AH Marketing Ideas

[Slade]

Focusing on the most favorable demographic for potential new customers maybe if AH had a sustained and committed presence at both air shows and air museums.  Maybe they already do I dont know.

For Air Shows a booth would be in order.

For Air Museums, for each that sign up a modest donation to the air museum could be made and thus they could act as in-the-field marketers.


Further thoughts:
* Maybe experiment with giving the first month or two for free as AH has a learning curve.
* Because AH has a modest learning curve switch it around. "So you think you have the right stuff. If you survive being washed out (during the free period) you can join the ranks of the top WWII virtual pilots in the world!"  Find a way to make it a positive vs. the instant gratification PS3\4 mentality.

EDIT: Standard Search Engine Optimization (SEO) too of course.  If someone searches Google on any WWII plane...have AH add be listed.  It is an active art and one must be committed to what it takes to keep your web presence that prominent BTW.


Slade  

[bozon]

Air shows and museums booths are OK in the crowd they target, but they give you a very VERY limited exposure. The TV ads also reach a very small crowd, American only.

AH needs internet exposure because this turns to the international global masses. AH has next to zero presence on gaming sites. If you grab some random teenager and ask him to find a WWII flight simulator for you, it is very unlikely that he will come up with AH. There are all the chances that he will come up with IL2 or even war thunder, and the latter is not even released yet. Even on specialized websites such as simHQ.com where I first heard about AH 12 years ago, you will be hard pressed to find any mention of AH.

AH must appear on major gaming sites such as gamespot as a premier flight simulator/ air combat game. More specific MMO and war gaming sites are also good. First stage is to get it listed there. In some of the site AH is listed, it looks like a dead game - no reviews, no news items, no promotion trailers. I bet it is not very difficult or expensive to create news items and distribute them to these websites. Every patch and development announcement should appear there in a big hu-ha. A new trailer every time a new plane/vehicle is released will go a long way. This constantly bumps AH up the news items list and make the game page on these websites looks alive. Dev interviews can work with some websites.

Second, AH needs some invited reviews from these websites. Still cheap. No official reviews makes it look like an insignificant second-rate game. Reviews bump you up the lists and makes you visible on these websites, regardless of the score you get.

Last, ads and banners. This does cost money and I suspect that on some websites it costs a lot of money, so a more targeted approach is required, probably going for smaller sim/war gaming websites. If AH can have some "special offer" to go along with that (a free month instead of 2 weeks, chance to win something etc.) it will be much more effective, but that means money again.

[atlau]

" There are all the chances that he will come up with IL2 or even war thunder, and the latter is not even released yet. Even on specialized websites such as simHQ.com where I first heard about AH 12 years ago, you will be hard pressed to find any mention of AH."

When I checked today, the 2 sidebar ads at simHQ are for... Il-2 and War Thunder

[bustr]

The current AI development in the AvA is very promising. Two of my squad mates and I flew against them for almost an hour and it was not boring. The magic combo was no-Icons, no clouds and 12 noon sunlight.

A free arena of some kind with the AI in average and easy mode. Along with a terrain that doesn't hide them on the deck and always 12 noon. Icons would be more fair to the casual freebee freeloader while looking to get a hook into the ones who want to eventually subscribe. Bet it will be 80% freeloader, and 20% subscribers, or near that. Even the ability for interested parties to up from other sides with the AI and blunder around at other humans. To show the physics superiority to the eventual lookyloos from War Thunder and other games. This would attract a lot of freebie freeloader abuse but, new subscribers in the mix.

It has become a bread and circuses world on the Internet. You need to give them free bread to get them in the arena while not allowing them to put up condos and squat on your property like the old HtH arenas. Word of mouth between gamers looking for freebies will be just as important as good Aces High Animation advertisements.

I wouldn't worry about SimHQ. Aces High doesn't fit the image of a modern visually appealing flight simm they want to promote. For all we know, it could be as simple as someone at SimHQ didn't get their tushy petted the right way talking to HTC. Maybe we are just too retro for them.

