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WotC puts a stop to online sales of PDFs
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<blockquote data-quote="Roman" data-source="post: 4747186" data-attributes="member: 1845"><p>I agree that there is a subset of existing customers that was intentionally written off, but I am much less sure it was such a good thing for the company to do so. Although these customers tend to have less growth potential, they could nevertheless provide a stable base and a steady source of income from which to try to expand the market and the cost of keeping a large number of them might have been as small as a token effort to address their concerns (for example, I might have well switched editions if a token effort were made to address some simulationist concerns) - a token effort that would likely not jeopardize the appeal of the game to their new target audience. </p><p></p><p>Besides that, RPGs are a niche hobby and this is not going to change any time soon. This niche market expands in mostly two ways: </p><p></p><p>1) Direct advertising by companies (mostly WotC) and the associated experimentation by non-gamers (probably also lured by Lord of the Rings or similar, more mainstream cultural influences). For all practical intents and purposes, advertising to non-gamers is essentially independent of the actual contents of the ruleset. </p><p></p><p>2) Organic growth by existing gamers spreading the word to new people, taking them in their groups, setting up new groups and so on. This largely depends on the existing customer-base and a general rule that applies here is that larger the customer base, the higher the absolute rate of growth. Legacy customers are therefore very useful in this regard. </p><p></p><p>Yes, there are other issues that may help market growth, such as how easy it is to learn the game and so on, but my point is that I don't think intentionally cutting off a considerable section of the legacy market, when a token effort may have been enough to bring many of them on board, is as clearly a winner-strategy as you seem to imply. WotC obviously believed it was a winner-strategy, otherwise they woldn't have pursued it. I have little doubt that WotC will be a successful company with their strategy, but I disagree with their assessment and believe they could have been even more successful if they tried to bring more of the legacy market on board (not all, of course, a 100% conversion rate is not realistic, but more than they did). </p><p></p><p>Well, this is getting into edition-effect assessments rather than PDF-blunder assessments, which is somewhat off topic for this thread, but an interesting subject nonetheless (interesting at least as long as it does not degenerate into a flame war).</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Roman, post: 4747186, member: 1845"] I agree that there is a subset of existing customers that was intentionally written off, but I am much less sure it was such a good thing for the company to do so. Although these customers tend to have less growth potential, they could nevertheless provide a stable base and a steady source of income from which to try to expand the market and the cost of keeping a large number of them might have been as small as a token effort to address their concerns (for example, I might have well switched editions if a token effort were made to address some simulationist concerns) - a token effort that would likely not jeopardize the appeal of the game to their new target audience. Besides that, RPGs are a niche hobby and this is not going to change any time soon. This niche market expands in mostly two ways: 1) Direct advertising by companies (mostly WotC) and the associated experimentation by non-gamers (probably also lured by Lord of the Rings or similar, more mainstream cultural influences). For all practical intents and purposes, advertising to non-gamers is essentially independent of the actual contents of the ruleset. 2) Organic growth by existing gamers spreading the word to new people, taking them in their groups, setting up new groups and so on. This largely depends on the existing customer-base and a general rule that applies here is that larger the customer base, the higher the absolute rate of growth. Legacy customers are therefore very useful in this regard. Yes, there are other issues that may help market growth, such as how easy it is to learn the game and so on, but my point is that I don't think intentionally cutting off a considerable section of the legacy market, when a token effort may have been enough to bring many of them on board, is as clearly a winner-strategy as you seem to imply. WotC obviously believed it was a winner-strategy, otherwise they woldn't have pursued it. I have little doubt that WotC will be a successful company with their strategy, but I disagree with their assessment and believe they could have been even more successful if they tried to bring more of the legacy market on board (not all, of course, a 100% conversion rate is not realistic, but more than they did). Well, this is getting into edition-effect assessments rather than PDF-blunder assessments, which is somewhat off topic for this thread, but an interesting subject nonetheless (interesting at least as long as it does not degenerate into a flame war). [/QUOTE]
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