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Marketing Ideas?

Idea threads

GamerGripz

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My company has been up for about 5 weeks now, our first month was pretty good; we brought in roughly $500 in revenue. Granted, a good bit of that revenue is from friends and acquaintances.

I need some ideas for marketing to grow our online sales.

ProGripz - Xbox 360 Controller Grips is our website with all our info, etc.

Online Marketing wise, we are currently utilizing facebook, twitter, and instagram to grow our social media presence. We have a good amount of YouTube reviews by respected gamers and channels. I do a bit of SEO here and there, but not much. We are emailing with Gaming LAN Centers about possibly retailing our product as well.

Locally, We are trying to get onto our local news (we think they would love to do a story about 2 local teenage entrepreneurs), and are also speaking with the local minor league baseball team about doing a giveaway night of our product.

Does anybody have any ideas on how we could get our product out to large target markets? Would love to be able to get these out to a bunch of colleges, (idea: trying to get our product out to the gaming organizations at large universities?). Anyway we could use something like Kickstarter to get it out there?

Appreciate all the help and ideas!
 
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OsmanS

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Go on GameBattles.com and do a giveaway. I have a friend who's really into major league gaming and all that, I can show him your business for some ideas if you want.
 

Kung Fu Steve

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Definitely get a different video on there. "I can't figure out how to get these on... and the instructions are bad" "Sorry I said these sucked, they're ok" "They are extremely similar to the other product".

Create a video of your own that explains the features and benefits of having those.

I don't know what to do when I hit your site. Guide people through the process of a sale the moment they hit the page.

Do you have a patent that you could license to Gamestop or other companies? What about going direct to Microsoft?
 
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GamerGripz

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we had a great review/instructional video on there but the person who made it deleted his account, so that was a quick temporary fix until we can get another good review to put up.

It is not patentable because it is a "novelty" the patent lawyers said. We thought about going straight to gamestop, but why would they pick our product up for their stores when we have no history of sales? im sure they would want a mature product that has proven it will sell, right?
 

Gold777

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How many subscribers/viewers does your biggest reviewer have?

Try getting in contact with the bigger gamers who could potentially get it 50k+ views and offering them some sort of deal.
 

Kung Fu Steve

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How many subscribers/viewers does your biggest reviewer have?

Try getting in contact with the bigger gamers who could potentially get it 50k+ views and offering them some sort of deal.

Looks like he's doing this already. Each one seems to have their own affiliate code.

The worst thing that would happen is that they say no. But if there's an opportunity there - maybe they'll go for it. You're only in your first month with $500 in sales. I wouldn't say that's proof of concept yet... buuuut if you can't patent it and people are going to rip you off anyways - go big or go home.

Maybe even take it to another level and create the custom controller with the special grips built in (maybe you can patent it that way??)
 
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100k

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Go on Ebay... you know that big platform where people go to BUY stuff because they are in a BUYING state of mind... ;)

Other than that.... try gumtree.
 

DennisD

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First off: get your hands on some copywriting books.

The controller shouldn't doesn't control hand sweat, that's freaking lame.
It eliminates moisture and improves your grip, to give you that competitive edge when things get tough.
I'd barely admit I have 'hand sweat', let along buy a product for it.

You can probably get away with cutting a ripomatic video of some game footage with a strong VO to help inject some feeling into it. My main source of income for some time was by selling products to gamers. Let me tell you something: These guys LOVE free stuff.

Take a look at what Melvin Cedeno did with Blue Steel Jewelry. Here's the interview on mixergy if you've got a membership: How Facebook Contests Helped Build A $30,000/Month Business
but basically what he did was hold facebook giveaways. Like the page + share on your wall to be entered to win a free ring. You can build a fast fanbase by holding 1 of these contests a month.

Don't limit yourself to just twitter. Here's a post I did here on the forums about how I did this crossing tumblr/twitter/facebook: https://www.thefastlaneforum.com/we...ia/44225-my-haro-publications.html#post256551

Have you sent these out to high profile bloggers and celebrities? You probably have partnerships where they pimp it for you and you give them a %, but some people aren't interested in money, strangely enough. There were a few people that wouldn't do business with me because they didn't want to 'betray their audience' by 'selling something'. If I had mentioned promoting it WITHOUT him gettinbg a commission he would have done it, strangely enough.

Other times I convinced people by instead of offering them an affiliate commission, I told them that 5-10% (whatever their commish WOULD have been) would be donated to charity. This got a few of the few people who didn't want to 'betray their audience' on board. They didn't feel like a 'dirty salesman' anymore, they felt like a do-gooder.
 
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psaco131

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I would create a promo vid:

Concept I would use: A guy playing Call Of Duty online in a Team Death match. He is looking for the last enemy to kill to win the match. Its all in his hands so he starts sweating nervously. Next thing you know his hands are so sweaty & moist he has to quickly wipe it off on his jeans. He looks down for a second and wipes it off, looks up and notices he has just been killed and lost the match. Then show a new clip of him using the grips & winning the match.

Show them what happens when your product is being used in a gamer's hands.

Sell them on benefits:
Full grip to allow smooth and quick reactions to improve chances of winning
Dry Hands to keep you worry free and focused on the game.

As for getting more exposure, I would try to cut a licensing deal with gamestop, madcatz (if they're still around) or some other 3rd party accessory company.
 

