Before we dive in, exciting news – you can play an online version of Cow Island Publishing’s Consul of Rome card game today by clicking here.
These blogs posts document my journey bringing this game to life (from the physical game to the digital version), which will hopefully help others looking to bring their games to life as well.
Introduction
Today I thought I’d give an overview of how I’m thinking about social media in terms of promoting the Consul of Rome card game from Cow Island Publishing. I’m millennial but far from adept at these things. I’ll probably eventually need help from a generation or two below me.
Here I’ll talk about the two channels I’m using, some lessons learned and what I’m planning next. Give us a follow and see how it turns out (links below).
TikTok “strategy”
I’ve put this in quotes and would air quote it if we were in person (same for Insta). It’s the equivalent of a monkey dressed in Roman armour throwing javelins at a dart board and wondering why things flopped or not.
I mostly post on TikTok – memes, play throughs, fun things with the cards, some bits on other games, a few things on history. videos or pictures are taken in groups when the inspiration comes and I stitch together a few things. I’m never sure why some things work and others don’t.
Originally I mostly posted about my Dictator of Rome logic puzzle game, though Consul of Rome has picked up quicker and is closer to a real launch, so that’s overtaken in terms of content.
My hope is to build as many followers as possible so when I start preorders I have a semi warm audience. Also I’m following lots of interesting gaming and history accounts for inspiration.
Check out the Of Rome TikTok and give us a follow!
Instagram “strategy”
There’s even less strategy going on here.
I’m confused myself as to whether I use the games handle “of Rome” or the publisher handle “Cow Island Publishing” – more followers on the game and more content but I haven’t really tried anything with Cow Island.
I think I plan to figure out what to do with this – feels like the place for any more polished content I eventually make. I’m not positive but if I plan to do paid marketing, this is probably the place.
Check out the Of Rome Instagram and give us a follow.
Learnings to take away for others starting out
My two main pieces of advice are completely at odds and I think the main way I can reconcile them is to simply say that the path you take depends on how much time/resources you have and what your ultimate goals are. Anyway, here are the two things I’d say in no particular order and remembering that I’m a zero -> ~100k followers in a few months so by no means a huge authority. When I use the term resource below I don’t only mean pure money though that is part of it – I mean friends/family willing to help, access to tools, skills you’ve already learned.
- Shoot from the hip and do it as frequently as is natural (good for getting a roll going when you’re time and resource poor):
- Don’t overthink things. Post about your game, how you’re building it, a walk in the park where you’re thinking about your game, some memes that are relevant, you playing games, etc.
- Don’t veer too far off track. I’m trying to promote an ancient Roman themed card game and build community (not just about the game but I want to connect with retailers, reviewers, distributors, historians, archaeologists to learn from them and see if there something I can offer them). Posting game reviews, say, doesn’t make massive sense as I’m not a reviewer, so I’m staying away from that. Likewise, even if I had fashion taste, I’m not going there with this account.
- Frequency seems to help. Try daily or at least several times a week. Don’t be discouraged by the inevitable flops.
- Test out new things whenever they pop into your mind.
- Content is off the cuff when it comes to me.
- Look at the stats and react.
- Plan, plan and execute (good if you are building momentum behind the scenes and you’re time and resource rich):
- Not my natural state but I can see how getting a proper overarching plan could have helped. I had my cow island publishing handle that friends and family followed but I started a new one for the of Rome games. Not sure I would have done that if I’d planned things out properly but think it’s ok now.
- Build out a schedule. Storyboard. Plan. Get the content filmed over a couple of days and then stick to your schedule.
- Tweak when you need to but test out your campaign properly.
- Get a mix of polished content and a few candid stuff.
What’s next?
I’ve got a ton of ideas and thinking how best to proceed.
Right now box art and rule book are almost done. Need to finalise copy. Need to get final printing quotes.
Then we’re in preorder mode and the socials will drive everything that way.
I’m going to try and do a mesh of the two pieces of advice above. Plan out the preorder content. Go and shoot from the hip for the rest.
I’ll post again when it’s played out in the lead up to Christmas.