 2008. |
Perhaps this is a short term phenomenon, but I'd rather be optimistic. If we keep getting this steady stream of new content, and the new Incarnate stuff doesn't fail to impress, I can see this increased activity going on for a while.
If the game and it's development were having issues I highly doubt we would see the amount of future planning like we are in the incarnate system.
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If user numbers continue to dwindle, this shaving of team members will happen again, and again, with the maintenance budget steadily shrinking in like wise to the diminishing revenue, until new development does cease for all practical intents and purposes, and only the GMs & Customer Support remain. This is a fate I would prefer we avoid.
No amount of subscriptions is going to save a company from war if war is going to affect it, none (Specially a nuclear war, and that discussion really is not one I care to participate in).
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-- Vivian
I'm generally not one to argue with numbers (though I haven't seen these numbers myself)
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If you would like to look for yourself, NCsoft's Quarterly Earnings Reports are all available to the public and can be downloaded at the following site:
http://www.ncsoft.net/global/ir/quarterly.aspx
My goal here is not to be alarmist, but to try and help put together a grassroots marketing campaign to help bring more people to CoX.
However, having thus far not received a single interested person's comment or PM on the subject, perhaps I have to concede that the Forums are just the wrong place to try and put this together.
I am beginning to think that a nicely-done web site with all of the posters available as PDFs, with the URL promoted across all zones, all servers of CoX and on the various global channels (in a non-spammy, once-in-a-while regular way) would get more traction.
-- Vivian
The Incarnate System was planned out during the development of GR. It's ongoing development and roll-out is part of an overall development schedule. At this point, things are not bad enough that new development would stop. However, expensive, Senior team members are already being removed from the maintenance team.
If user numbers continue to dwindle, this shaving of team members will happen again, and again, with the maintenance budget steadily shrinking in like wise to the diminishing revenue, until new development does cease for all practical intents and purposes, and only the GMs & Customer Support remain. This is a fate I would prefer we avoid. You missed the point entirely. To clarify for you, my point was that currency values -- specifically the Korean Won to US Dollar exchange rate -- are fluctuating because of the threat of war. This causes the actual monthly "income" from US Dollar sales to fluctuate in like wise, exacerbating the problem of the already-small user base. -- Vivian |
I didn't miss the point on the currency exchange. I got that completely but the point still stands. This movement with posters and such is very unlikely to succeed in the first place and subscription gain from it would be minimal at best. The best way to recruit people to a game is to focus on its strengths, not to simply put it out there and be like "Hey look at this poster, play City of Heroes today!"
I'm not an economic genius but if the value of korean currency is dropping in comparison to the US dollar would that not mean that they are making more money instead of less since they are being paid in US dollars? (Completely unsure of this, I am not an expert on the subject of currency changes :P) Unless of course prices they are paying elsewhere are also drastically rising at the same time in which case again... a minimal spike in subscriptions for a month or two is not going to save them nor cause them to start hiring more people than they already would.
I'm sorry but I'm afraid I really just can't back you on this as a major effort to "Save the game" or whatever. It's nice and all but you're delusional if you think it will.
When I say the game is alive and well I mean just that. The game is alive and well.
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I'm not an economic genius but if the value of korean currency is dropping in comparison to the US dollar would that not mean that they are making more money instead of less since they are being paid in US dollars? (Completely unsure of this, I am not an expert on the subject of currency changes :P)
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If you look at the value of the Korean Won vs the US Dollar over time you will see a significant drop since 2009.
http://www.forecast-chart.com/usd-korean-won.html
In 2009, the KRW was around 1,450 per US Dollar. Today, it stands at 1,174. That's a 19% drop in value of the US Dollar. Just on the basis of the currency drop alone, and not including any other attrition or gains in user population, it's as if CoX lost 19% of its users over the last year.
I'm sorry but I'm afraid I really just can't back you on this as a major effort to "Save the game" or whatever. It's nice and all but you're delusional if you think it will.
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-- Vivian
You are correct, if the KRW value was dropping, that would mean they would be better off with US Dollars. However, the additional trillion dollars of foreign debt the US piled on itself with the so-called "stimulus plan" has significantly devalued the US dollar. So, the reverse is taking place.
