Throwing down the gauntlet

AndrewE · 11-30-2007, 03:28 PM

This post comes as a response to a thread I posted earlier, but more specifically to points raised in one of the comments on that thread. Given that my reply grew beyond just a simple counter-comment, I decided to develop it into a new thread here.

I launched my arcade a few weeks ago with zero games and I'm now at 113 games, got 4 people who actually signed up and I'm seeing a steady increase of traffic. However it's obviously nothing spectacular.

Let me add a few more points that I've had in mind to the discussion on the state of flash game arcades.

After frequenting several of the main arcade forums and having visited more than 30 different arcade sites, I've reached the unsurprising conclusion that the flash arcade market is saturated with a majority of arcade owners vying for a tiny portion of the market's advertising revenue. The largest portion of arcade revenue goes to the top level 'A-List' arcades.

Most of the 'B and C-List' (and forgive me for laboring this 'A, B and C List' analogy) arcades that exist to generate income don't earn that much money, so arcade webmasters are inclined to run multiple arcades to stand more chance of gaining profit. This then leads to the nurturing of mediocre standards across the arcade industry: purchase cheap hosting, buy a cheap arcade script, upload a 2000-3000 games pack and repeat the process x 10 until what you end up with is a culture of arcade 'cloning'.

A-List arcades are usually run by larger media groups who can pour considerable amounts of capital funding into their projects. They therefore have the best designs, they have proprietary games, and they work with developers to create unique site options for their users. They exist in a league of their own - they would appear to be quasi-untouchable.

And while there is an audience for the B and C-list arcades, albeit at the minor end of the spectrum, I'm almost certain that it is in no way a loyal or enthusiastic audience or the type that would want to recommend this B or C list arcade to others. Rather, I suspect it is the sort of audience that we generically refer to on these forums as 'traffic'. An unknown entity, a string of numbers that could consist of pink elephants for all we care. But so long as a reasonable percentage of that 'traffic' clicks on our arcade banner ads, we are not going to worry about its origins or its behavior.

I would hazard a guess to say that many users of these forums and other similar arcade forums will never come close to this so-called A-list. Not because they don't want to, but because they have already resigned themselves to B and C list positions. They have embraced the banner exchanges, the flashing animated gifs, the pop-up ads, the endless submissions to directories and other such SEO wonders. In short, they are trapped in a self-inflicted state of stagnation; and by continuing to consume these services and in accepting these standards, they perpetuate the whole dilemma.

Now, I'm not suggesting for one minute that I'm better than anyone else, I'm not here to brag or to piss people off, I'm simply working through some thoughts and strategies about how to approach the arcade industry from a 'new' and 'fresh' angle. I'm trying to find ways of pushing the boundaries of the industry and redefining its vocabulary. I'm doing this because I think flash arcades are dead.

Over the coming weeks I will be writing a series of posts on my arcade blog about these strategies, and I will be putting them to test. I don't have any answers to any of this right now, I simply have the motivation to step out of the mold and do something different. But to get the ball rolling right here tonight, I invite anyone with any interest in this matter to respond with ideas for changing the way we run our sites. To ask ourselves how can we breathe new life into this industry? What steps can we take to generate loyal and organic traffic? And how can we give this so-called A-list a well-deserved run for its money? I'm throwing down the gauntlet...

dWhite · 11-30-2007, 03:33 PM

Thanks, that was a very good read.

khang · 11-30-2007, 04:38 PM

this is true, but what is the phrase that the American said " the rich get richer". Over the last three months i have asked exchange banner of some major sites (88x 31) and didn't get reply or answer.

cuz my site is not good as their

so most of the time, it is very hard to get traffic. However, on the large side, all the A list trade with others

. therefore, we can't get in unless we willing to spend the money .!!!

RickyG · 11-30-2007, 06:14 PM

Very keen for someone that is new in the biz! Let us know when you update your blog, I would like to follow it.
RickyG

brendgard · 11-30-2007, 07:10 PM

Very perceptive. He figured that out real quick. I look forward to reading your blogs, please do post that you've made them, or PM me, or something, please?