[FatalError1]

Make the WW1 arena free. That would draw hundreds of new players with a lot going on to the WW2 arenas.

FE

[coombz]

Make the WW1 arena free. That would draw hundreds of new players with a lot going on to the WW2 arenas.

FE

you do know there is already an excellent free WW1 flight sim with a graphics engine that looks like it was made this decade?

[bustr]

Make the WW1 arena free. That would draw hundreds of new players with a lot going on to the WW2 arenas.

FE

I guess you would cancel your subscription to become a freebie freeloader. Or do you even have a subscription at this time?

You wouldn't keep interest beyond the fact it was a freebie game to freeload in. Show casing the ww2 toys will attract more potential new paying customers. An updated WW1 arena for paying customers would be icing on a small cake. Especially if it were populated with AI flying in a specific area allowing other areas for players who want to clobber other players.

Even a free AI arena that rotates the offering every 2-4 hours or something to keep the freeloaders from setting up shop thinking they can fight a never ending war on HTC's dime. That was one of the problems with the 8 man HtH free arenas. The sense of entitlement and ownership having no consequences to face, no bill to pay for the arena, and free hosting seemingly for ever off Hitech's backside.

There is a fine line between giving away samples of a new food product, and becoming an eat all you want free soup kitchen. COSTCO and Whole Foods seems to have mastered that balance. Just gotta Love "free" stuff owned by other people and those prophets of the masses who proselytize:

If you give it away for free, they will come to enjoy your product. And leading the freeloader pack is always that prophet.

And so do locusts, who then leave you to pick up the devastation after them, has ever been the historic allegorical lesson, no longer taught in public indoctrination centers today.

[FatalError1]

I know about ROF if that is the sim you are talking about coombz. I really like the simplicity of AH WW1 but there are never any pilots logged on when I am there.
Just trying to add numbers to the sim bustr. I been there since the beginning and just recently quit because of empty arena. I don't care about the cost but it needs numbers to fly.
That was just a idea. I don't see anything else working. Those that like a complex ww1 sim are in rof.

FE

[save]

I remember old Warbirds days, I gave everyone that came and visited my plane at air shows a CD with the game, videos and links to different warbirds sites.

How many subscriptions that gave I do not know, but 2 of these guys started to fly in my squad 

TV ads and flying magazine ad's  I would think could be the best way.

[Arlo]

Air shows and museums booths are OK in the crowd they target, but they give you a very VERY limited exposure.

With a higher chance of return, given the specific niche market cross-over potential. Ace's High could have a prime-time commercial on TV (at a cost that would bankrupt it before it saw a single customer come out of the effort) and still get less hits, I would think.

[Arlo]

I remember old Warbirds days, I gave everyone that came and visited my plane at air shows a CD with the game, videos and links to different warbirds sites.

How many subscriptions that gave I do not know, but 2 of these guys started to fly in my squad 

^Great example of word-of-mouth as well as cost-effective positive result^

[Slate]

  I found AH in 2003 from TV ad. 

   12 x 14.95 x 10yrs = $1,794  a bargain for me HTC maybe not so much. 

[bozon]

With a higher chance of return, given the specific niche market cross-over potential. Ace's High could have a prime-time commercial on TV (at a cost that would bankrupt it before it saw a single customer come out of the effort) and still get less hits, I would think.

I was not suggesting TV ads - quite the opposite. Museums and air shows are small crowd. Even if a good crowd to target, the amount of subscriptions this will generate cannot be large. It also requires man power to make it happen. What I was suggesting was more internet presence that will not cost very much and can reach millions.

[deadstikmac]

Make a small 8x11 sized poster... Place them at your local Starbucks.... More Starbucks more banners.... Also look into any game place... GameStop ect.... Profit!

[Citabria]

you do know there is already an excellent free WW1 flight sim with a graphics engine that looks like it was made this decade?

I was not impressed by ROF graphics.