I did then and would now like to be involved, very much so because I believe it can be done. I believe UO:SA has a lot to offer new & old gamers alike. And moving the discussion out of 'general' is probably a good idea too [thought I'd posted this in 'suggestions' originally]If someone wants to genuinely be involved in a marketing campaign or speak more about it, perhaps we should use a sub-board for people who want to participate. We certainly could use the help in this department.
From my own readings (on various Ultima Online communities), it seems there are 2 consistent factors that have pushed people away from UOSA.
1) The community is the problem.
2) There's nothing "fresh"
I'm self-employed and work from home so I can make the time for this, and I enjoy the challenge so I'm willing to commit to this little endeavor and see it through.
Boondox, I always figured there would be an access problem with the current online material but I never really saw the website as detrimental to in-flow...why?
Although it is a secondary business to my main profession, what we do is start-up 'brand-ing" and [mainly] setup for online presence. Mainly for small-businesses but we have done/do it for a lot of low-level rock bands too. Effectively what you are doing with the website might be a part of what we'd do for a client.
We create the 'brand' and style the imagery around that theme, then we set up all the subsidiary social media accounts/sites using that graphic material for visual consistency across those sites. We also create media content for promotional use and target-market promotion. Video ads/trailers/demos, promo fliers for online & print event promotions, etc.
Basically we strive to generate a sense of excitement about what is being promoted within this content and place it in front of the people who will most likely be receptive to it.
Now, a lot of what we would do has already been done. Website, logo, a good amount of the graphic content, facebook account/page, email is already in place. Either we would set these things up with temp passwords or the client has to provide access to existing sites in order for us to make changes.
This is the access problem you refer to.
The website can not be updated without server access
The Facebook page can not be updated without at least admin rights
Youtube...same thing, as with any other associated media sites.
The alternative, as you have begun, is to set up new sites/accounts for these things. OR the owners of the existing sites have to be willing to work with us to upload new content provided and make the changes themselves wtih it. Both are complicated.
As I said before...what we do is really just a lot of guerrilla-type marketing. We often have to work with what we have to...figure out ways around things, out-of-the-box stuff.
I was of the opinion that a marketing campaign could very easily be created using what is available, without access, that would bring people in. [retention is another matter]
All the pieces are there I always thought they just needed to be put together and used was the major hold-up. At the time there were several people talking about doing it...I remember a Reddit discussion & page that flamed and died...something about a Youtube video...contest?
Anyways...I am in no way disparaging the website you created [I mean seriously, credit where it's due] but...is the current one truly a part of the reason why new players aren't signing up? Perhaps I'm missing something.
As others have said, a large part of the problem of why people aren't signing up IMO is simply a lack of promotion, not a lack of promotional material.
Again, maybe I'm ignorant here....
