A few years ago, I was baffled by the performance of an email my team was sending to our users. At a glance, the unique open and click-through rates were fantastic by our industry standards, but when the users landed in our app, the bounce rate was uncomfortably high. Paradoxical, indeed. When we looked at the feature activity data, it seemed that users were either bailing seconds after arriving or clicking aimlessly before eventually leaving, missing the feature we told them about entirely. It was almost as if they had no idea what to do once they got there. Determined to understand why the email was clearly failing at what we wanted it to do (and under a somewhat intimidating time constraint of the upcoming sprint), I printed it out and took it to the food carts down the street. I had every food cart owner read the email, and in their own words, tell me what the email said. Each and every conversation went something like this: Me: “Hi, can you please read this example email?” Food Cart Owner:

One question developers often ask is if they should trademark their game title or company name (or not). We just went through the trademarking process with our new gaming platform Kartridge and, after a lot of calls with lawyers and trademark specialists, can share some insights. As with everything, there are both pros and cons to trademarking. Please note that this article is merely an opinion from a marketer's perspective and does not constitute legal guidance. One should always check and verify their own approach with a qualified lawyer experienced in trademark law. What is a trademark anyway? A trademark is generally defined as “a recognizable sign, design, or expression which identifies products or services of a particular source from those of others.” It offers legal protection against anyone using your game or company title, or a similar derivative of your name, without permission. Trademarks fall into different classes that, generally, identify the industry the mark exists under. Trademarks can span different classes, and it is possible to have the same name exist in different classes so long as the

For an indie dev with a small team, it can be overwhelming to think of everything that goes into successfully launching a game -- from actually building something unique and fun to picking the right art style. By the time you get close to launch and have to think about how to market the game, it can seem like a herculean task. Should you have an advertising strategy? Should you work with influencers and, if so, where do you start? How do you manage and grow a community on social media? By the time you’ve wound up in the Twitch wormhole of doom, you’ve probably already created an account, but have no idea what to do next. It's easy, right? Just stream some stuff... On paper, Twitch looks like just another social account. But it's really a different planet in comparison to Twitter and Facebook and requires significantly more time and resources to really do it right. So TL;DR, if you don’t have the time, resources, and most importantly PASSION to run it and stick to

If you’re looking to paid advertising to grow your user base, you probably already know that it’s getting harder and harder to engage users with standard ad formats. Look around and you’ll notice that new ad types keep popping up, and while during the last few years the market has continued to move toward video ads, this year we’ve seen the growth of playable and game-simulation ads to be the most innovative ad type yet. Admittedly, we’ve tested a lot of different ads, and we’re here to proclaim that if you’ve not tried playable ads as part of your UA creative tool set, you may be missing out on some big growth opportunities. Playable ads create an entirely new ad experience built around the player -- an ad that doesn’t feel like an ad and is actually welcomed by users. Here are a few advantages of playables that we like from our experience: Natural User Experience: It’s a great way to allow users to experience the game before installing an app.

At Kongregate we have the privilege of working with a wide variety of game developers, many of whom are enthusiastic to open up their game pitches with an x-statement. X-statements attempt to summarize a game succinctly using two subjects, often referencing other video games, mechanics, art styles, or popular media. Very often they look like this: “My game is Crossy Road meets Mad Max.” “What if Towerfall had Dark Souls-style sword combat?” “I’m working on a game that is Cooking Mama meets Elite Beat Agents.” Developers view x-statements as a thesis to a game pitch. Well-crafted x-statements can evoke both a sense of gameplay and market positioning, transporting a reader to really understand where your game is going. Likewise, a poorly crafted x-statement can be damaging, setting the wrong tone and ultimately damaging the concept or creating confusion around what is being created. As a publisher, x-statements give us a glimpse into the mind of game developers. An x-statement says a lot about how game developers think they should be marketing a game to their audience. It shows succinct

So, you want to get YouTubers and Twitch streamers playing your game, but aren’t sure where to start? First off, you should ask yourself if your game is YouTube-able. Think you’ve got that covered and want to get started, but aren’t sure if you should get an agency or try reaching out to influencers directly? Then you’re in the right place. Knowing whether to go Direct or through an Agency is a big question and depending on your situation, there might not be a clear-cut answer. So here are some of my tips for knowing what’s best for your situation. 1 vs. 100: Are My Emails Falling into a Black Hole? You’re on a shoestring budget, but want to get your game out there? That’s not a problem, but be prepared to invest a lot of hours into outreach and relationship-building. First things first, influencers hate spammers. Don’t pull a list of 5,000 influencer email addresses off the internet and send them a mass email. YouTube and Twitch are very tight

Jeff Gurian, Kongregate's VP of Marketing and Ad Monetization, recently did a podcast with Appmasters, a mobile marketing agency specializing in growth hacking for independent developers. Jeff talks with Appmasters founder Steve Young about a wide range of topics including how to effectively market a mobile game, ad monetization tips, the rigorous marketability testing Kongregate performs, and what Kongregate looks for in both games and developers they publish titles with. The full Appmasters podcast can be found here.