Why I think all publishers should releases teasers.

[V_Shane]

Hey James, I didn't realize that. Hmmmm maybe another teaser for Arcanum 2. I posted a visual here jsut a few minutes ago, but I think I will make a 1 pager of 4 items for RPGnow free section.

I made 1 page teaser for Arcanum 1 and announced it here, I usually get like eh, 5-20 hits per day on the Arcanum Creations page, but when I put up the sample PDF, I had 248 hits in one evening, then it went back to normal the next day.

 

[Strutinan]

Speaking of teasers, Appendix C: Psionic Threats is up at DaemonEye Publishing .

 

[rpghost]

Hey James, I didn't realize that. Hmmmm maybe another teaser for Arcanum 2. I posted a visual here jsut a few minutes ago, but I think I will make a 1 pager of 4 items for RPGnow free section.

Don't get me wrong... what I said is we'll list and distribute whole stand alone free product form Publishers of RPGNow. We'll not put demos or teasers from vendors in the catalog FREE section. Demos are attached to the product they are releated to with a DEMO button for the customer to press. But to get something in the FREE category it has to be a fully self standing release.

Free items also never show on the front page or any of the top ranking lists.

James

 

[Geron Raveneye]

Would be great

Putting up 3-5 page teasers for a product (adventures probably not) would give us (customers) the opportunity to check it out a little before buying it...and face it, for some people it is important to know wether to spend money on one or the other product, especially when two products cover the same topic. Of course, reviews are great to go for, too, but nothing can convince as good as a glimpse at the finished product.

As some here already remarked, electronic commerce is rising, and there just IS no possibility to flip through the pages of an electronically offered book. Teasers serve exactly that situation.

 

[mroberon1972]

Actually, I'm not sure that a teaser is actually that useful now...

Out of 5 days statistics, I only have about 30 downloads of a 400kb pdf teaser. And the point is, the teaser is not even "just a teaser". It's actually a template class and set of spells that are going to be straight from the book.

Or perhaps the product I'm designing just is not what people want... No way to know from this end...

Regardless, I'm probably not releasing anymore teasers until after the book is finished. Takes time away from my main projects, and does not seem to have any real net gain.

Oh well...

Mr. Oberon
"Hmnnn, average of 3 downloads per day vs. over 100 message views..."

 

[philreed]

Free PDF Downloads

I find the free PDFs work great for showing people what kind of stuff you do and to drive traffic to your site. The one I released earlier this week has been downloaded almost 600 times on my website.

The free spellbooks PDF on my site has been downloaded over 4,000 times since it was released in September.

I admit I don't have sales near these numbers but I have at least made a large number of people aware that I exist.

 

[rpghost]

If you release a free teaser on RPGNow.com as a seperate product it gets little or no promotion and only sits in the FREE category for people to stumble on. I'm sure that's why you only got 30 downloads. It's up to you to promote it. What is better is if you put a DEMO button on a completed product.

But for the most part pre-release teasers should point to your OWN website where a simple click will get them a download. Remember that RPGNow requires someone to signup at the site to download anything. That's more of a pain. But at least you know then that the 30 people that did download it _ARE_ very interested and they are NOT annonymous as you can now contact them when the new product is out. Still most teasers are used to drive product and publisher awareness to your website (not rpgnow.com) as in what Phil did.

James

 

[philreed]

Awareness

Something I'm also doing in all PDFs is trying to build awareness of the fact that people can buy PDFs. Each one includes a short bit of info saying PDFs can be bought and directing people to my site and rpgnow.com.

I sell PDFs through my site but prefer if people buy through RPGNow since it's so much easier for me. I had been "selling" on RPGNet but sales were so sad ($4.80 for me in 4 months compared to over $1,600 for me from RPGNow in the same amount of time) that I dumped RPGNet sales.

 

[HellHound]

Meanwhile, I think the teaser demo for Everyone Else has improved the sales of the product overall. It is rapidly climbing again in our sales statistics since we released the demo.

 

[mroberon1972]

If you release a free teaser on RPGNow.com as a seperate product it gets little or no promotion and only sits in the FREE category for people to stumble on. I'm sure that's why you only got 30 downloads. It's up to you to promote it. What is better is if you put a DEMO button on a completed product.

But for the most part pre-release teasers should point to your OWN website where a simple click will get them a download. Remember that RPGNow requires someone to signup at the site to download anything. That's more of a pain. But at least you know then that the 30 people that did download it _ARE_ very interested and they are NOT annonymous as you can now contact them when the new product is out. Still most teasers are used to drive product and publisher awareness to your website (not rpgnow.com) as in what Phil did.

James

Umnnn, I'm not selling the final product yet, and the pdf is on my website for free download...

Sorry, Guess I should have made that clear.

(By the way, anyone know what ENWORLD charges for advertising? I e-mailed twice, but have not heard back from anyone yet...)

Mr. Oberon
"But, I'm giving it away..."