Poor Marketing/Release on PS4/xbox1?

[grkrama]

my two cents on the thread would be people should hold off attacking anyone questioning the marketing campaign just on grounds that the marketing department must know best. if this game is marketed badly it will not be the first nor the last product ever to have been subject to a botched marketing campaign. marketing departments screw up, it happens all the time.

I suppose from my point of view is I can't undertsand why the marketing campaign needs to involve keeping the release date under wraps. a short marketing campaign is fine, but a short time period between the announcement of the release date and the release date doesn't seem particularly necessary and does seem to be damaging confidence in the game.

the OP wasnt making much sense with comparing the marketing of the game to GTA's marketing and over-hyping next gen at such early stage in its life-cycle.

But the points you made are reasonable, Sega comes to mind with regards to binary domain, but i wouldnt panic cause of the history of this particular publisher,this seems to be the routine with their games.

 

[ethybubs]

a quick google indicates Kellaa is a beer, so i'll take that.

for Gods I always preferred Baldur (to you guys) / Baldaeg (to me)

Kellaa: God of accounting.

 

[blockerdave]

my two cents on the thread would be people should hold off attacking anyone questioning the marketing campaign just on grounds that the marketing department must know best. if this game is marketed badly it will not be the first nor the last product ever to have been subject to a botched marketing campaign. marketing departments screw up, it happens all the time.

I suppose from my point of view is I can't undertsand why the marketing campaign needs to involve keeping the release date under wraps. a short marketing campaign is fine, but a short time period between the announcement of the release date and the release date doesn't seem particularly necessary and does seem to be damaging confidence in the game.

i actually don't disagree with that, or the general sentiment that (to us) the marketing appears to leave a bit to be desired (e.g. a trailer and premiere in november, still waiting for an amazon listing in march...)

but my problems with the post are:
1)claiming that being close to the supposed release without an official marketing campaign is indicitaive of a problem when we're still inside the time for announcing with a "typical" tru blu pattern.
2)ridiculous "stats" regarding next-gen
3)ignoring that from the publisher's (and majority of the market's)point of view, there hasn't been a marketing campaign yet, for good or ill
4)comparing it to GTA

 

[Crossy333]

The biggest problem is some people claiming it is 'poor marketing' and that Tru Blu/Big Ant are basically incompetent. This is a claim made by people who haven't read or understand the posts made by Ross in the past. It is also made by people who have no idea what they are talking about. This isn't the first game they have released.

Think of it this way, if you only have say, $100,000 to spend on marketing. Would you rather to spread that thin over many months or saturate the market over a few weeks. To put it another way, if I told you now that I have a game releasing in 3 months, would you remember then? Would you even care because you can't buy it yet. So wouldn't it be better to save the cash and tell you that I got a game releasing next week. It's in the front of people's mind.

Additionally, those that are talking about that they haven't seen anything on websites or in catalogues etc. The marketing doesn't stop once the game is released. In fact, I would argue that it's more important to have advertising to say that the game is 'Out Now' then coming soon. This means that people who hear about it now can go buy it now. This refers back to my earlier point, there is only limited amount of dollars to go around.

Finally, Tru Blu have traditionally had a 3 week lead in time - plus marketing once the game is released - because this obviously works. Anybody who disagrees with this approach then please tell us how you would market a game on a limited budget that would be successful and sell units. If it's a great idea, please start your own publishing company and contact @Ross with your fantastic ideas. I'm sure he wants to hear how the internet knows best.

 

[Fissionmailed]

Ross did say that next gen will come after the first release, what else needs to be said? I don't understand.

 

[Crossy333]

I wouldn't expect Next Gen version to arrive until late next year at the earliest.

 

[Snowy]

Ross did say that next gen will come after the first release, what else needs to be said? I don't understand.

Nothing else needs to be said. These people just haven't read it. Or spent 30 seconds searching for the answer before prattling on.

 

[Pat]

I wouldn't expect Next Gen version to arrive until late next year at the earliest.

I think they would be missing a trick if they don't have a version ready for the World Cup.

 

[MattW]

Think of it this way, if you only have say, $100,000 to spend on marketing. Would you rather to spread that thin over many months or saturate the market over a few weeks.

I'd get that argument if at the same time they were doing every bit of free or minimal cost marketing they could.

It's been three months since the official trailer - if they reached a bunch of new people with that, they've probably lost a lot of them since and would need to reach them again later - instead of putting stuff out on a reasonably regular basis to keep things ticking along despite the push into 2014.

