Click here to download the: Player Avatar Blueprint Google Doc.

First Steps In Marketing Your Indie Game (When You Don't Have Much To Show Yet)

What's the very first step in marketing your game? Especially if you don't have much to show yet?

Well, in this article, you'll get a step-by-step action plan and a blueprint that will show you a starting point into marketing your indie game.

And the technique you're about to learn can be used if you're only weeks into your game project, or if you're a few months before your game launch.

Because what you'll learn here are the fundamental, building blocks of your indie game marketing strategy.

So grab your favorite drink, get comfortable, and get ready to learn (and use) a new technique to help you find players... and help you make sure your game launch will be a financial success...

Indie Game Marketing First Step: Create A "Player Avatar"

Let's start with an analogy that you can relate to. Once you understand this simple analogy, then we'll get into the technique and how-to....

Ok... think back to when you first came up with your game idea...

Before you committed to a game idea, you mentally created a game first in your imagination. Yeah, you probably tinkered around with code, art, story, level design, and theme to help you develop a game idea.

But the VERY first step was you had a game idea... a mental image of what your game could be... a vision.

And as you worked on this idea, you finally gave this vision of your game a name. Because once you stamped a name on your vision, then it became more real.

This vision... this idea... this mental image sets the direction of your game project. It's what drove your dev project. And yeah, things changed. But you needed this direction to get going on the right path.

I'm telling you this because before you start creating marketing content for your indie game, you also need to create this mental image of your target player. And then give them a name.

In other words, create a "Player Avatar".

Why?

Because often what happens is, once a game dev has something worth sharing, they'll start what I call the "Indie Game Marketing Spiral"...

The spiral goes like this...

1. Finish something worth sharing
2. Post that content on social media
3. Wait. See what happens
4. Not much happens actually
5. Repeat

There's nothing wrong with taking action, and posting. But the problem is, game devs are basically throwing everything and anything up against the "marketing" wall and seeing what sticks.

But imagine doing the same spiral with game development: you just throw ideas on the wall and see what sticks.

My point is, if you have no direction, you wouldn't ever finish your game. You need to have a clear vision and know exactly what you want before you see any real progress. That's the starting point.

It's the same with marketing. If you have a clear vision of who your target player is, then you won't be wasting your time creating content nobody cares about.

Because when you have a clear vision of who your player is in your mind, it kinda forces you to create content that will resonate with that person.

In other words, you're not trying to be everything to everyone. You're directing your efforts to one type of person.

And this works because if you want to cut through all the noise, you need to be clear, direct, and know who your game is for.

So that's why it's very important to create a Player Avatar: to help you focus your marketing so that you directly speak to your potential player, and grab their attention.

Because if you can't grab attention in this noisy marketplace, then it doesn't matter how cool or high quality your game is.

Your ability to grab attention is just as important as having a high quality, cool, fun game.

Alright, let's keep going, and I'll show you exactly how to create your Player Avatar... and how to use this technique to start finding players and wishlists...

How To Create A Player Avatar So That When You Create Content It'll Grab Attention

Ok, here's the technique...

Let's pretend you have 100 people in a big room. And these 100 people are all huge fans of the game you're making.

Now, out of all these 100 people, what common qualities do these players have?

To help you understand where I'm going with this, let's look at the game Space Engineers:

If you had a room full of 100 fans of Space Engineers, what would be some qualities they would all share?

Well, here's what I came up with:

• Problem solvers and tinkerers
• Space enthusiasts
• Logical and detail oriented
• As a kid they took apart watches and toys to see how things worked
• Don't mind playing stressful and engaging games after work
• Love experimenting and designing creating complex things
• Interest in mechanical things, physics, and engineering

Now, let's look at the game Unpacking:

If you had a room full of 100 fans of Unpacking, here's a list of qualities they would all have in common:

• Love to organize and declutter
• Low pressure meditative game-play
• Love environmental story-telling
• Calming experience
• Like cute and cozy things
• Interest in interior design
• Don't like to stress their brain too much after work

Both of these games offer the player similar things: problem solving, creativity, and experimentation. But each game directly speaks to two different types of players. One game speaks to the player who loves cold, mechanical things. And the other game speaks to the player who loves warm, cozy cute things.

Now the problem is, most indie game marketing I see tries to speak to ALL types of people.

So for example, an indie game dev will try to grab the attention of people who love cold, mechanical things AND people who love cozy, cute things.

And I get it. It's "intuitive" to think that if you widen your target, you'll grab more attention.

