Today I’m trying something a little different. I look forward to hearing your thoughts about these links, questions, and the experiment at the end!
3 Inspiring Links
- Kickstarter Analytics: 2021 in Review (by Adam West): This is an excellent analysis and overview of tabletop games on Kickstarter in 2021. It includes a drop in overall funding (which was more than made up for–and probably caused by–the rise of Gamefound), an examination of projects with lots of backers and relatively low-cost reward levels, and fantasy card games.
- Blue Apron’s Recycling Guidelines: I’m inspired by the detail with which Blue Apron provides recycling guidelines for their various products–it’s so much more helpful than a few icons! Not that it applies to tabletop games, but I didn’t know that there were options for recycling ice packs. My main takeaway here is to highlight the disposable portions of tabletop games that either (a) can’t be recycled or (b) need to be recycled in a special way (i.e., not curbside recycling).
- Heath’s Business for Creatives: I’ve really enjoyed the crowdfunding series on this YouTube channel, especially the videos on budgeting.
2 Questions
- If you use Steam, how do you feel about its “wishlist” feature? Just yesterday I saw post about a digital game that looked intriguing (something called “Time Masters”), and the post directed me to add the game to my Steam wishlist. As I did so, I realized just how much I like their wishlist system. It’s so easy to add a game to your wishlist, and within a single click I know that (a) I’ll get a notification when the game is available, (b) if I don’t buy the game right away, I’ll get a notification later if it’s on sale, and (c) if I buy the game, Steam automatically removes the game from my wishlist (though maybe I’ll get a notification if there’s something new for the game added later. All that with one click. We’ve considered adding a wishlist to our webstore, but I’m not aware of a Shopify app that’s so streamlined for the user (and for us). I’d love to hear your thoughts about this and if you’ve seen any wishlist this effective elsewhere.
- What compelled you most recently to subscribe to an e-newsletter? Earlier this week I had a great discussion with shareholders about the monthly Stonemaier Games e-newsletter. A few days later, I was buying a product I love from a company I love–the bamboo toilet paper from Who Gives a Crap–yet when I was prompted to sign up for their e-newsletter, I declined. I wasn’t looking for a special discount; I just wasn’t compelled to actually subscribe, and I’m not sure why. So I’m curious about the last time you were inspired to sign up for a company e-newsletter and why you did so, as I want to make sure we’re not missing out on people who are right on the edge of opting into staying in the loop on Stonemaier Games news.
1 Experiment
- Instagram Ad: Following our discussion about the e-newsletter, I decided to experiment with an Instagram ad. I was truly surprised by how easy it was to set up–it was literally a few taps on my phone. While it isn’t a strategy I plan to pursue often, it was neat to see how low the barrier to entry is to reach people who might be interested in Stonemaier Games but aren’t already directly connected to us on Instagram. How do you feel about Instagram ads?
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22 Comments on “3 Inspiring Links, 2 Questions, and 1 Experiment”
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The wishlist feature in Amazon is so important, I use it for nearly everything. At any given point I have a few dozen board games on there. One workaround so that I am able to check price and get price change updates on Amazon is to place the item in my cart and select save for later; Amazon notifies me every time with a message “Import information for item in your cart” I scroll down and can see the price change as well as information on what the current price is in relation to price history. I won’t lie, I purchased both Tapestry and Scythe at their lowest ever pricing.
One thing I recently posted on BGG is about retailers and publishers relationships when it comes to waste. It would be great if in the entire industry it would be possible to pre order a game at my FLGS or other retailer and then upon release the game ships directly from the publisher to the individuals house and the retailer still is able to get their percentage.
I have three general categories of game on my Steam wishlist – games where I want launch notifications; games I’m interested in but not willing to buy at the current price (for sale notifications or for picking up when I have some spare cash); and games that I’m interested in, but which my current PC won’t run (which I might pick up on sale, or might stay on the list until I upgrade my machine).
And, yeah, the Steam wishlist is very good. The only improvement I can think of is having some way to tag, label, classify, or comment on games to indicate why a given game is on the list.
About recycling labels: For Legacy games my group often wonders whether components are recyclable (we assumed the sticker-cards in Charterstone were not, but in general its unclear with nice glossy cards).
SPOILER FOR PANDEMIC SEASON 0: Depending on a decision, you are instructed to throw something away sight unseen, and it tells you that the entire contents were paper recycling, which I thought was a nice touch.
