[Blueentity]

I am intrigued by the discussion of marketing in this thread. How did I “discover” this game? Back when I had a boring chemical sales job, a weekly search on CNET’s Downloads netted SE 3. Downloaded demo, loved it, sent demo to all family & friends who enjoy that type of game, eventually bought full game. What marketing was that? Most of the games at that time on CNET were garbage, so a few lines of description in that sea of trash was nothing that any marketer to be proud of.

In the “business” I was an “inside sales” contact. Already bought product, and likely to buy again, as are most of us who are fans of SE. I received an email from MM when one of the SEIV demos came out, downloaded gold demo from CNET (again sent to all family & friends who enjoy this type of game). Liked it even better than SE III, bought it and made sure all said family and friends bought a copy of their own to stop sponging off of my copy and to support Mr. Hall. With all due respect, how are those 10 sales a plus for anyone’s marketing department? Inside sales are easy to close.

Now where does marketing come in? After enjoying many hours learning not to right click in SEIV, I read the book that came with the game. The other book-not the manual-the sales one. It was near Christmas and relatives were inquiring what I wanted. Dungeon Odyssey caught my attention. So off to the Shrapnel web page. That’s marketing. Getting someone to buy your product that would not have otherwise. Kudos to whoever designed that book. You got the sale.

I wonder how much cross-over Strategy First is expecting to get from the SE audience, or if their marketing is even considering it.