How do you manage your time between your day job, creating your game, and marketing your game? I got this question a few times since I put up my last post earlier this week. From talking with different developers there is a feeling that if they spend too much time marketing then they won’t ever get their game completed. This is especially a concern for the solo game dev, but it can affect any small game studio. What I’m going to attempt to do is list out some tips and tools for managing your time effectively so that you can both create your game and spend the necessary time marketing it.
Let’s go!
1. Create A Schedule
This is the first and most important aspect. If you don’t create a schedule for yourself you’ll end up developing the same game forever. I remember a quote from the movie industry that I believe Peter Jackson said – “You never finish your movie, you just run out of time.” The same can be said for game design. Just because you’re indie doesn’t mean you shouldn’t have a deadline. Deadlines are important for a lot of reasons, but the most important of all is having a day on the calendar you are shooting for. If you have a date, you have a goal.
Here are the top three things you should take into account for your timeline:
- Allocate one hour a day for marketing
- Allocate a full day off a week (it’s important to the creative process to have a day off)
- Allocate two hours a week to write two short updates for your blog
After you take this into account make your best guess at a date that you will have a completed game. Mark that date on your calendars (digital, desk, or both) because this is your target date! This is your goal!
2. Get Social Media Management Software
The importance of having software like this is immeasurable! You need all of your brand accounts in one place, easily accessible so you can quickly see your conversations and schedule posts. I recommend going with HootSuite if you’re just starting out. It’s perfect for the small indie studio because it allows you to include up to 5 social media accounts. It also has the Klout scoring feature built in so you know what kind of influence your followers have in the world of social media.
Once you download HootSuite you can login with your Facebook page, Google+ page, and Twitter account. The software let’s you switch back and forth between accounts effortlessly while also being able to customize different columns. But maybe the most important function of software like this is its scheduling feature. As you read articles from the web that you think would be beneficial to your audience you can set them up to tweet out the next day at whatever time you like.
So picture this, you get home from your day job around 6PM, work on your game for 3-4 hours, and then spend 1 hour replying to conversations on social media and setting up 5 tweets to go out throughout the next day! While it would be even better if you could check your accounts throughout the day, you should at least be doing this as a minimum.
3. Sign up for Tweriod
Each night you are scheduling posts to go up for the next day, but at what times are you supposed to schedule these posts? For Facebook all recent research shows that the best time to get the most Likes and Comments is 12PM EST. But for Twitter it could vary greatly depending on your audience. Insert Tweriod. Tweriod analyzes your followers’ activity over a certain amount of time and then quickly sends you a report of the best times to post your content each day.
This way you aren’t throwing a shot in the dark at when you should be posting your original blog post vs. an interesting article you found (HINT: Your original work should be posted at the heaviest traffic times).
4. Create a WordPress blog
It’s true that there are many, many sources to create blogs, and by no means is WordPress the right choice for everyone. However, WordPress.com offers built in widgets, built-in SEO (Search Engine Optimization – so that people can find you when they use search engines), a community of bloggers that can find your blog easily from the WordPress site, and a ton of themes that you can customize to your brand – all for free!
It also has a built-in analytics tool so you can get some basic information of where people are coming to your site from, where in the world they are, and what they are clicking on when they get there.
Earlier I said you should allocate two hours a week to creating original content for your blog. This is a MINIMUM! Split those two hours into two days – one at the beginning of the week and one at the end. Your content should include any progress you’ve made on your game and any other info you think your audience will find interesting and useful.
Hopefully this gave you a good starting point to beginning your marketing efforts with social media. If you follow these four basic steps you will feel less stress when thinking about juggling the creation of your game and marketing it. You’ll also have a one stop shop to see all of your conversations, know the best times to post, and own an original blog that will begin to attract more customers looking for your type of game.
Talk soon,
Startup Gamers helps you make a name in the indie game space 
Patrick Stephens 