Hey Khang, PM me if you're interested in an 88x31 banner exchange still.

diex · 12-01-2007, 12:52 AM

Nice post, I remember looking at your site a few weeks ago and thinking to myself, this guy is doing something different. I was interested to see how you might succeed.

I am surprised that you are balking this early in the game. Surely you were aware of the thousands of "arcades sites" out there and that creating the slick website was only a very small part of the game.

I have also used the A-C list reference and agree with you 100%. I would disagree with you a bit on the desire to make the B list, I would consider that a somewhat of a successful venture.

As far as breathing new life in to the industry, I am afraid you might be alone on that one. You see, in my opinion, it would seem the message boards you want to rally are made up of C and D list webmasters who are not likely to share any truly valuable information that would actually bring real traffic or success. Its not easy making the B list and the last thing you want to do is bring your fellow C listers with you to the B list. The A list is only to be dreamed of if the B list is ever obtained.

These are small time ventures started for fun or hopes of fame by young kids and old timers.

Also, I think arcades are no more dead than BLOGS.

In any case, your analysis is correct. However, if you are talking about making the A list, then thats REAL BUSINESS venture that does require capital and exceptional NET BUSINESS SENSE. And for anyone that thinks you don't need capital to compete with GameHouse.com, Yahoo etc, well, I beg to differ.

You are more likely to find success taping the market of B-C list and hopefuls for your blog. Which is what I think most savvy arcade webmaster ultimately do, that is, tap the arcade webmasters market for banner exchanges, script and media resources, and blogs etc.

Lastly, I think the B-C list of arcades and webmasters is a developing net subculture. It is reminding me of the BBS days. Back in the day, there were thousands of BBS's and most of them were the same, using the same old pool of BBS programs. But it was a HUGE subculture.

Running a BBS was fun, might make you a little money and who knows, you might someday hit the big time, Compuserve, AOL, etc.

Good luck man, the A list a is tight market and like anything open to competition.

ps.

A LIST - GAMEHOUSE etc.

B LIST - JARKEY, BLITZGAMER and all of their friends.

C LIST - everyone else who is able to drive some traffic.

D LIST - The guy with a script installed realizing it takes more than a domain and script to get more than 50-200 game plays

digitali16 · 12-01-2007, 02:35 AM

What a great start to a thread and very well writen. I have to say to a great extent it is inspirational. I felt the same way as you 2 months ago when I started but now I have to say that some of that has changed. I really don't think adding the banner exchanges is just settling. Also directory posting is tried and true and big or small you will have to do some of that link building.

Searching a popular website in Google reveals that they have 1000's of links but until you get traffic links is not so easy to get. So directories and link dumps are not so bad to me. Also RSS directory submission.

I just want to express my simple view. I have to be honest Mibbi,arcadejunkie and hahaboy ( Anthony ) so many other guys on this and other boards have helped me. Anytime I am trying something new I just have a habit of learning from guys first. I have to say that in order to get into the Arcade industry you have to get some type of traffic. The big guys will not trade links with you and they just stick together and honestly it would not help you at the beginning even if they linked because you need to build your brand to make guys come back.

I would love for someone to point me in a way around this but it seems to me that either you have to do a lot of work or pay a lot of money to get on the A list. So I am anxious to hear your thoughts.

People make people rich ( in any industry ) so you have to get the links. Banner exchanges have helped me a lot. I hated the flashing banners and I noticecd everyone just focused on Mario, Sonic etc.. ( they don't need anymore branding ) so we focus a bit on our mascot. My analytics says that this is helping us get more bookmarks and favorites from people.
We do animations and we work with guys for myspace and orkut bulletins and we are working on youtube and other vid websites. I will also be using Ebay some in my promotions but all of this is because these websites are well ranked and I am applying the 80/20 rule.

20% of my work ( big traffic websites )
will bring me 80% of my traffic.

I am very open to Ideas but Banners have been there for years and if you don't like the designs then add in your mascot and do cool things with him along with what is working already but you need the banners to get the traffic going ( short term ). Also I initially thought banners were a turn off but visitors have almost been conditioned to expect them it seems. I get more repeat traffic with them now than ever. Even the larger websites use arcadebanners & funklicks atleast and or Moregamers. I am interested in alternatives but I think alternatives begin with improvisation on a theme.