DennisD

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A guy playing Call Of Duty online in a Team Death match. He is looking for the last enemy to kill to win the match. Its all in his hands so he starts sweating nervously. Next thing you know his hands are so sweaty & moist he has to quickly wipe it off on his jeans. He looks down for a second and wipes it off, looks up and notices he has just been killed and lost the match. Then show a new clip of him using the grips & winning the match.

I think this would bomb. The gamer crowd is sarcastic, 'mean', ruthless. I'd bet a video selling them on the benefits of a product like this, no matter how well produced the video would tank big time. Unless you were to turn the commercial into a parody of itself. Make it a little stupid and outrageous, like an SNL sketch where they make fun of products. Think sweat shooting out of hands like a firehose level of ridiculousness. Something like that would go viral in a big bad way.

I would try to cut a licensing deal
Licensing only works if you have a patent.

Another idea I just thought of is hold a competition! "Make us a commercial, winner gets $1,000". The main people entering will be college kids, which is your ideal market. They'll share the video they made with their friends to vote for them. A fair number of these people will actually be interested in purchasing the product. IDK your margins or if giving away 1K makes sense, but it's something to think about.
 

Gsuz

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Different colors? Contact big youtubers, ask if they are interested in a sample, run a special offer with customized grips, say with the logo of their Youtube channel on it AFTER getting their permission and agreement and I think they'll push that way harder.

And please, put a button on the homepage "Order now" "Let me grip that" whatever
 
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GamerGripz

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The controller shouldn't doesn't control hand sweat, that's freaking lame.
It eliminates moisture and improves your grip, to give you that competitive edge when things get tough.
I'd barely admit I have 'hand sweat', let along buy a product for it.

I like that, i agree. We just didnt want to claim that it would stop your hands from sweating because that is not possible, but i think eliminates moisture is perfect.

I will be trying a couple social media giveaways, and i think we will see what we can do as far as a commercial/promo vid goes.

I also found a local retail gaming company that has 5 local stores, so we will be visiting there on wednesday to see if they would retail our product.
 

DennisD

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we will see what we can do as far as a commercial/promo vid goes.

I also found a local retail gaming company that has 5 local stores, so we will be visiting there on Wednesday to see if they would retail our product.

Congrats, update us here on how it goes.

If you need help figuring out ideas for your vid campaign feel free to PM me. Video's kinda my thing.
 

CommonCents

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Take a lesson from phone covers or 'skins'. I'd look at doing all kinds of graphics on the gripz, logos, etc.. people love customizing their stuff. They don't even need to be sold on the technical better grip benefits as much as making their controller look cool.

why not contact some big games and offer them custom printed grips? They could do a free marketing campaign to upsell their gamers to buy the grips w/ custom print of the game on them.

Wouldn't any consumer companies buy a crap ton from you w/ their logo on it to give away to the gamer demographic???

I'd also just go ahead on contact retailers. They are savvy enough buyers out there who recognize a new product oppty when they see it, not needing big prior proven sales. Remember they are trying to get an edge on other retailers so sometimes they'll just jump on a product.
 
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GamerGripz

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went to the local retailer today and it didnt go even close to what we expected. He wasnt in his the office, but we got a cell phone number, so i gave it a ring. I introduced myself and told him about my company and that we stopped by to talk with him, i mentioned that we have unique grips for xbox 360 controllers and immediately after i said that he said "sorry were not interested in grips, weve tried them before, they dont sell" and i told him our product was unique and not just a rubber controller case and asked what brand of products he had tried and he responded "i dont know but were not interested" and then ended the conversation and hung up.

So I was kind of shocked that he wasnt even interested in hearing more about the product and just completely shut me down immediately.
 

The-J

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went to the local retailer today and it didnt go even close to what we expected. He wasnt in his the office, but we got a cell phone number, so i gave it a ring. I introduced myself and told him about my company and that we stopped by to talk with him, i mentioned that we have unique grips for xbox 360 controllers and immediately after i said that he said "sorry were not interested in grips, weve tried them before, they dont sell" and i told him our product was unique and not just a rubber controller case and asked what brand of products he had tried and he responded "i dont know but were not interested" and then ended the conversation and hung up.

So I was kind of shocked that he wasnt even interested in hearing more about the product and just completely shut me down immediately.

Go to another retailer. See how many shut-downs you can get.

Just because he wasnt willing to take the risk on your product doesn't say anything about your product itself. Don't worry about it.
 

wade1mil

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So I was kind of shocked that he wasnt even interested in hearing more about the product and just completely shut me down immediately.

If it were me, I wouldn't worry too much about getting into local retailers. The PS4 and XBOX 720 are coming out within 12 months and after it is announced, sales of the PS3 and 360 will all but stop for your target customer. If you spend the next nine months working your a$$ off to get into 20 local retailers, your product will be outdated by then (assuming it's specific to the current version of the controllers).

I would contact the big 5-10 biggest YouTube names who do gaming commentaries and given them 10 free samples of your product to give to their fans. They want more interaction (likes, favorites, comments) on their videos to get more views and gain more subscribers and they often do that with free stuff. They give away your product, which provides you with brand recognition and them with subscribers.

Besides, if you can get customers to demand your product, that same retail might call you and not the other way around. That's how I would do it.
 
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Nick

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So I was kind of shocked that he wasnt even interested in hearing more about the product and just completely shut me down immediately.

This is a classical mistake that new entrepreneurs make: assuming that other people (clients, or partners, distributors, etc..) are as enthusiastic about your product as you.

Do not let this discourage you, everyone gets through this. Hit the next retailer.
 

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