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Post by Adam Schmelzle on May 20, 2008 7:16:53 GMT -5
In response to this post that was made on the 'Welcome' thread... Hi
Got here from indiegamer forums.
Thanks for the forum! It really helps getting started easily.
I got a question about distribution with the Greystripe.
They have that link 'adwrap for publishers' and it feels like they only work with PUBLISHERS, you know what I mean. The question is whether it is possible to work with them directly for some one with only 1 game and starting out. I understand you (Adam) started in that fashion some time ago. But what's the current situation?
It would be perfectly cool to hear from someone who has recent experience distributing their first game with gs.
I understand this might be not the very best place for the question(fixed), but I haven't found anything more appropriate.
Once again, thanks for pioneering and sharing info.
Cheers and good luck with your games! As you say, it's been a while since I was a 'new' guy when dealing with Greystripe. Back then they had fewer than 100 games, and were desperate for content. When I e-mailed them inquiring about adWrapping a game, I got a personal response from their CEO! They've grown since, but I bet they still won't treat the little guy any differently. Just check out their top games, and you'll see that a great deal of them are from myself, and another publisher 'Tomas Kaminskas', whom I'm gonna assume is likely somewhat indie himself since he's using his own name. I too would like to hear from other people that have just started out with Greystripe. |
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Post by voxelvoxel on May 20, 2008 15:19:32 GMT -5
Going to figure it out. But need to make a decent game first.
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Post by vlad on May 28, 2008 12:05:57 GMT -5
To be honest, I registered there and never got an email back with account details. Later on sent an email regarding this and never got an answer.
This is unfortunate.
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Post by Adam Schmelzle on May 28, 2008 12:37:38 GMT -5
I'm e-mailing you an internal contact at greystripe...
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Post by vlad on May 29, 2008 3:51:50 GMT -5
Got that, thanks.  |
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Post by xdan on May 29, 2008 15:37:35 GMT -5
Yeah, I never got my account activated either. I waited about 12 days then emailed their support - I got a reply then (from a certain Daniel Cheng) asking for demo files etc. I sent them a copy of the game and haven't heard back... that was two weeks ago.
Maybe my game is rubbish, or maybe they just can't be bothered with single games - but they could at least tell me!
I posted a somewhat annoyed rant about this on my weblog (that no one reads..), and wrote that I might try Hovr next - and now Hovr have contacted me of their own accord! It still remains to be seen if they will accept my game either though... and I have no idea how Hovr compares to Grey Stripe.
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Post by Adam Schmelzle on May 29, 2008 16:04:28 GMT -5
I've got a couple games on Hovr.com now: 'Attack Breaker Pro' and 'Origami Sunflower'. First off it was really painful to submit each game to them. The were eager to get my games up, but when I sent the builds to them there were numerous e-mails back and forth with their QA guys telling me my games don't work. It turned out that they don't actually know how to properly install/test mobile apps. When they finally figured out how to actually install the games properly(they got help from their developer), it turned out my games were working just fine. I went through that with both games. As for the money: I have made a whopping $0.98 over the last 7 days fro 'Origami Sunflower, and a massive $1.34 from 'Attack Breaker Pro'. My games don't really 'market' themselves all that well. I don't have fancy screenshots, and the names aren't exactly great. So I don't get many downloads through Hovr.com, and therefore don't make much money. Maybe a more pro-ish game would get downloaded enough to make some notable money from Hovr.com, but I can't say that I'm too impressed. In the last week 'Attack Breaker Pro' made me around $260.00 from Greystripe, which is a might better than $1.34. Give the guys at mobilerated.com a shout, I get much better circulation from them than I do from Hovr.com. I don't know how much money I've made through mobilerated in the last week/month, because their reporting system only shows ad impressions, not ad $$'s. I'll be getting a monthly report with ad-revenue for the month of May presumably next week. Later. |
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Post by Adam Schmelzle on May 29, 2008 16:39:40 GMT -5
This makes me ponder other options. For example, I'd be able to submit the application, since I'm already a 'publisher' in Greystripe's system. I wouldn't really want to deal with the legal issues that could arise though, and certainly don't want other people to have my login info so they can check the reports.
