How much do different social media platforms help your games to grow?

[Daruko01]

Do you use twitter, instagram, deviantart, etc to market your game? How much do you find these platforms help boost your games? Or do you just stick to posting your games for free on websites like F95 and link your patreon, itch.io, subscribestar, etc?

 

[anne O'nymous]

Do you use twitter, instagram, deviantart, etc to market your game? How much do you find these platforms help boost your games?

Seen from the outside, it's not the platform that make the difference, but how you use it.

It's obvious that the more platform you use to promote your game, the more it will be know. But being known is not enough. Using a Twitter account (by example) to present a render time to time have no interest. This while using it to strengthen the bound with your players can lead to more fans and supporters. And this have a cost, in time, what mean that you've to choice one platform and limit to it, else you'll spend too much time working on the public relation, and not enough working on the game itself.

 

[Daruko01]

Seen from the outside, it's not the platform that make the difference, but how you use it.

It's obvious that the more platform you use to promote your game, the more it will be know. But being known is not enough. Using a Twitter account (by example) to present a render time to time have no interest. This while using it to strengthen the bound with your players can lead to more fans and supporters. And this have a cost, in time, what mean that you've to choice one platform and limit to it, else you'll spend too much time working on the public relation, and not enough working on the game itself.

Hmmm I've been thinking of keeping most interactions with my players here on F95 since people are pretty active, and promote on different subreddits. I've been using instagram and twitter, but there's a very slim response and engagement there, so I think I'd rather cut them out. I wanna make a music composition and graphic design business as well, so maybe I'll keep these platforms for these two businesses?

 

[anne O'nymous]

I've been using instagram and twitter, but there's a very slim response and engagement there, so I think I'd rather cut them out.

I follow some creators on Twitter and, as I said, it depend how you use it. One of them have 20 times more followers on Twitter (5000+) than patrons on Patreon. It can seem unbalanced, but for the scene, and due to F95zone, less than 1% of the players pay, in a way or another ; becoming patron, itch.io, a tip jar, whatever. Therefore, this ratio is relatively good ; and by itself it's already a good number of followers for such specific account.

I wanna make a music composition and graphic design business as well, so maybe I'll keep these platforms for these two businesses?

It can be a good idea. And if you feel like it, you can still mention the game there. Some kind of, "nothing you on the music side this week, I was working on my game", news time to time.

 

[Daruko01]

I follow some creators on Twitter and, as I said, it depend how you use it. One of them have 20 times more followers on Twitter (5000+) than patrons on Patreon. It can seem unbalanced, but for the scene, and due to F95zone, less than 1% of the players pay, in a way or another ; becoming patron, itch.io, a tip jar, whatever. Therefore, this ratio is relatively good ; and by itself it's already a good number of followers for such specific account.




It can be a good idea. And if you feel like it, you can still mention the game there. Some kind of, "nothing you on the music side this week, I was working on my game", news time to time.

Hmmm I'm really gonna need to do a bit more research on how to market my game on something like Twitter and have more engagement with my audience, I'm really not used to this platform tbh, and for a hentai game now at this.

And yep, that's an amazing idea, funneling the audience between each account, or idk maybe merge my audio/graphic account with my h-game account. Though tbh I'm trying to not bring too much attention to my game on well used sites like intagram, twitter and facebook, just to avoid any chance of the government finding this, at least until I move out from my country.

 

[anne O'nymous]

[...] just to avoid any chance of the government finding this, at least until I move out from my country.

Hmm... In this case you should drop the idea to promote it on social media, at least while you're still in your country.
So far Patreon seem to be reliable (they don't drop out what kind of creation you do, so you're safe), but using social media to promote your game is something different. You tend to give some information by yourself, not regarding who you are, but where you live ; "we've been hit by a hurricane, but I'm fine", "I like [a brand not this known internationally, when not sold only in your country]", and things like that. And if asked by the authorities, the platforms will have the legal obligation to comply and give any information they have regarding the account. So, if being known as making an adult game is effectively a problem in your country, keep a low public profile.
Talking about it here is different. The site being a pirate site, respecting the Law isn't its priority.