Talking marketing

"Internet marketing" computer keyboard graphicA site owner, who probably wouldn’t want to be named at this point, recently expressed to this site an opinion that they thought a specific competitor of theirs had one of the most interesting and best-produced games in town, but observed that this competitor seemed to attract very little custom and wondered how they could afford to remain in business. It’s not the first time that there has seemed to be occasional degrees of disparity between what might be considered critical opinion (see, for instance, bloggers’ “favourite game” charts), popular opinion (see, for instance, TripAdvisor charts) and apparent levels of custom. Having the most interesting game, that operates really reliably and provides a consistently really strong experience, counts for little if people don’t know about it.

Whether you’re in the business or not, this site wholly recommends the Escape Room Enthusiasts Facebook group, modulo some people’s standard objections to the site. It has over a thousand members and is far busier than most Facebook groups, without being overwhelming. The content often has valuable insights from around the world – and when so many businesses are local or national, people are often really happy to help out those who they’re not going to rub up against. There have recently been a couple of comments on marketing issues, often quite specific in detail; Josh Nekrep wrote on advanced data collection through Facebook and Shaun Collignon shared three strategies that worked for him. Huge gratitude to Josh and Shaun for sharing them, of course!

Further to that, another exciting initiative is the RoomEscapeist monthly conference call for those in the business or looking to get started. The September call’s topic is marketing; the Facebook announcement suggests more specific topics might include dealing with the press and the use of Press Releases (bonus tip for UK and Irish sites: please include this site on your distribution list!), social media, social buying sites, e-mail marketing, video marketing, pay-per-click advertising, word of mouth and more. The detailed announcement suggests that the call will take place tomorrow night at 11pm UK time (late, but it’s hard to pick a time that’ll suit everyone between Vienna and Vancouver) and suggests a UK freephone number to call to get involved.

This site gets the impression that there may well be more to come from Paul at RoomEscapeist between now and the next monthly call, but time will tell!

Pop-ups

Pop-up book graphicThis site recently very much enjoyed reading about an exciting publicity technique operated by Escape Hunt of London at this week’s World Travel Market conference. On a small (6 m2) stand, packed to the rafters, they had a very small (one-player?) little exit game for people to come and try.

Well done to them for promoting the exit game industry at large to a conference where people might not have expected to find it; despite the size of the room being about that of a typical WC, it was sufficiently well-packed to attract people’s attention and gain excited tweets from those who thoroughly enjoyed their very little lock-in, setting the record by escaping with six minutes to spare.

There’s definitely the potential for pop-up exit games, and indeed this isn’t unique. Two museums in Cambridge are hosting such games, one for each of the next two Tuesdays as part of the Curating Cambridge festival (more, please!) and this site has already written about the week-long Escap3d @ the MAC, again as part of a festival.

The world is bound to see other such events in the future. For instance, Escape of Edinburgh, Glasgow and also now Newcastle hinted at striking deals to run pop-up games at the end of a recent, really good interview they conducted with STV (and another one tailored towards their Glasgow branch as well). Extremely promising.

On a much, much smaller scale, it’s tempting to wonder whether there might be a future for other micro-escape games. That sort of size is about the size of a typical market stall; some cities may also provide high-profile, highly subsidised retail space to start-ups, such as Stockton-on-Tees’ Enterprise Arcade. Clearly you could put an exit game in there, but could you put one worth playing, one that might get people begging for more?

Hard to say, and it would be a very different model from that which exists at the moment. Markets are noisy; outdoor markets can also be windy – and, if you’re downwind from the fish stall, possibly also a bit whiffy. It would be hard to build up much of an atmosphere. It also takes time and detail for people to start to suspend disbelief and get into the game, which may be luxuries that a small market stall sized installation might not have. Exit games, so far, have not been things can do as impulse purchases; it’s more usual to require people to book well in advance, with the anticipation of the game contributing to the experience. It’s also key to think of the clientele; market shoppers are typically looking for bargains, rather than for experiences.

This is putting up strong arguments against markets possibly being a step too far. However, perhaps someone will be smart enough to find an ideal way for good things to come in small boxes, even in the exit game field.

Could there ever be a smart voucher scheme for exit games some day?

Blank purple voucherTonight’s Christmas shopping came as a reminder of the prominence of voucher schemes. A little research reveals that the UK Gift Card and Voucher Association, a trade body not previously known to this site, claim that the voucher market for their UK members alone is growing still and might be worth two billion pounds in 2014.

Looking further, considering Red Letter Days, Leisure Vouchers, Virgin Experience Days, the Great Days Out scheme in Ireland and doubtless many other competitors, none of them seem to permit you to use your vouchers to play exit games. This seems a strange omission. You can get all sorts of other exciting experiences which might be considered competitors of exit games (ropes courses, bungee jumping, driving, spa days and so on…) but this site cannot find any exit games which have signed up to the scheme yet.

Are site operators missing a trick here? Is this item number 283 on operators’ “get around to it some day” lists? Have site operators considered it and rejected it – for instance, are the voucher companies pains to deal with or do they charge excessive fees? Some exit games list stag and hen parties as possible categories within “Who is this game for?” lists, and this site has seen at least one company form a partnership with a stag-/hen- party company, which seems like excellent practice. If you’re looking to use a reseller like that, perhaps these experience voucher companies might be worth investigating as well. (Surely they would likely lead to teams of more, er… sober players!)

Taking this further, would it make sense for there to be an industry-wide exit game voucher scheme? The principle would be that you could get a voucher which every exit game in the scheme would accept in exchange for a booking for a certain number of people, at a location that happens to suit you. The obvious criticism is that different sites have good reason to charge different sums of money for their games, and apply different terms and conditions; perhaps a nominal £20-per-player voucher might get you, say, a before-2pm-on-weekdays-only game in an expensive market like London, or might get you an any-time game and a 50% discount towards a second game at the same site in a cheaper market elsewhere.

There are doubtless hurdles to overcome, but if there were the will in the market to make this happen, it could surely be an option. (And, airing the dirty little secret out loud, just think of the revenue from the vouchers that are paid for but never actually redeemed…)