I wonder if there's enough 'indies' out there to warrant a 'publisher' that accepts everything, and submits it to Hovr, mobilerated, Greystripe, etc for you. Could simply charge members and annual fee to make it a worthwhile service to run.
Members could have options:
1)$50.00 submission fee per game
2) Free submissions, but this 'publisher' takes a 5% cut for the first year.
3) $150.00 submission fee, where 'publisher' creates all marketing material like: web/wap graphics, descriptions, screenshots
4) Free submission, but publisher does all marketing materials and takes a 10% cut.
Members can build up discounts for testing other members applications for compatibility/bugs, and submitting reports. This way we could get 'free' device testing.
Just some random thoughts...
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Post by xdan on May 29, 2008 17:02:14 GMT -5
That would be handy. Certainly for publishing on Grey Stripe. I guess you'd need your own quality control too. Ho hum.
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Post by vlad on May 30, 2008 5:15:11 GMT -5
@adam
What you describe is an aggregator, except that an aggregator does not have fees but rather a % from the earnings.
If you can handle marketing, distribution and so on, that would be good for you, good for the distributors and good or bad depending on the developers.
We have considered working directly with you in terms of mobile development, not as an aggregator though, maybe you can build up a different set of services for developers.
Be warned though... that might mean a huge ammount of unwanted email going your way.
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Post by Adam Schmelzle on May 30, 2008 8:16:18 GMT -5
I was just throwing ideas out there, I don't have any plans for doing something like that myself though. I'll try to help people as much as I can with development issues, but I don't really want to take on any tasks beyond that right now. I greatly enjoy my freedom from real 'work', by getting paid to do what I always used to do in my spare time. I'm not saying I won't listen to every proposal that comes my way, but I am saying that it's hard to convince me to take time away from my own projects |
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Post by chrisl on May 31, 2008 18:55:04 GMT -5
Hi Adam,
Do Mobilerated provide their own ad-wrapping system? Or your game must already be ad-wrapped, and they "just" provide distribution?
And regarding your publishing ideas, there's certainly something there. Now I totally understand that you would have to keep your (time) involvement low, in order to stay focused on your own games!
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Post by Adam Schmelzle on May 31, 2008 21:39:34 GMT -5
Mobilerated does in fact adWrap with their own code. They'll also host/distribute your game anyway as well if you want. What you do is get a dev account with them, upload your game, and then e-mail their support asking to get it ad enabled. You'll likely be conversing with Barry if you do.
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Post by chrisl on Jun 1, 2008 4:44:48 GMT -5
Thanks!
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Post by xdan on Jun 5, 2008 11:08:57 GMT -5
I was wondering the same thing. Is it mobilerated or kalador I should have signed up for? (I registered on Kalador and contacted partners@kalador RE:adwrapping but no reply yet)
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Post by Adam Schmelzle on Jun 5, 2008 13:01:50 GMT -5
I don't think it matters weather you contact Kalador or mobilerated, since they're the same company, and Barry does the support on both.
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Post by xdan on Jun 5, 2008 13:41:36 GMT -5
OK thanks!
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Post by chrisl on Jun 19, 2008 16:44:55 GMT -5
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Post by Adam Schmelzle on Jun 19, 2008 23:27:31 GMT -5
Thanks, I've fired off an e-mail to Didmo now. I think I tried to contact them last year when they first announced their ad funded model, but never heard back. I'm pimping out the Greystripe 'Consumer Insights report' whenever I contact these other companies now, so I hope that gives me some more credibility in their eyes. I also had an e-mail from www.inner-active.com/ asking to talk on the phone, but I never got any further responses after replying to them. |
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Post by chrisl on Jun 20, 2008 15:47:53 GMT -5
Yes I think this report should definitely help you through their selection process.
By the way, any more insights about Hovr or Mobilerated?
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Post by Adam Schmelzle on Jun 20, 2008 16:59:52 GMT -5
Well Hovr seems to be a total bust. They don't appear to have a lot of people buying ads for their system, so the total number of impressions is uselessly low most of the time. I'm making less than $0.50/day on the two games combined through Hovr on most days.
