Guide:Marketing Funnels

A marketing funnel is a basic part of developing a marketing plan and details your player's journey with your game. The funnel starts at the top with the awareness stage, when someone first learns about your game, and ends with the purchase/loyalty stage, when someone has not only played your game but is advocating to others about it. The marketing funnel is a visual interpretation of the player's journey with a key part of it being that a lot more people will be exposed to your game than will eventually play it. These stages are not definite- think of it more as a visual guide of how fans interact with your games rather than a set in stone process.

---

Awareness Stage

The Awareness Stage is where everyone starts. This is where players first learn about your game, so it's the largest stage. This can be through social media posts, gaming events, and browsing store fronts.

Players who decide to learn more about your game rather than keep scrolling will move down to the Interest Stage.

Interest Stage

The Interest Stage is where players actively seek out more information on your game. They will look for your social media accounts and find out more about your project. They might also follow your social media accounts and sign up for your newsletter at this point.

Players who stick around for your game will move down to the Consideration Stage.

Consideration Stage

The Consideration Stage is where players know who you are and are considering downloading/buying your game (or demo). They follow you on social media but haven't made the jump to downloading your demo or signed up to your Patreon.

Players who end up downloading your game or joining your more exclusive channels (like Patreon or crowdfunding) will move down to the Conversion Stage.

Conversion Stage

The Conversion Stage is where players download or purchase your game.

Players who play the game and continue to support you will move down to the Loyalty Stage.

Loyalty Stage

The Loyalty Stage is where players have played your game and continue to support you, whether financially or vocally. These are players who are active in your Discord server, support you on Patreon, and/or advocate for the game to their friends.

---

Ideally every player would make their way to the Loyalty Stage, but in reality a very, very few amount of players will. Most players will fall off the funnel during the Awareness Stage, whether because they're not your target audience, the game doesn't appeal to them, they forget to check it out, and tons of other reasons.

When you set up your marketing funnel, you should make it easy for players to navigate from each stage downwards- but not every player. You want your marketing funnel to focus on your target audience, the group of people who are most likely to enjoy your game. The more people you can get down your funnel might sound good, but if they aren't people who would like your game then you're not spending your time and efforts wisely. One last note: store pages like Steam can make up the entire marketing funnel. Players can become aware of your game through searching tags and end up buying your game through store pages. Setting up your store pages with your target audience in mind is very important!