Google SUCKS. They take their sweet time indexing your website and until your alexa ranking goes up other guys will not trade links so I think part of the magic is also just being in business for a long time. I wish I knew more ways to monetize because traffic for me is starting to pick up but until I can get 10K - 20K game plays a day I am not that worried about monetizing yet. I see that this industry requires tons of traffic unlike a Niche but again I am always open to learn new ideas and I just LOVE your spirit man! Power to the people Viva La resistance .

the problem really lies in the fact that 2% of arcades get 90% of the gamer traffic and 98% of us shuffle around the remaining 10% but the same can be said for any industry LOL. Me and my brother are

Trained musicians ( Worse there )
Trained Traders ( Worse there Guys even took some of our software design Ideas and ran with them ) .

Now we do Arcades same deal but what can you do? I would love to hear more discussion on this topic. So everyone lets put something in and see if we can take down the A list machine.

Regards:
Alfred
( fingers ache from typing LOL )

ArcadeSiteBuilder · 12-01-2007, 06:08 AM

I am impressed, a site two weeks old and you added 113 gmaes. Now, that is the way I am convinced it should be done for a site less than six months old.

Keep it up.. and you will soon pass that C list thing..

diex · 12-01-2007, 02:25 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ArcadeSiteBuilder

I am impressed, a site two weeks old and you added 113 gmaes. Now, that is the way I am convinced it should be done for a site less than six months old.

Keep it up.. and you will soon pass that C list thing..

I agree, its easy to get in to this thing without knowing what you are doing. I was quick to put up 2000 games. It got me a few indexed pages, but slow content growth would have been better.

ArcadeJunky · 12-01-2007, 10:38 PM

Great thread, and replies. Good work people.

Some random thoughts of mine to increase your arcade success:

If you've got the default template of a common script with the base gamepack, it's going to be rough going.
You must have a unique template
A logo or mascot or other branding devices should be used (but not in your 100x100 banner ads, you will hurt your CTR!)
Try to add a unique feature. Some add chat, some add shoutbox, some add forum, some add proxy. Use your creativity make your site STICKY.
Work for SEO traffic, but buy advertising in the meantime. Leverage your advertising for gaining partners.
Don't glut your site with ads. I saw an arcade today, it took like a minute and a half to get the game actually playing, between the in-house interstitial page, and the in-game Moochi ad, and the slow server loading the flash. Of course there is no harm in some 100x100 banners, LOL.
Plan for success. Optimize your code, cache your pages, and/or consider dedicated hosting if you plan to be a big player. You don't want sudden success in the form of lots of traffic to be your downfall. New visitors don't want to wait and wait to play, they will go somewhere else.
Experiment with your monitization. The more you make, the more you can build your empire. Did you try YPN?, did you try AdEngage?, did you try Chitka?, Text-Link-Ads.com?, and others? (FunKlicks provides a Paid Publisher program, don't forget. )
Do something to increase your site's sense of community.
Rotate content, or do something that helps keep things fresh. Whether this is new games, or different featured games, or popular game of the day, or something similar.

