oneADseven said: Well my idea is actually for a "recruit a pledger" system, not recruit a friend. Its a completely different concept. I tried to talk about it on this thread a few weeks ago and ran into the same issue; people think I am talking about recruit a friend because that's the title of this thread. Recruit a pledger would allow players to upgrade their own pledge tier depending on how many other people they recruited to make a pledge for the game. There are a ton of ways to make something like this work. Pantheon already has a pretty big following ... it's the #1 anticipated MMO of 2017. I think it would great if VR could empower the fan base for this game and allow them to leverage the hype train and recruit people through custom trackable links. My question is simple ... what is more valuable? If VR had to choose between me personally donating 1k or me finding someone else willing to donate 2k, which option would they choose? If the latter would be more beneficial, wouldn't it make sense to incentivize people that are capable of contributing in that way? If I get a reward for pledging money, why couldn't I get a reward for finding and converting someone else as a pledger through my link? The pledge system is designed to offer rewards to people who financially support the game. If I dedicate 50 hours of my time to find other people willing to contribute the financial support that VR is seeking, how is that any different? It's still money in the bank ... I understand that it isn't exactly the same thing, but the result is pretty similar, regardless of where the money is coming from. In this day and age, social media is a very powerful thing. Someone can create a video and before you know it, it goes viral and has 10 million people viewing it and commenting. My idea is just a way to harness the passion and drive that the existing player base already has for this game, and incentivize us to share our passion with as many people as possible. Many of us already do this with family or friends, but who can genuinely say that they have done EVERYTHING in their power to spread the word about Pantheon? What is the downside? What does VR stand to lose by putting an idea like this into effect? As a business owner, I know how valuable a referral is. I have been using referral programs for my business for over 6 years. I have over 1000 clients and many of them chose to do business with me because of the relationship I had with one of their friends, neighbors or family members. Any time one of my clients sends me a referral prospect, I send them a thank you card. If that prospect turns into a client, I send a $25 gift card to the person that referred them to me. I appreciate these referrals very much. Referrals have the highest conversion rate of any prospect and also have the best retention. This is why I treat them like gold, and reward the people who go out of their way to send me business. This isn't something they have to do. They do it because they believe in me and the services that I provide, something I am extremely proud of. As a gesture of appreciation, I send out gift cards. This isn't something I have to do ... I choose to do it. I choose to do it because it just makes sense ... I don't know what else to say. I have clients that were a referral of a referral of a referral of a referral. It's amazing how much people are willing to do in an effort to help you succeed ... but in order to harness this amazing social behavior, you have to acknowledge their efforts. In my industry ... when an existing client refers business to you, you treat them like gold. You show them exactly how much you appreciate their efforts to help you succeed and before you know it, they will be sending more referrals. More referrals who quite likely will send some of their own referrals as well. It's a beautiful thing when you reward people who help you grow your business. They will love you for it, and you get to feel pretty awesome about it too.
As I have previously explained to you, my friend, our Pledge/Sub system is not up for discussion, we have an experienced team working on it and it is not something we discuss publicly as it is part of our business strategy.
You folks are free to discuss it but we will not be taking feedback or chiming in with official replies other than to say we already have it covered. This is also typically the response we give when discussing anything to do with our business side of things as we have experienced professionals working in teams for marketing, economics, business strategy, finances etc. and like many other companies, we do not share our business strategies or take public input on them.
So please don't take it to heart, there are just some things that we are not open to discuss, there are not many at all, but this in one of them, I hope you and everyone else understands. :)
I have a large group of online friends I have met over the last 10 years and they are all over the place right now, in many different games. I have already put the bug in their ears for over a year with update reminders when Twitch streams come out etc...
They are still skeptical as I am sure a lot of people are... To me, this means a LOT more players are out there that will be coming over, including a lot of my friends. As I get into testing Pantheon, I can see my friends start to get highly inerested in this game. Going to be a lot of fun times ahead!
So I will do this naturally since I want my friends to play with me... don't think I need a friend program.
Game design and the marketing strategies for them are horribly complex beasts...
.... so I absolutely believe Kilsin when he says :
(A)
Kilsin said:... I will look into a proper refer system down the track, though, I have had it listed for quite a while, we are just waiting for the right time and it is currently a bit too soon.
and
(B)
Kilsin said:... we have experienced professionals working in teams for marketing, economics, business strategy, finances etc.
I do think there is merit in a referral system of some kind. It seems Kilsin and the VR posse agree with me :)
However, I agree with Kilsin in that now is probably a bit too early in the development cycle.
The gaming industry (and its massed hordes of fervent yay/nay-sayers) seems to have peculiar cycles of hype, fervour, disdain, adulation, disillusionment, psychotic breaks and the ability to hold more diametrically opposed views simultaneously than even the most inbred of politicians!
Unlike most sane industries .... in this one,
once you poke the bear, you better be ready to get poked back!
Evoras, is careful not to poke bears!