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That's from your original post, so you might want to edit it, along with all the other warnings of grave danger, averting disasters and such if you don't want your message to seem like doom and gloom. Just another suggestion.
The number of KRW you get for a US dollar has been declining since 2009.
Ergo, the value of the dollar in buying KRW has been decreasing.
Thus, the amount of revenue NCsoft has been getting from our monthly fees has been likewise declining.
I'm sorry if that wasn't clear. I normally don't edit my old posts, but if it was not clear, perhaps I should re-phrase it to make it more clear.
So I am a Recruitaholic, and i support this message, however...every game i play i recruit all my friends to play...and am usually successful to the point they all say i should go into politics. with that i will proudly volunteer to help promote the game in anyway i can, but somewhere i heard someone say that going rogue was advertised well. I disagree. my girlfriend watches alot of TV and when im not playing CoH so do i. we typically watch shows of a superhero nature. ie Heroes, Smallville, no Ordinary family, and a few others. i also watch numerous shows on the SyFy channel during prime time!!. and from the time they Announced GR till today i have yet to see one commercial for GR or anything CoX related. but can you guess how many inane mohawk grenade commercials i saw? well it was alot more than none. someone earlier asked for other suggestions, i just happen to have one!
RealWorldHero.com ....
If you have played CoX for the last few years you may have seen this. It is a Legit Charity put on by CoX players. Mr. Wentworth started it and you can read the info at there website! My suggestion is that during these holidays call your radio stations Rock/country /Rap call them all and tell them of this great program! Most radio shows are already advertising charities and stuff because this is the giving season. When people heare about stuff like this on the radio about 10% of them will at least check it out...
What this will do is 2 things.
A) give Mr Wentworth and RealWorldHero alot of visitors to the website.
B) garner awareness and interest to a game in which the community of gamers can and does support noble charities. which is what this thread is trying to do! (Also its alot cooler to be the geek who gives to charities than the geek who throws a mohawk grenade)
Disclaimer: while i have spoken with Mr. Wentworth in the past this post is not even discussed with him before i randomly spouted this awesome idea. and i did not get permission for anything, these are strictly my opinions but dang its an awesome idea!
I like the OP's enthusiasm. I have done this, to a degree, with some friends. I also gave my local comic shop an extra copy of the GvE edition to give away.
Maybe if some of the talented artists wanted to make posters describing the game with cool visuals and attach it here, others could go post them at their comic shop. Maybe even their theatre or games shop etc.
I also think the OP is off on players. Based on the server loads, I would think we would be closer to the 150K total and not the 80-ish K total. I have never seen the server loads so heavy in all of my 3 years. I realize there are some that say the server loads have been artificially increased by the Devs but I think I can give them the benefit of the doubt.
Hi Jaz! Thanks for the supportive comments. You and Chrome are the only two positive replies to this idea! I had been a bit dismayed at all the negativity, truth to tell.
As to the posters, I was thinking that at the bottom of each poster would be 10-20 little tear-off strips with the URL for the Free Trial on it, so interested people could take it away with them. What do you think?
Server load is not indicative of the number of active, paying accounts, nor does it represent sales -- it simply represents the number of people who are playing online at that particular moment in time compared to the CPU capacity of the server in question (i.e., it takes more users to make the Freedom server go Red than others, as it is (if memory serves) a much more powerful unit).
If all of the players of CoH attempted to connect all at the same time to their respective servers it would bring whatever servers they were trying to connect to up to Red level, and a good chunk of those users likely couldn't connect at all, or would be very lagged when they did. The servers are only intended to service a percentage of the total subscribed userbase at any given time. There's a formula for it, I just forget what it is.
(Although I agree that the Incarnate system has brought a lot of users out of the woodwork, and has them online and playing every night -- it's likely the reason for the higher-than-usual loads!)
Until and unless NCsoft were to publicize actual paid account data (which they haven't done since 2008), we won't know the actual number of live accounts. All we can do is look at their quarterly reports, look at the CoH/V income figures and extrapolate from there based on the 2008 income-vs-user numbers.
-- Vivian
Here is the part I don't get.