But success in business is counter-intuitive. Here's my marketing mantra...

The smaller the target, the easier it is to hit.

When you narrow your target, you have a better chance of grabbing attention.

Why?

Because players are self interested. They don't care about you (yet). They only care about their wants and needs.

Also, when your marketing message isn't clear, people won't take the time to try to figure it out.

For example, say a pizza place was selling "all-meat, vegan pizzas". They are trying to be everything to everyone.

Makes no sense, right!?

But often game devs who try to appeal to everybody like this, really appeal to nobody.

This is why it's so important that you understand who your customer is before you start pumping out content.

Note: Don't get me wrong,.. when you become a successful game studio, then yes... trying to be everything to everyone is how you grab the attention of the masses. But not right now. Right now when nobody knows about you yet, your strategy is all about putting the focus on the player.

Anyway, let's keep going. Here is your step-by-step action plan...

Step One: List Seven Common Qualities Your Fans Have

So let's do that... let's imagine you have 100 people in a room.

And if you got 100 people in the same room, what would be seven common qualities they would all share?

To get you started, you can use my Player Avatar Blueprint Google Doc. Save the document to your drive so that you can edit it.

Or open up your own Google doc.

Ok, once you got my Blueprint open (or open your own Google document), take 10 minutes to answer these questions:

1. What emotion is most important to them when they play games (i.e. sad, excited, stressed, accomplished, happy, relaxed, thought provoking)?


2. What's the most important thing to them in a video game (i.e. game play, combat, exploration, story, level design, art, difficulty)?


3. What's their favorite game genre?


4. What genres do they NOT play?


5. What other media are they also into (i.e. horror movies, comics, classical novels, music genre, youtube?)


6. What hobbies do they have (i.e. drawing, sports, cooking, baking, shopping, socializing, pets, reading, gardening, wellness, cars, tech)?


7. What's their demographics (age, gender, location)?

Don't worry if you're having trouble coming up with answers. And it's ok to generalize.

Marketing is NOT about techniques, and getting the technique perfect.

It's the same with game dev: your game wasn't perfect early on. You spent months and years iterating, making it better.

Same with marketing your game. What's more important right now, is that you're shifting your mindset away from you and focusing on what the player wants and is interested in. Thinking like a consumer when you're a producer takes practice. So good job. It's not easy trying to think like a player would when you're a developer.

Ok, once you're done, you're ready for...

Step Two: Give Your "Player Avatar" A Name

Remember how when you gave your game idea a name, it kinda makes it more official? It's the same idea here, too.

Once you have your 7 common qualities these 100 people share... combine all of these people into ONE person... and give them a name.

For instance, in my Space Engineers example, I would name my Player Avatar:

Nicola Hadfield (famous engineer + astronaut).

This is important because people don't like being treated like a number in a crowd. People like connecting with people and not nameless corporate entities.

So by giving your Player Avatar an actual name, it kinda personalizes your fans as an individual, and not a bunch of "customers".

And that's the key concept here...

Use Your Player Avatar To Start Building Relationships With Your Fans

When I say "marketing", I really mean connecting with potential fans.

People hate being sold to. And people hate being interrupted by marketing. Sometimes marketing does the opposite effect, and people make it a point not to ever use that product because the marketing is so annoying.

But people LOVE to buy. Shopping is a hobby. And people love to buy things that are made specifically for THEM.

And that's the core here: I want to help you market your game in a way so that when a potential player sees your game, they go...

"Hey, this game is exactly made for me!".

But to do that, you need to take yourself out of "developer" and start thinking like a "consumer". Once you do that, the marketing you create won't feel like salesy crap that people ignore.

When you put the customer first, the marketing you create will feel more like you're genuinely trying to connect with people who like what you like.

Ok, enough... let's get to work...

Your Action Plan Right Now...

So do this right now. It'll only take 10 minutes. Open my Player Avatar Blueprint Google Doc. And answer those questions.

Do this because when you're ready to show off any cool stuff about your game, you can use your Player Avatar to help you craft a message that will resonate with potential fans.

And remember my mantra:

The smaller the target, the easier it is to hit.

Message Me If You're Stuck Creating Your Player Avatar Or Marketing Your Game...

Marketing isn't easy, it takes time, and results aren't instant. So if you're stuck, feel free to contact me anytime, and I'll help the best I can. Here's my info:

Dariusz Konrad
Email: dariusz at mainquestmarketing dot com
Discord Username: dariuszkonrad
LinkedIn: My entrepreneurial successes
Work: Game devs I've helped so far