11-30-2007, 03:28 PM	#1 (permalink)
AndrewE Preferred Member Join Date: Nov 2007 Posts: 137	Throwing down the gauntlet This post comes as a response to a thread I posted earlier, but more specifically to points raised in one of the comments on that thread. Given that my reply grew beyond just a simple counter-comment, I decided to develop it into a new thread here. I launched my arcade a few weeks ago with zero games and I'm now at 113 games, got 4 people who actually signed up and I'm seeing a steady increase of traffic. However it's obviously nothing spectacular. Let me add a few more points that I've had in mind to the discussion on the state of flash game arcades. After frequenting several of the main arcade forums and having visited more than 30 different arcade sites, I've reached the unsurprising conclusion that the flash arcade market is saturated with a majority of arcade owners vying for a tiny portion of the market's advertising revenue. The largest portion of arcade revenue goes to the top level 'A-List' arcades. Most of the 'B and C-List' (and forgive me for laboring this 'A, B and C List' analogy) arcades that exist to generate income don't earn that much money, so arcade webmasters are inclined to run multiple arcades to stand more chance of gaining profit. This then leads to the nurturing of mediocre standards across the arcade industry: purchase cheap hosting, buy a cheap arcade script, upload a 2000-3000 games pack and repeat the process x 10 until what you end up with is a culture of arcade 'cloning'. A-List arcades are usually run by larger media groups who can pour considerable amounts of capital funding into their projects. They therefore have the best designs, they have proprietary games, and they work with developers to create unique site options for their users. They exist in a league of their own - they would appear to be quasi-untouchable. And while there is an audience for the B and C-list arcades, albeit at the minor end of the spectrum, I'm almost certain that it is in no way a loyal or enthusiastic audience or the type that would want to recommend this B or C list arcade to others. Rather, I suspect it is the sort of audience that we generically refer to on these forums as 'traffic'. An unknown entity, a string of numbers that could consist of pink elephants for all we care. But so long as a reasonable percentage of that 'traffic' clicks on our arcade banner ads, we are not going to worry about its origins or its behavior. I would hazard a guess to say that many users of these forums and other similar arcade forums will never come close to this so-called A-list. Not because they don't want to, but because they have already resigned themselves to B and C list positions. They have embraced the banner exchanges, the flashing animated gifs, the pop-up ads, the endless submissions to directories and other such SEO wonders. In short, they are trapped in a self-inflicted state of stagnation; and by continuing to consume these services and in accepting these standards, they perpetuate the whole dilemma. Now, I'm not suggesting for one minute that I'm better than anyone else, I'm not here to brag or to piss people off, I'm simply working through some thoughts and strategies about how to approach the arcade industry from a 'new' and 'fresh' angle. I'm trying to find ways of pushing the boundaries of the industry and redefining its vocabulary. I'm doing this because I think flash arcades are dead. Over the coming weeks I will be writing a series of posts on my arcade blog about these strategies, and I will be putting them to test. I don't have any answers to any of this right now, I simply have the motivation to step out of the mold and do something different. But to get the ball rolling right here tonight, I invite anyone with any interest in this matter to respond with ideas for changing the way we run our sites. To ask ourselves how can we breathe new life into this industry? What steps can we take to generate loyal and organic traffic? And how can we give this so-called A-list a well-deserved run for its money? I'm throwing down the gauntlet... __________________ FingerMonkey \| Little Loki \| Craverz.com \| Arcade Blog \| Twitter Last edited by AndrewE : 11-30-2007 at 06:43 PM.

11-30-2007, 03:33 PM	#2 (permalink)
dWhite Arcade Master Join Date: Nov 2007 Location: United States Posts: 1,532	Thanks, that was a very good read. __________________ Webmaster Forum - Free Web Hosting - SEO Hosting

11-30-2007, 06:14 PM	#4 (permalink)
RickyG Moderator Arcade Master Join Date: Dec 2006 Location: Under Your Mouse! Posts: 1,764	Very keen for someone that is new in the biz! Let us know when you update your blog, I would like to follow it. RickyG __________________ Arcade Banner Exchange, game packs, top site, arcade script and forum for all of your arcade needs http://www.mibbi.com This site stinks!! www.farting.us Had Enough Of AdToll? Try MibbiJr! www.mibbijr.com

11-30-2007, 07:10 PM	#5 (permalink)
brendgard Gamer FX Staff Arcade Elite Join Date: Oct 2006 Posts: 1,008	Very perceptive. He figured that out real quick. I look forward to reading your blogs, please do post that you've made them, or PM me, or something, please? Hey Khang, PM me if you're interested in an 88x31 banner exchange still. __________________ The biggest and best freelance site on the web! http://gamersgo.com A list of arcade related sites, add yours. http://funarcadeonline.com/ Submit games and trade links with me.