Wouldn't we all be doing that to begin with? From the moment we realized this was the game for us?
I just can't see anyone standing in Atlas on their Blaster and thinking. "Man, I hope Jim doesn't find out about this game! I'd hate if my real friends were on here."
I think, by default, anyone playing and posting would have already exhausted their resources for gaining new subscriptions. Heck NC even rewards you for doing so. I've personally begged and pleaded with numerous friends just to give it a chance. These are the ones who refuse to pay to play. I've managed to talk one into playing, but he grew tired of it after only a few months. Came back a year and half later and stayed a few days. Just wasn't for him.
Truth of the matter is. At this point there isn't some huge pool of potential subscribers who just don't know about the game. Thinking that we just need to 'Spread the word' as it were just won't work. Lets face it, if you like superheroes and MMOs you know about COX and have probably tried it. Those that fell in love stayed, the others went looking for greener fields.
Now, whenever I hear about a friend or even a friend of a friend that has burned out on whatever MMO they play I always talk up this one. Most often I get the response that they tried and just couldn't get into it for various reasons. I'll go into detail about all the changes but more often than not, it's the core engine that they disliked so...
I applaud your efforts to secure the longterm future, I just don't see it working. Then again, I can't see any advertising working either, even TV ads, simply for the reasons stated above. After 6 years we have a recognized brand already.
Maestro Mavius - Infinity
Capt. Biohazrd - PCSAR
Talsor Tech - Talsorian Guard
Keep Calm & Chive On!
actually that is the main problem, we do not have a recognized brand, when peopel talk MMos they talk WoW, they talk Everquest, They talk DAOC, heck even Lord of the Rings Online, but no one talks about CoX... it is not an established brand and hasnt been in along time. I was on a team tonight that actually had some new subscribers on...literally 0 vet badges and maybe 5 total badges.. and they were all into the game and how cool everything was...and then one guy/girl... starts talking about how burned out they are and how this and that needs to change...we wonder how and why we dont get new people to stay... how about we give a little effort... maybe talk it up at work...or school or where ever you are whenever you can! the game is not dying, nor is it clsoe to dying, new and returning subscribers come back everyday...if only we as a community had the resources and drive to put this game on the Air... it is Still beating out new Super hero MMOs ... I guess i really like the game and the community and i wanna help keep the game active and encouraging Devs and Corporations to keep giving us new and better content... I am not saying that this game is in Dire need of Subscribers, but what i am saying is that when it comes right down to it the game is getting up ther in age and thing slike GR are revitalizing its look and content. If we can help by going crazy about this and telling everyone we know about it ...it woudl just be a great thing!!!
BTW to the OP have you tried contacting Support to see if there are Official Posters available online that we can use in a campaign like this ? doing this on our own is good ...doing this with support from NC Soft and Paragon Studios would be even better!!
I think the free-trial tear-off idea is cool. Have them on posters. I am sure a lot of players have a good rapport with their comic shop owners and may ok posting these. I am almost at 3 years on this game and only know of it because of my friend. I never saw it advertised anywhere but then I am not really into gaming. I tried this because I enjoy supers and used to be into comics.
It would be cool if to spread the word. I think putting this up at comic shops and theatres is a good idea It seems there are some people willing to do so.
Oh, I agree there have been some negatives here. Such is life. Some people just go through life oblivious but what can you do. Anyone thinking this game is fine and will keep going for a while may not have a realistic approach to gaming. Also, to put up a simple poster is not too much to ask anyone. I won't comment on some of the posts on here....I don't want to get banned
CoX is getting no advertising whatsoever?
One moment...
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Yup, Going Rogue is still a featured game on the Mac section of Steam. It used to be in the PC side too, but seems to have dropped off since I last logged. Back before I disabled ad banners in my browser, I also used to see CoX banner ads on some sites. Then there was the GR give away contest on MMORPG.com. And the parodies of the "I'm a Mac and I'm a PC" ads. And the trailers for every issue.
TV ad =/= lack of advertising. Putting an ad on TV is very expensive, so there's a very good reason why you barely see any game that isn't a big name flagship title being advertised on TV. Even if it's own by the same company. For example, I've seen TV ads for Mario and Metroid, but never for Star Fox, even though it's also a first party Nintendo game.
