Done.

i think its good exposure, this site has a pretty large userbase.

Think of it like torrents.... nevermind....

Maybe like 50 copies is fine.

I know that they got at least 17 sales (Four, 4 packs and a friend who wanted to do the NPC name thing) as a result of me checking out their game and talking to my friends about it after seeing it here. I personally didn't pick up a copy (moneeeyyy), but I have a lot of friends who loved Terraria and a few of them bought packs to share with their friends. AND WHO KNOWS HOW FAR THE CHAIN WENT o_o!

Anyways, I would think it's relatively decent exposure.

I don't know the answer to the question posed in the title, but I think there are 2 faulty conclusions here.

Regarding Defender's Quest and whether or not the giveaway had any discernible impact on sales, I think looking at a single day while the giveaway is going on is not likely to yield any worthwhile information whether or not it's a daily at the same time. First of all, if people think they have a chance at a free copy of the game it stands to reason that many will wait until after that giveaway has ended and they've lost to buy it. I also think the more likely benefit is less about "oh hey, I found out about DQ on Steamgifts and now I'm going to go buy it." than it is to be from positive word of mouth - people who won the game playing it and then touting it to their friends, which would take a lot longer to show up in sales stats.

And I don't think giving away 100 copies of Starbound costs the devs anywhere near $1500. The only actual cost is the man hours it takes them to get and distribute the keys. While they may lose some sales from winners who would have preordered, I sincerely doubt everyone who won it would have bought it otherwise, and even among those who would have, most would have waited for a sale to get it at a fraction of the full price.

I think you are putting too much stock in referral links. I look much harder at games that I see often on here, but I don't just click links. I pay attention to game names and know what to be on the lookout for when I am shopping around. I actually made plans to buy Starbound and I didn't click on the link. I wouldn't judge it by money lost or anything because the exposure of the game is worth more than money never spent. Most of the winners never would have bought the game, but many people will because they hear about it. I feel the same way about Dead Hungry Diner, which I plan to buy as well. I look up games on my own time and can remember game names fairly easily. Seeing them on here definitely makes me more likely to pay attention when I see them elsewhere. I think most people are the same way.

There's no cost to recoup when they hold a 100-key giveaway. The game is going to get made, regardless.

The only loss from that giveaway is potential sales. How many people won that game that would've otherwise bought it at full price or a discounted price somewhere down the line. Let's assume that only three-quarters of the winners would ever have bought the game at all, and that only a third of that (25% of total) would've bought it at full price. For the sake of napkin math, we'll give the other two-thirds of purchasers (or 50% of total) an average entry price point of half-cost (or $7.50.)

By my math, that's only $750 "lost," not that developers have to pay for keys. Now, maybe that giveaway only brought a handful of visitors to the website, but there are further benefits. It fosters goodwill towards the developers. When the game releases, there's 100 more people (let's be super-optimistic) filling up the multiplayer community. And that's 100 more people with the game in their library, with friends who will see them playing that weird new game.

For a fairly generous "loss" of $750, it will more than make up for it in the long run.

That said, they only gave away like 15 keys on reddit's /r/gaming and probably got a solid thousand hits to their website at least.

I don't think it's fair to limit your traffic values to the time when the giveaway was open.
IMHO, the real interest comes up from forum topics like this one, or others like here. I, for example, bought the game right after the pre-order was available. I didn't enter or comment on the giveaway. However, I still see it as a valid investment if it can at least allow the creation of such topics and rise an interest in the community, which may eventually lead users to actually buy the game.

I must say though, considering the daily traffic SteamGifts gets, they'll definitely get more traffic to their site by advertising their game somewhere else (like reddit) where the user count is multiples of what we have here. On the other hand, SteamGifts allows them a "cheap" tool to use, as they don't have to worry about getting keys, choosing people or giving them the game; it's all done by the system and site admin. In that sense, it turns into a question of convenience vs. exposure.

I'd also suggest talking with cg about the traffic SteamGifts gets. I think we get something about 15k views daily, but don't take my word on that.

"There's no such thing as bad publicity."

It's pretty apt, if not always true.

Another thing to consider is learning general information about the game. I had never heard about the game prior to the giveaway. I might not click any links but the name registered. Further down the road, the name might pop up again. Already a brand recognition exists because the giveaway was a dominant feature that showed up for days at the top of the list. How that brand recognition is nurtured is up to the developer. Spreading even further word of mouth can assist. There are many catalysts that can take word of mouth and have it become a purchase. As a website owner, I have to find new ways to improve exposure for the developers I wish to cover on the website. It is not always easy and not always a proven factor but know this, people saw the name and started learning about the product. As time goes by, more sales will developer because of this.