12-01-2007, 12:52 AM	#6 (permalink)
diex Senior Member Join Date: Feb 2007 Posts: 312	Nice Nice post, I remember looking at your site a few weeks ago and thinking to myself, this guy is doing something different. I was interested to see how you might succeed. I am surprised that you are balking this early in the game. Surely you were aware of the thousands of "arcades sites" out there and that creating the slick website was only a very small part of the game. I have also used the A-C list reference and agree with you 100%. I would disagree with you a bit on the desire to make the B list, I would consider that a somewhat of a successful venture. As far as breathing new life in to the industry, I am afraid you might be alone on that one. You see, in my opinion, it would seem the message boards you want to rally are made up of C and D list webmasters who are not likely to share any truly valuable information that would actually bring real traffic or success. Its not easy making the B list and the last thing you want to do is bring your fellow C listers with you to the B list. The A list is only to be dreamed of if the B list is ever obtained. These are small time ventures started for fun or hopes of fame by young kids and old timers. Also, I think arcades are no more dead than BLOGS. In any case, your analysis is correct. However, if you are talking about making the A list, then thats REAL BUSINESS venture that does require capital and exceptional NET BUSINESS SENSE. And for anyone that thinks you don't need capital to compete with GameHouse.com, Yahoo etc, well, I beg to differ. You are more likely to find success taping the market of B-C list and hopefuls for your blog. Which is what I think most savvy arcade webmaster ultimately do, that is, tap the arcade webmasters market for banner exchanges, script and media resources, and blogs etc. Lastly, I think the B-C list of arcades and webmasters is a developing net subculture. It is reminding me of the BBS days. Back in the day, there were thousands of BBS's and most of them were the same, using the same old pool of BBS programs. But it was a HUGE subculture. Running a BBS was fun, might make you a little money and who knows, you might someday hit the big time, Compuserve, AOL, etc. Good luck man, the A list a is tight market and like anything open to competition. ps. A LIST - GAMEHOUSE etc. B LIST - JARKEY, BLITZGAMER and all of their friends. C LIST - everyone else who is able to drive some traffic. D LIST - The guy with a script installed realizing it takes more than a domain and script to get more than 50-200 game plays __________________ Punk Arcade for cool games and retro arcade games Kids can play games fun happy fun games at Happy Fun Games Land. I also like guitar games Last edited by diex : 12-01-2007 at 12:53 AM. Reason: sp

11-30-2007, 04:38 PM	#3 (permalink)
khang Preferred Member Join Date: Mar 2007 Posts: 178	this is true, but what is the phrase that the American said " the rich get richer". Over the last three months i have asked exchange banner of some major sites (88x 31) and didn't get reply or answer. cuz my site is not good as their so most of the time, it is very hard to get traffic. However, on the large side, all the A list trade with others . therefore, we can't get in unless we willing to spend the money .!!!

