Venture Arctic Launch Numbers

Venture Arctic Release Data below!



(Demo Download, 22MB)

I'd like to run a little self-serving experiment here. Have you ever wondered what the true effect of getting "DUGG" is? I certainly have wondered.

Below are some charts showing the following stats for the launch of Venture Arctic. I'm posting this blog just as I post a link on Digg. Digg the game, hopefully it will see a bunch of downloads, and then I'll post more statistics after a week or two, showing the effects on Download Rate, Conversion Rate, Unique Site Visitors and any other interesting info.

I really need all the help I can get... I'd like to get paid someday! ;)

Digg here!
Rate it on Download.com
Bump it on Gametrove.net

Digg users are notoriously bad game-buyers. I expect that getting posted on Digg will cause my download rate to drop, my conversion rate to drop, but in the end, I still expect to add a few sales and possibly a few backlinks.




Venture Arctic is sold for $29.95.

Dates of Note:
May 25, 2007: Venture Arctic Soft Launch (announed on our forums)
June 1, 2007: Press Release issued via PR Web, has had about 140 full page reads a day since then, totaling 2158 as of June 19)
June 9, 2007: Version 1.01 Released

Definitions:
*Downloads: Downloads Started of the Venture Arctic Trial, multiplied by 70% (a reasonable download completion rate - as evidenced by Venture Africa and these numbers from reflexive)
*Visitors: Unique views of the Venture Arctic product page. It is possible to download the game from a couple other places as well, but the vast majority of downloads come from this page.
*5-Day Conversion: Sales divided by Downloads, averaged over 5 days
*5-Day Download Rate: Downloads Completed divided by Visitors, averaged over 5 days

Observations:
*Conversion Rate seems to have steadied out around 2-4% after starting out at around 10%. Venture Africa converts at 1.5-2% from our website.
*Conversion rate is much lower in the middle of the week.

Analysis:
*I haven't yet discovered the "golden touch" that can turn non-game-buyers into game-buyers. Readers coming in from our press release were most likely intrigued by the environmental aspects of the game, but are not actually game players. However, increasing the number of impressions a person has of a game will be more likely to cause them to buy in retail, so perhaps it can be viewed as investment into future purchases. I have no way of knowing if this is the case.
*After an initially disappointing download rate (20%), our DLR seems to have climbed to a solid 40%. Strictly anecdotal evidence research suggests that a download rate of 25%-40% is good for a product of this size being sold from a developer website.
*We have decent search engine traffic coming in for Venture Africa -- we need to find ways to convert those customers over to Arctic better.

By the way, the data above comes from a few sources. First, eSellerate, our payment processor provided download and sales stats, while we are using Google Analytics (beta) to profile visitors to our website.

Final Thoughts:
I never thought that it would be easy to focus on selling our games direct -- drumming up traffic is a difficult business. My hope is that the gameplay is unique enough, the content is family-friendly enough, and the message is important enough that we will be able to break through into mainstream press. I have a few pots on the stove in this regard... I'll keep the community updated...

Reminder:
PLEASE Digg
PRETTY PLEASE Rate on Download.com
PRETTY PLEASE WITH A CHERRY ON TOP Bump on GameTrove.net