Archive for December, 2007
Thursday, December 6th, 2007
This is part 2 of the BGT Case Study. You can find part 1 here.
Today I’ll talk about how I intend to approach content creation and what I want the blog to be about.
I have two paths that I could follow when it comes to content here:
First, would be to cover all the major browser games, updating the blog with news every time a new feature is introduced or a new server is started, writing tips and guides for each of them. The problem is that if someone is playing just one of those games, then he would find 95% of the content useless. Hardly a reason to become a subscriber.
Second, and the route that I’m going to take, is to have a dedicated page for each game, that will link to guides and tips, resources, tools, and will have a list of all the posts done in the blog where that game was mentioned. A page similar to what Wikipedia has if you will. A complete resource for that game, updated at least once per month, or when I post something new about that game. As example, the page I created for my own game, Imperial Ages. It’s not that detailed right now, as my game is still in alpha stage, but other games will have more detailed descriptions and guides.
Every time I mention a game, I will link to its profile page from my own site, so readers can get a detailed view on it, and decide if they want to play it or not. Hopefully, in time, those detailed pages will rank for quite a few long tail keywords related to those games.
As for the blog posts, they will be industry news, new games launched by the major players in this market, major improvements in already successful games, talking about browser games in general and tips on making your own, interviews and so on.
To make sure I know the latest news from different browser games, I took a couple of steps and there are a few more to be done, to make sure I don’t miss anything.
- I’ll look for popular games in browser game directories. Those that don’t display the number of players I’ll choose based on Alexa rank and forum activity.
- subscribe to game newsletters if I can find any that use this feature
- bookmark in a folder the Latest News pages from games, and Announcements sections from their forums. Then once a day I can right click on that bookmark folder in Firefox and click Open all in tabs. Shouldn’t take more then a few minutes to see if there are news worthy of reporting.
- subscribe by RSS to browser game blogs
- subscribe to blogs/sites talking about browser games
- once the blog gets a bit of popularity, I’ll start networking with game owners and get interviews
Other then that, I will write quite a few articles from my own experience on how it’s like to develop a browser game, what you need to know and what to avoid.
As for posting frequency, I’ll keep it limited to a couple of posts per week, plus any major news in the industry that will be reported immediately, and shouldn’t take too much time.
This concludes part 2 of the BGT Case Study, the content creation. Part 3 will probably be about the keyword research done for Browser Games Talk.
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Monday, December 3rd, 2007
As I announced in my last post, I’m going to do a case study this month, on a new blog that I’m launching. As some of you may know, I’m working together with some friends on a browser game, that will be launched in January. As part of the launching plan, I decided to start a blog about browser games, to support the launch and growth of the game.
The blog I’m talking about is Browser Games Talk. As online games are generally a low paid niche, I think this blog can make for a good case study. Since my reasons in this case have nothing to do with money, and everything to do with reaching an audience that I can promote my game to, I can afford making the project public, and talk about how I promote and grow that blog.
What topics I’ll cover in this case study, in the next month, until the game is launched, and after that, as I continue to develop the site:
- keyword research
- content creation
- promotion
- link building
- some monetization eventually
Since my only purpose here is gaining subscribers, monetization is not really a priority for me.
I’ll tell you why I don’t think this is a good niche to be in if you’re after the money. First of all, the value of Adsense clicks is horrible in gaming related topics and the volume of traffic needed to make a living of it doesn’t seem to be there for persistent browser games. There are affiliate offers if you write about casual flash games, but my main interest is getting an audience interested in persistent browser games (check out the Imperial Ages Alpha to understand the difference) that take months to complete or they never end. There are no affiliate offers to promote for these games as far as I know. If your reason is money, there are much better niches out there that can be covered.
Now, before I start filling the blog with content and promoting it, here are a few of the choices made so far:
Domain Name: contains my keywords of choice and the word talk. I didn’t go for the word blog at the end, because I didn’t want to limit the potential of the site. At some point in the future I might want to add a forum or a directory and the word blog in the url doesn’t really fit with my plans.
Full Feed: since my only priority here is subscribers, a full feed is the way to go. You should always go for the full feed if you ask me. A partial feed might bring you a few extra page views in the beginning and maybe a few extra bucks, but ultimately, a bigger number of subscribers give you access to better monetization options.
If you want to keep up with the next parts of the case study, make sure to subscribe to the RSS feed. December will be focused mostly on this case study, as I prepare for the launch of my browser game.
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Saturday, December 1st, 2007
As you can see if you’re reading this on the blog (if not, come see the new theme), the new ShylockBlogging theme is up and running. I’d appreciate any comments on it or if you see any problems with it.
The theme is done by a very good friend of mine, that is working on his own blog right now and will offer custom WordPress themes at affordable prices. I’ll make an announcement when his blog is up and running.
The people that ordered ads for December+January and sponsored this theme:
There is one ad left at $15 and you get December + January for this price, and a monthly mention of your blog in a special post.
Now, on to the November stats.
While November saw an increase in visits and page views, the increase in subscribers has been minor this month. I posted very little in the second part of this month, probably part of the reason for this minor increase. Managed to get into Top 20,000 Technorati, released a WordPress theme.
Hopefully, I’ll manage to get back on track in December, and maybe start a case study on a new blog that I’m launching.
First number is from November and the ones in brackets are from October
- 9,912 visits (6,624)
- 16,383 page views (11,349)
- 866 visitors from search engines (470)
- Technorati Rank: 19,292 - authority 268 (25,970 - 215)
- Alexa Rank: 68,345 (79,628)
- Subscribers: 212 (193)
- 84 posts and 385 comments (68 - 306)
- 1867 downloads for the Shylock Adsense Plugin (1,396)
- 212 downloads for the Abstract Shylock Theme
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