You have to keep in mind, CoX targets a very, very specific audience, so mass advertising wouldn't work out that well to begin with. Lemme break it down.
Take everyone you advertise to and narrow it down to gamers.
Narrow that down to those interested in RPGs.
Narrow that down to those in MMORPGs.
Narrow that down to those interested in P2P MMOs.
Narrow that down to people not subscribed to something or willing to add to or change their MMO line-up.
Narrow that down to someone interested in non-traditional MMO mechanics.
Narrow that down to someone who doesn't mind the age of the game.
Narrow that down to someone who would prefer an original universe rather than a big name franchise.
Narrow that down to someone who'd enjoy CoX's mature community more than the type we see floating around certain other popular games.
I may have missed some things and some may not apply to everyone, but that's the general gist of it. Other games have either a broader appeal or started with a huge fan base before the idea of said MMO was even a twinkle in someone's eye. If you want to have any real success, you'll want to target whatever player-based ad campaign at the right audience or otherwise you'll get very few to no new subscriptions.
so...your belief is that if we advertise to less peoplea bigger percentage of those advertised will play/subscribe....fair enough....but what we want is to advertise to more people a huge audience...mathematically speaking:
if we focus the advertising to a small group of hand picked audience say for example its 100 people...the success rate of the advertising will be in the hi 75% range there fore 75 people will begin to play the game....75% is a great statistic!!!
however... if we advertise to 10000 people we may only get 10% of them to play...but wait thats 1000 people!!! now maybe 10% is to hi... but even 1% is 100 people!! which is still more than the small focus group...now these numbers are not realistic at all but i think it illustrates my point quite nicely!
Especially when you have the Community doing the advertising for you !!
I'll say again. I applaud the effort, I just don't see it gaining us more than 1 or 2 new players in total.
In my area alone (Alabama) I could plaster the place with posters and free trial deals and even stand outside Wal-Mart during peak Christmas time with a bullhorn warning folks of the Praetorian invasion.
I even go so far as to pull up Ftp.coh and play the Atlas theme and a few other choice selections whenever a guest is sitting in the lobby. My hope is one day someone will recognize it and we can strike up a conversation about it. As it stands, I think I'm the only COX subscriber in the entire Birmingham metro area... how sad is that?
Thing is, even if one of those people saw the poster they'd still be out of luck. Of the 3 Gamestops in my area not a single one has a copy of this game, not even GR. Best buy is the only place in town still carrying it and the manager there said if he sells the last 2 copies they won't be re-ordering...
I'm not saying the game is in trouble, far from it. I can see your fear about the Korean Won becoming more valued to the investors but with a sustanable base like we have, even a selling of the IP would come with a few more years of support.
I'd love to see an influx of 100,000 or more new blood, I just don't see it happening with whats looming on the horizen. Maybe if one of the big dogs was to fold, but even then I think we'd only pick up 10,000 or so.
Fact is, this is a niche title. Not all gamers like superheroes.
Maestro Mavius - Infinity
Capt. Biohazrd - PCSAR
Talsor Tech - Talsorian Guard
Keep Calm & Chive On!
I'll say again. I applaud the effort, I just don't see it gaining us more than 1 or 2 new players in total.
In my area alone (Alabama) I could plaster the place with posters and free trial deals and even stand outside Wal-Mart during peak Christmas time with a bullhorn warning folks of the Praetorian invasion. I even go so far as to pull up Ftp.coh and play the Atlas theme and a few other choice selections whenever a guest is sitting in the lobby. My hope is one day someone will recognize it and we can strike up a conversation about it. As it stands, I think I'm the only COX subscriber in the entire Birmingham metro area... how sad is that? Thing is, even if one of those people saw the poster they'd still be out of luck. Of the 3 Gamestops in my area not a single one has a copy of this game, not even GR. Best buy is the only place in town still carrying it and the manager there said if he sells the last 2 copies they won't be re-ordering... I'm not saying the game is in trouble, far from it. I can see your fear about the Korean Won becoming more valued to the investors but with a sustanable base like we have, even a selling of the IP would come with a few more years of support. I'd love to see an influx of 100,000 or more new blood, I just don't see it happening with whats looming on the horizen. Maybe if one of the big dogs was to fold, but even then I think we'd only pick up 10,000 or so. Fact is, this is a niche title. Not all gamers like superheroes. ![]() |
Anyway, I think the devs should give us a colorful ad and place it on this thread. We print and post.
