I am currently working on an extraordinary game, where everything is unique, the game will be ready after a month, but I am confused between the use of publisher or publishing by myself, what is the best solution? I do not have an advertising budget
Please use the search before posting as this has been covered a couple of time. Unless you are willing to drop everything right now and go full tilt into learning how to make connections and market your game for the next month I would contact pubs. You can build the best billboard the world has ever seen but if you put it up in the desert nobody is going to see it. Good luck with your new game though i can't wait to see it.
DO NOT USE A PUBLISHER CLAIMING THEY KNOW HOW TO MAKE YOU GO VIRAL, HINT THEY DON'T! Unless it's Chillengo, Ketchup Bitboom etc. Bottomline you can do it yourself and save the headache of what they will end up taking from you. Just make sure that you do the following as a rule of thumb: 1. Connect to Google Play Services 2. Use AdMob as one of your ad networks 3. Use a Rate My App pop up. 4. Write a good description (don't worry about the keywords, Apple and Google will dock you if you try to hard) 5. Use High quality images 6. Don't go crazy with ads, people don't play your game to see ads. 7. Upload to multiple stores before going live on Apple and Google Play (PM me i have a list of over 45 off market stores) 8. Try to Go Live at the sametime with Google Play and Apple, Best on Thursday (Apple does editor choice) 9. Submit to free review sites and blogs vlog 10. Submit to "paid review sites & blogs 11. Make sure you have Social Buttons 12 Repeat and rinse. Bottomline don't believe the hype! I've been doing this appstore marketing and in the mobile ad business since 2009, so loads of snake oil salesman!
I won't personally sign a publishing or licensing deal to a business partner who won't say how they will market the game. I think that's what's meant by "CLAIMING THEY KNOW" above
If you have no ad budget, then one option is to make sure you are enticing Apple by including features in your game that relate directly to In App Purchases, and try to get an Apple feature. IAPS are what Apple gets a cut from; Apple does not get a cut from in-app ad money.
@heathclose sorry, What I meant to say regarding "claiming they know" is when they claim to make your game go viral. Many elements and moving parts to that equation and it is unpredictable. Just because someone has had past experience in social media, does not guarantee success. It is like getting struck by lightening twice in one lifetime. While at Game Development Conference, I had the fortune to speak to an engineer that actually worked on the algorithm that placed games on the "recommendation" page of the Google Play Store. He told me that this part is very programmatic and you can increase your odds of being "recommended" to your friends or friends friends by simply using Google Play Services. At the end of the day it is your decision whether to use a publisher or not, but just make sure the deal makes sense for you. For example, what is the future revenue split? What experience do they have working directly with ad networks? How can they be part of your team not just collecting ad money for you. Where are they based? Are they US based or foreign?Have they had success? How do you measure that success? Is it by one game going viral or by having a score of companies earn revenue. One has to take all this and more into consideration.*** Note, what I mean by US based is from the aspect of uploading your game or 'first crack at your game" in the US stores and also most ad networks can send you money with out any hiccup if you are US based.*** I'm free to help anyone out on this forum. PM me
Correct and they are closing down iAds. What a waste. Fill Rates for US averaged less than 20%. This means no one was using them! Ok so you mention Apple but you forgot Android and Google Play. Did you know that Android is the #1 OS in the world? Did you know that globally Android eclipses Apple? Scale, scale, scale. Have a look at this article that illustrates the point: http://www.ibtimes.com/apples-ios-still-getting-crushed-android-us-2130868.
That is actually a loaded statement. Apple makes most of the money? What do you mean by that? Apple keeps most of the money 33% on IAP or that the Apple platform you can make more money? Again it doesn't make sense. I have people that Ive worked with that all they do is android and that are earning over $300 -$500K per month. ...
you do know that Google play also rejects hundreds of those apps you purchase from these source code farms right? Reskinning gets you no where but broke fast. Thanks @wesam_badr but nope
Regarding OP's question, here's my $0.02. If you have no marketing budget, still publish on your own first, but aim to find a good publisher soon after. Do whatever it takes to get as many quality installs as you can quickly, while building up some stats. That's admittedly hard, but tapping your personal network is a good start. The most important stat to a publisher is retention. This gives them an indication of the LTV of your users - how much they are worth. This is what good retention numbers look like: Day1/Day7/Day30, 40%/20%/5%. If your game produces anything close to those numbers, you're ready to seriously approach a quality publisher. If your game produces significantly lower, either quickly find more installs and keep trying, or consider the product isn't that valuable, and continue on your own. This isn't to say your game won't succeed, but pubs nowadays aren't going to commit if the numbers show low LTV potential. They looks at tons of apps every day. Publishers don't care about how many installs you have, so don't worry about that number. They care about how much they can monetize the users you do have.
I heard a lot of publishers do NOT publish a game which is already on the App Store. So this would be the complete opposite of what you say @mattyhug. I think if you have a great game it always is best to send a trailer or the app itself to publishers first. Correct me if I'm wrong.
If you can connect and convince quality publishers to take your game before it's released, by all means shoot for that if the deal sounds good. That's easier said than done however, because there's so much noise in the space now, there's less publishers willing to gamble that your app will succeed. But if you can prove your game has good stats before you contact them, you now have some leverage. Chances are, if a publisher is willing to publish your game before they see any stats, they're probably not offering a fair deal. Another available option is to submit your game to a "pre launch" service, to help build these stats. Prices vary, but you can gain significant insight into how users engage or how long they play on average, allowing you to optimize before approaching a publisher.
I kind of agree with @Christoph I have had publishers reply to me on a submission saying that they do not take on games that are already published.