12-01-2007, 02:35 AM	#7 (permalink)
digitali16 Arcade Elite Join Date: Oct 2007 Posts: 1,087	What a great start to a thread and very well writen. I have to say to a great extent it is inspirational. I felt the same way as you 2 months ago when I started but now I have to say that some of that has changed. I really don't think adding the banner exchanges is just settling. Also directory posting is tried and true and big or small you will have to do some of that link building. Searching a popular website in Google reveals that they have 1000's of links but until you get traffic links is not so easy to get. So directories and link dumps are not so bad to me. Also RSS directory submission. I just want to express my simple view. I have to be honest Mibbi,arcadejunkie and hahaboy ( Anthony ) so many other guys on this and other boards have helped me. Anytime I am trying something new I just have a habit of learning from guys first. I have to say that in order to get into the Arcade industry you have to get some type of traffic. The big guys will not trade links with you and they just stick together and honestly it would not help you at the beginning even if they linked because you need to build your brand to make guys come back. I would love for someone to point me in a way around this but it seems to me that either you have to do a lot of work or pay a lot of money to get on the A list. So I am anxious to hear your thoughts. People make people rich ( in any industry ) so you have to get the links. Banner exchanges have helped me a lot. I hated the flashing banners and I noticecd everyone just focused on Mario, Sonic etc.. ( they don't need anymore branding ) so we focus a bit on our mascot. My analytics says that this is helping us get more bookmarks and favorites from people. We do animations and we work with guys for myspace and orkut bulletins and we are working on youtube and other vid websites. I will also be using Ebay some in my promotions but all of this is because these websites are well ranked and I am applying the 80/20 rule. 20% of my work ( big traffic websites ) will bring me 80% of my traffic. I am very open to Ideas but Banners have been there for years and if you don't like the designs then add in your mascot and do cool things with him along with what is working already but you need the banners to get the traffic going ( short term ). Also I initially thought banners were a turn off but visitors have almost been conditioned to expect them it seems. I get more repeat traffic with them now than ever. Even the larger websites use arcadebanners & funklicks atleast and or Moregamers. I am interested in alternatives but I think alternatives begin with improvisation on a theme. Google SUCKS. They take their sweet time indexing your website and until your alexa ranking goes up other guys will not trade links so I think part of the magic is also just being in business for a long time. I wish I knew more ways to monetize because traffic for me is starting to pick up but until I can get 10K - 20K game plays a day I am not that worried about monetizing yet. I see that this industry requires tons of traffic unlike a Niche but again I am always open to learn new ideas and I just LOVE your spirit man! Power to the people Viva La resistance . the problem really lies in the fact that 2% of arcades get 90% of the gamer traffic and 98% of us shuffle around the remaining 10% but the same can be said for any industry LOL. Me and my brother are Trained musicians ( Worse there ) Trained Traders ( Worse there Guys even took some of our software design Ideas and ran with them ) . Now we do Arcades same deal but what can you do? I would love to hear more discussion on this topic. So everyone lets put something in and see if we can take down the A list machine. Regards: Alfred ( fingers ache from typing LOL ) __________________ Superior Arcade Script State of the art arcade technology at a Rock bottom price!!!! Trade 1:1 Traffic with our sites Fun Online Games \| Sonic and Mario Games \|Hot Flash Games \| Play Sonic Games \| MotorBike Games \| Bike Games

12-01-2007, 06:08 AM	#8 (permalink)
ArcadeSiteBuilder Advanced Member Join Date: Oct 2007 Posts: 402	I am impressed, a site two weeks old and you added 113 gmaes. Now, that is the way I am convinced it should be done for a site less than six months old. Keep it up.. and you will soon pass that C list thing.. __________________ Parking Games Pizza Games Always looking for good permanent hardlink partners, treat my links well and so do I!

12-01-2007, 10:38 PM	#10 (permalink)
ArcadeJunky Administrator Arcade Warrior Join Date: Aug 2006 Posts: 837	Great thread, and replies. Good work people. Some random thoughts of mine to increase your arcade success: If you've got the default template of a common script with the base gamepack, it's going to be rough going. You must have a unique template A logo or mascot or other branding devices should be used (but not in your 100x100 banner ads, you will hurt your CTR!) Try to add a unique feature. Some add chat, some add shoutbox, some add forum, some add proxy. Use your creativity make your site STICKY. Work for SEO traffic, but buy advertising in the meantime. Leverage your advertising for gaining partners. Don't glut your site with ads. I saw an arcade today, it took like a minute and a half to get the game actually playing, between the in-house interstitial page, and the in-game Moochi ad, and the slow server loading the flash. Of course there is no harm in some 100x100 banners, LOL. Plan for success. Optimize your code, cache your pages, and/or consider dedicated hosting if you plan to be a big player. You don't want sudden success in the form of lots of traffic to be your downfall. New visitors don't want to wait and wait to play, they will go somewhere else. Experiment with your monitization. The more you make, the more you can build your empire. Did you try YPN?, did you try AdEngage?, did you try Chitka?, Text-Link-Ads.com?, and others? (FunKlicks provides a Paid Publisher program, don't forget. ) Do something to increase your site's sense of community. Rotate content, or do something that helps keep things fresh. Whether this is new games, or different featured games, or popular game of the day, or something similar. __________________ >> FunKlicks.com Banner Exchange - Try our 1:1 Game Plug exchange

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