As for mobilerated, they have no shortage of ads to show, since they funnel adMob text ads through the system. They don't pay very much per impressions though. My share of the ad money from mobilerated in May was only $17.00. I only had my games up from May 16th on, and even then, it was only AC1, AC2, ABP and AB. Origami Dandilion is doing better than the other games now that it's available as well, so I expect around 3X the money for the month of June. Still paltry compared to Greystripe though. I'll add my other games to mobilerated as my exclusive deals run out with Greystripe, but I don't think I'll bother with Hovr unless they start getting more $$'s spent on their ads. Hovr wasn't too bad in April, as they seemed to have more ads to show back then.
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Post by Adam Schmelzle on Jun 20, 2008 17:01:00 GMT -5
I've been saying 'though' a lot lately, that post is bugging me now...
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Post by chrisl on Jun 20, 2008 17:15:10 GMT -5
So Greystripe is doing a lot better than the others in attracting advertising dollars?
Plus you have better exposition on Greystripe?
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Post by Adam Schmelzle on Jun 20, 2008 18:46:37 GMT -5
Exactly. Greystripe is significantly better in both distribution and ad spending. Also, Greystripe ads pay more per impression than the other guys sites as well. Other sites rely more on payment per click, but greystripe is 100% per impression based.
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Post by Adam Schmelzle on Jun 22, 2008 8:57:37 GMT -5
Wow, I got responses from both Didmo and Inner-Active. Must be the greystripe report. Didmo seems to want me on board, and I'm gonna talk with somebody from Inner-Active soon from the looks of things. I'll share my experiences once things are up and rolling. I don't expect either to have the same revenue generating power as Greystripe, but maybe I'll be surprised |
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Post by Adam Schmelzle on Jun 23, 2008 10:04:34 GMT -5
I don't think the person from Inner-Active checked out my games ahead of time. I got the impression that they weren't impressed looking at the screen shots of the games when we were on the phone.
Looks like the link I sent didn't list my games properly, so the person from Inner Active saw the entire catalog from greystripe.com, instead of just my games. I kinda feel bad, 'cause I didn't mean to give the impression that I made all the games on my site: 00adam.com.
My mistake may have been what got me the phone call though, so maybe I shouldn't feel guilty about it. I'm hoping we can still go forward with 'Attack Breaker Pro' and one of the flower games like 'Origami Dandilion'. I may be out of luck though.
Didmo already wanted my games last year, so that won't be a problem, but I am worried about compatibility. From Didmo's tech docs, it looks like I need to manually list each supported device for my games. I hope they have a more generic option though, 'cause I have no idea which games are compatible.
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Post by chrisl on Jun 23, 2008 15:42:09 GMT -5
I thought you reported the same issue with Greystripe, ie having to list every device when submitting a new game? (contrary to their previous system)
Did they improve that recently? (or did I get that wrong?)
I also wonder how can anyone seriously guarantee comptibility with a huge list of devices?
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Post by chrisl on Jun 23, 2008 15:51:57 GMT -5
vlad, xdan and other readers: What is you own experience with Greystripe or other aggregators? Adam really is a star author for them  so it would be also interesting to learn from indies who initiated contacts more recently...
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Post by Adam Schmelzle on Jun 23, 2008 16:30:59 GMT -5
Greystripe at least has an online form where I can multi-select a pile of phones from a listbox. The didmo doc talks about me uploading an xml file with all the models listed inside it. I didn't see mention of any automated tools to help with the process. Reading that part made me cringe.
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sonique
Somebody who actually posted!
Posts: 3
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Post by sonique on Jul 17, 2008 15:03:45 GMT -5
Hello everyone, Interesting thread. We're a new indie developer company and I was wondering about many things discussed on this forum. We are also looking to publish our first "casual" titles and AD enabled publishing might be the only option really.. I think that many "large" publishers (gameloft, EA, digital chocolate etc) require a throughout polishing on their java games and only want to work with well established developer companies which have the resources to polish, port and test their games extensively. Tried registering to Greystripe but seems their captcha-image in the registeration is bugged / down at the moment.. doenst show anything, so can't register.. Cheers, Teemu Kivimäki Mirake Ltd. www.mirake.com |
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so it would be also interesting to learn from indies who initiated contacts more recently...