![Smile](images/smilies/smile.gif)
I found myself asking a simple question after my last post.
What's the harm in trying? Oh yeah, there isn't any.
So yeah, lets get some promotional material ready to go.
I'm thinking maybe a mass leaflet dropping over major metropolitan areas with pleas for help from the invasion of Cole.
I don't have a plane at the moment though...
Maybe I'll just stick to touting the virtues of COX over whatever other game my friends are playing. I still have hope that one day I'll be able to convince a (gasp) girl to try it too. I've heard girl gamers exist... somewhere.
Maestro Mavius - Infinity
Capt. Biohazrd - PCSAR
Talsor Tech - Talsorian Guard
Keep Calm & Chive On!
I understand what the OP is trying to do.I've started my own crusade to turn the table on the terrible situation COX faces in Brazil.I've organized a Meet&Greet today,and sent the results to Avatea.I might post a report on the forums later.
![](http://img156.imageshack.us/img156/9729/loyalistsig6.png)
so...your belief is that if we advertise to less peoplea bigger percentage of those advertised will play/subscribe....fair enough....but what we want is to advertise to more people a huge audience...mathematically speaking:
if we focus the advertising to a small group of hand picked audience say for example its 100 people...the success rate of the advertising will be in the hi 75% range there fore 75 people will begin to play the game....75% is a great statistic!!! however... if we advertise to 10000 people we may only get 10% of them to play...but wait thats 1000 people!!! now maybe 10% is to hi... but even 1% is 100 people!! which is still more than the small focus group...now these numbers are not realistic at all but i think it illustrates my point quite nicely! Especially when you have the Community doing the advertising for you !! |
Marketing doesn't quite work like that. But, for the sake of this, let's say it does. But let's add costs! Let's say it costs $5 advertise to one person. Advertising to the first 100 would cost us $500. Let's say the 75 who did sub bought a box ($20) and paid for three months ($15). That'd be $4875 revenue for a total profit of $4375, ignoring all other costs associated with running and updating the game. Now, for the group of 10,000, it's going to cost us $50,000. 1,000 sub, buy a box, but since this is just random people and not the audience CoH targets, they are therefore less into this sort of thing. So they unsub after the free month. So, we get $20,000 in box sales for a net loss of $30,000.
But wait, I'm being unfair by saying the second group doesn't sub three months! Well, in the unlikely scenario that our 1,000 subscribers who may not even like video games, as opposed to the target audience CoX aims at, subs three months as well. We then end at $65,000 total for a $15,000 profit.
So, isn't that better than the first target? No, it's not. First, that $50k we'd need to reach the 10,000 people? Yeah, that's a crap ton more money than $500. Additionally, the former is a 90% return from the gross income whereas the latter is a 23% return. The latter is, comparatively, a very poor investment where in the former we could sink a few thousand more and quickly exceed the general targeted ads while still spending far less.
But of course, costs don't work like that either. This is all just very simplified.
Now, considering we're talking about the fan base doing advertising, initial costs are going to be a HUGE factor. We don't have the huge sums of cash to reach the mass audience. For us, if we want to maximize our reach, we need to target the specific groups who'd be more likely to get interested in CoX. Vivian, for example, can only afford to print so many fliers, so why not post them where people most likely to be interested in CoX would be instead of just plopping them randomly?
I guess I can add to the topic, too, though...
I've attempted to get co-workers and friends onto this game...but it seems most of them are somewhat MMO illiterate. Which saddens me. I've had an IT worker log in and not able to figure out how to chat until I sent him repeated tells, and even after that it seems it was too much for him, for that was the first and last time he played on the trial. And then there are my cheap friends that decide they can't afford an MMO.
I just don't see how much you can do to get people onto this game. Unless they live under a rock, the ones that would have joined by now have joined and/or left. This type of game attracts a certain kind of person, I think, and most of those are already here.