Also, in Arts and Architecture, we were instructed to discard 10 Automa cards (and P&P has us replace a space tile), so even though its not common, there are times when a nudge about recycling the tossed component in your games could work.
David: That’s an excellent point about legacy games or games that have any component that replaces another (you can definitely recycle the Automa cards and space tile).
I think the biggest recycling items are the mailing boxes. I just recently found out Amazon has a way to recycle them. I spent over $15,000 ordering things through the web last year, whew that’s a lot of cardboard, didn’t know what to do with it all. I live in a rural area and don’t have many options since the recycling center has been close since the virus start. However making recycling easy is key, I haven’t checked into how Amazon recycles those boxes yet, but recycling these helps Amazon keep costs down. Not everything that is recycled is cost effective or energy efficient to do so, papers yes, and some plastics yes. That makes up 99.9% of what a game is.
Q1. When I used to regularly buy games from steam I loved the wishlist system for both of those reasons.
Q2. To get a launch day notification. Something similar to a launch and newsletter signup is a “back in stock” notification sign up. I regularly sign up to them, but I only get notified when the game is back in stock.
https://boardgameprices.eu allows you to get notifications when there are price drops in stores around Europe for the game you are interested in. Similar to stock market software you can set the price at which you want to be notified.
Thanks Gerald! We’ve had a back-in-stock system in place for a few years on our webstore, and I really like it. You’re right that it’s fairly similar to what I discussed here.
Jamey,
I don’t have much to contribute to the Inspiring Links other than to say, yes, they do inspire in a specific way. As to your questions, I’m very transactional with Steam, so nothing to add there. As to the e-newsletters, if a company or person is interesting enough to maintain a relationship, I’ll gladly accept their e-newsletter.
As I’m taking a hiatus from professional work as a board game editor/proofreader and developer for a few months as I’m recently married, we opened the cafe, and I’m moving jobs to Philly, I’m a bit out of the loop with regard to the industry at the moment, however…
As to the experiment, this one I can definitely tell you as a café owner, this is the easiest way to engage with folks. There are a few rules of thumb I would absolutely recommend
1. Do not post more than once a day (twice tops and that second time better be very important to do so)
2. Use hashtags ALL the time…it creates an easy mnemonic for all of your customers; they see StonemaierGames and they know it’s you and they get excited
3. Use pictures…it really is equal to a thousand words.
Cheers,
Joe
Thanks Joe! I really like the once-a-day method (I post every morning, just once, on Instagram). And I really should use the #stonemaiergames hashtag more often.
I like the Steam wishlist system, since I generally wait with purchasing something until after it leaves Early Access, and preferably on one of the incessant sales.
I also use it as a “bookmark” list for items that are free, either free games or free movies, since free items seem to disappear from the library if you uninstall them.
The thing that I actually like the most about the steam wish list is it gives me an easy and reliable way to give gifts. I can look at a friend’s wish list and instantly know games that they are at least somewhat interested in and do not already own. Additionally if they have a variety of things on it I can likely spend as much or as little as I want.
The last time I was compelled to sign up for a newsletter was this week and it was for Van Ryder Games. They offered a sneak peek of their final girl Kickstarter in their newsletter and I was anxiously anticipating the reveal so I signed up.
Thanks for the info. I backed Final Girl an hour ago, now I went and signed up for the newsletter.
Q1: Steam‘s Wishlist is a feature I honestly mostly use to be reminded of Sales. I love the feature, but it does help keep companies in the Sale loop. So I imagine you‘d calculate an X% cost from the getgo based on big discounts. Otherwise, I use it to get launch announcements for upcoming games I‘m interested in.
Q2: Newsletters I subscribe to for News (upcoming/launched items, interesting new articles) and discounts/sales for things I want.
E: I‘m certain that Social Media (Advertisement) has played a massive role in the rise in popularity of boardgames (and Puzzles!) these past years, a valuable channel to reach people who had not been involved in the hobby at all before. It‘s a much lower hurdle than a first step into your FLGS.
It‘s the original reason we created a boardgames account on Instagram: to get all our Boardgames content and ads in one hyper focussed account and stay up to date.
That said, Online Marketing/Advertisement (and as such, also Social Ads) is actually my job so I know my way around the facebook business manager a LOT better than the owned content part (which is only a hobby). If you ever want to chat about it, feel free to hit me up!