They've totally underused social media - obviously their involvement on here is great - but the casual fans on Facebook (as horribly bad as that page is) could easily be engaged with the occasional extra video or screenshot that they would share around, like or otherwise - free marketing.

 

[asprin]

They've totally underused social media

I second this. It has been seriously untapped. They have around 17k likes in spite of minimal exposure (PC excluded). Surely the interest is there and I feel they are missing out on capitalizing on that.

 

[Crossy333]

I'd get that argument if at the same time they were doing every bit of free or minimal cost marketing they could.

It's been three months since the official trailer - if they reached a bunch of new people with that, they've probably lost a lot of them since and would need to reach them again later - instead of putting stuff out on a reasonably regular basis to keep things ticking along despite the push into 2014.

They've totally underused social media - obviously their involvement on here is great - but the casual fans on Facebook (as horribly bad as that page is) could easily be engaged with the occasional extra video or screenshot that they would share around, like or otherwise - free marketing.

I do recall a post from Ross from last year that this is the most complicated release that he's ever had to do. There's probably so many factors none of us are fully aware of, especially the debacle of Ashes 13 and how many distributors/retailers had backed that horse rather than DBC14.

I agree that none of this has been ideal. Also, Tru Blu seem to have a bigger say in how things are presented which is understandable as this is their job. Think about how free Ross was with info before the announcement of Tru Blu as a publisher etc. I'm sure they would rather him not on here at all.

Social media, screenshots etc would be great but all those things also take time. You have to take people away from other jobs and put onto doing those things. In my own professional life, I know that social media is such a hard thing to get right.

Again, the simple fact is that the big push towards the start line hasn't really began yet (officially). My whole issue is the people saying it is poor when they don't have a fishin clue. It drives me nuts when people do the same thing about my industry, make big broad comments about it and it just makes them look like fools because they haven't got a clue.

All that being said, I wish it would all start soon because I'm pretty keen to get my hands on this game.

 

[grkrama]

This may throw some light checked out trublu twitter and FB accounts ,
https://twitter.com/trublugames
https://www.facebook.com/trublugames
they announced Rll2 WC edition on oct 17 that it will be released by nov 21 and in the following weeks they give of a few teasers and then launch it.(in this case it had got delayed a week) but from that page that seems pretty much their standard routine '4 weeks release schedule' not too much hoopla, granted they can definitely use some Social media coverage, proper website and stuff, even indie devs do that, i dont think its much about money and resources than change of their preferred workflow, they seem to be pretty satisfied with what works for them and what they are used to and i think that's what counts.

 

[UnknownSoul]

My whole issue is the people saying it is poor when they don't have a fishin clue.

Totally agree

 

[StinkyBoHoon]

I think though a lot of people here are right to challenge the perception that ashes 13 would have really effected marketing as much as has been claimed. the example is not exact but if you take the football manager series for example.

in 2004 SI Games split with Eidos and had to re-title the championship manager series. despite Eidos releasing a game called championship manager the same year, SI Games were able to put out their game, newly called Football Manager to little detriment despite losing their brand. FM 05 was the 5th fastest selling game of all time while championship manager bombed.

there are differences in that there was an established fan base that simply needed to be informed, plus SI Games managed to get their game out before Eidos (big ant have said they wanted to get DBC out before ashes) but I think the overall moral of the story is people don't take 40 quid (or $100) out their pocket without knowing what they're paying for.

if anything I'd have thought the need to make people aware DBC was a whole new game would have facillitated the need for more market awareness not a state where people aren't even sure if the game exists. (not us, but the general populace who have no confirmed info beyond a few screen shots and 3 month old video)

If we stick to rigidly to the line that "My whole issue is the people saying it is poor when they don't have a fishin clue." then we might as well shut the "Cricket Discussion" part of the site down as it's mostly just members of the public criticisizing professional cricketers for their team selection and tactics.

 

[grkrama]

if anything I'd have thought the need to make people aware DBC was a whole new game would have facillitated the need for more market awareness not a state where people aren't even sure if the game exists. (not us, but the general populace who have no confirmed info beyond a few screen shots and 3 month old video)

This has been stated to Ross many times before and he has stated that he doesnt have the budget to mass educate people on the game.

Though the twitter handles, fb page, the official site could use some attention( the site still says 2013 release date and more game relevant info can be properly organised there), for this ross has stated all this and more will be covered in a short burst leading to launch.