Thanks Boris! I may take you up on that. :)
I actively use Steam’s wishlist and would love to see this incorporated in more places. The ease of adding, removing, and prioritizing items is huge. Notifications of sales and being able to sort by discount amounts is a big deal.
A lot of online-retailers have wishlists. Some things I don’t like include being directed to the wishlist page when adding an item to the list, not being able to share the list with others, page reloading when removing items or changing quantities. (Miniature Market and GameNerdz are both examples of wishlists that I’ve given up on)
Newsletters, I’m actually on a big campaign of unsubscribing from them so I feel a bit qualified in a fresh mindset of what makes me subscribe and stay subscribed. If the source provides quality content that I’m interested in I generally will subscribe or stay on. A business that has products I’m currently (0-12 months) interested in purchasing I’ll subscribe.
I have been unsubscribing if the content is general news, products I find ‘cool’ or ‘novelty’, notifications or content I digest through another medium, or a company that I would only be interested in their offerings when I decide I want to look for that item (looking at you mattress companies).
Instagram, I’m no help. I have an account, but I really only use it for my cats. Facebook, Tiktok (not sure how I ended up there), YouTube, and Reddit are where I end up.
That said, I work with several business (web/software developer) that use Instagram and other platforms for advertisement. The features and tools available to advertisers like you change so much from year to year, I amazing to watch. Instagram, owned by Facebook, is usually at the forefront of innovation with digital advertising. Sometimes leading to controversy for businesses to connect with their followers and potential followers.
Social-wall platforms like Instagram and Facebook I feel have the least intrusive form of advertisement while still staying in the line of site. From a consumers perspective this means I can easily look passed the ad while still having the subconscious viewing of it. Platforms like Reddit, Tiktok, and Twitter are either extremely interfering to the consumer viewing or too well hidden from the eyes of non-followers.
My favorite bit with Instragram is the ease to share, post, and even advertise to both platforms with practically the same content and flow. Maybe ads have changed since I’ve been in, but at one point in time you could make an ad in one platform and have it formatted to appear in both.
I would be curious how a business like Stonemaier would fair at ads in Facebook’s Marketplace. Targeted products often appear trashy or scam-ish. Could there be room as a breakthrough?
Once again I got carried away just typing…
I subscribe to e-newsletters for companies that provide what I consider to be quality products and services. In some cases I’ll also subscribe to e-newsletters to know more about companies that I believe in: their values and how they do business, the people that make up the company, and how their business is doing. In that regard, Stonemaier Games and The Dice Tower are at the top of my list: quality people, quality businesses, and great products.
I rarely use Instagram (or Twitter, etc.), my RSS news feeds and a few newsletters are enough for me. But, in general, I’m okay with ads if they are not obnoxious or popping up every few minutes.
I think wish list are a ok feature , helpful when I’m trying to remember a game I’ve been wanting to get for a while.
As for why I subscribe to a news letter , well the last two I signed up for were a craft store that sold paint brushes and would offer weekly coupons . And well the other one with be the SM news letter, this one is signed up for because it was basically that, a news letter not constant emails about every sale or discount that has been applied trying to get me to buy something , I mean you do mention if a item is on sale in your news letter , but it’s never the main focus .
Can’t comment on anything instagram as I don’t have it ….
I both love and hate Steam’s wishlist… Love it because it is a great feature. Hate it because my wishlist is over 80 games now and every time I look at it I despair that I’ll ever find the time to play every game on there! =)
Steam’s wishlist is how I’ve heard about sales of the games I want. It is easy.
I will sign up for a newsletter if I think it will give me information, sales, and a community for that company’s products and services. Your newsletter does all of that. Thank you.
I’ll answer at least one of the questions: I use Steam’s wishlist, and I really appreciate that it tells me when I added something, and that I can rearrange the list (either manually or by review score or other things). I wish that I could leave comments on it — frequently I will go back to it and not remember why I added something to my list–sometimes it’s to buy if it’s on sale, sometimes it’s to remind me to go back and look at it further, sometimes it’s for a kid…but I don’t remember which kid.
I’ve used and loved Steam’s wishlist feature for years. The best aspect is the email notification when something on your wishlist goes on sale. Steam frequently discounts things, so it’s nice to know when a desired game is finally at a price that is “worth it” to buy.