The issue really is that getting hard stats with how well marketing works is a bit difficult. A lot of things are really subtle in how it benefits. For example, who knows how many people added the game to their wishlist because of the giveaway. Or how many may buy a copy later. Or how many of the 100 people who won it will later recommend the game to friends who will buy the game? Or people on here may buy it later on to gift to other users? There's a lot of ways that giving out free keys can benefit but not be an immediate benefit. A lot also depends on the game as well since users on this site have varying tastes.

The main thing is that it is getting exposure. A big part of marketing is just getting the name out there so people recognize it and then spread the word. People also tend to think more highly of companies that give freebies. There are many ways it can benefit, but a lot also depends on the description posted with the giveaway and also the game itself being good enough that people will enjoy playing it and spread the word. With one like Starbound, since it's a preorder copy, we can't know as much how much benefit there will be since the winners likely have not been able to play it yet.

I think it's better if they use SGifts as a tool than a be-all-end-all marketing resource in itself. Imagine if you sent a PR and had it picked up by a handful of major outlets and included a SGifts link in it as well as your usual hijinks. It'd be easier for outlets to post that SGifts link and say, "get your chance to win a copy here courtesy of the devs!"

...

SG is great to revive a dying online community. ie: it's something that Lead and Gold could really use. It's a good game, but nobody is online playing it. It's also something that Sky Drift could use. There's a bunch of games that the publisher's could revive with SG giveaways.

Giving away free copies is a good marketing strategy because it introduces people who might not otherwise have been interested to your game and your company. It also expands the potential for the word-of-mouth advertising which is, by far, the best advertising to have. People will trust their friend's judgement over an ad or trailer they saw.

As for the website click and only getting 318. That really doesn't matter. Most people aren't interested in going to a game's main webpage or its developer's/publisher's webpage anyways. Seeing as how this is a Steam based community, most people will just want the steampage.

Also, 100 copies were given out but 24,280 people entered. That means 24,180 people didn't win (duh), but the significance of that is that it gave the idea of owning this game to 24k people. Out of those people, there's the potential of "aw, I didn't win but I really wanted to. Maybe I'll just go buy it myself". While without the giveaway this same person might not have even heard of the game. This "I didn't win" mentality is great because it creates a feeling of having lost something when you really didn't. But now you want to fix this feeling... therefore, purchase.

they are offering copies of their game to people that come for free games. I don't think they are losing much worst case scenario

"100 preorders is potentially $1,500 to them, so it's a pretty sizeable chunk. Over 1/3 of the people who went to the website would have had to buy the game to make it worth their investment..."

I think someone already said this, but that logic doesn't hold up. 100 preorders costs them absolutely nothing. Let's use your stats, although I'm rounding. 24,000 people entered, 100 won, 300 checked the page from SG. Let's say 100 of those people actually bought the game. That means 23,900 didn't feel like buying the game. Statistically, most of the winners will be from the 23,900 size group, as opposed to the 100 who hypothetically would buy the game. Giving away 100 preorders loses you almost no sales whatsoever and, since it's digital distrubution, the actual cost of giving them away costs nothing either.

Also, some people from here probably checked it out on YouTube or something instead of the actual site.

Lastly, and someone else mentioned this also, you can't track word of mouth. More than 24,000 people now know the name Starbound, some may have checked it out and, either way, the name is floating around out there. Next time they're exposed to it - beta release, final release, popular streamers/let's plays/personalities/reviews talking about it, etc. - it will resonate. And some of them have already told their friends.

To answer your question, though...there's no real way too statistically say if it is indeed worth it or not but, as I said, I don't think it can possibly hurt, since it costs next to nothing. Is it worth the effort for a game developer to get a giveaway setup? I don't know, but I feel like it is, due to the low risk and high potential reward.

yep its like faerie solitarie, i miss the giveaway and i feel bad for dont own that game that everybody owns, i was too close for buy the game

If the game is good, then of course it benefits them. If the game is generic, then people wont talk about it regardless. However, if the game is truly good, then they wouldn't need to give away so many copies anyways. I guess it all goes down to how impatient as a developer/publisher when giving away the games. It could take a long time depending on marketing strategies, which first time indie game developers lack skill in sometimes.

I think 8 out of 10 users did not even read the description in public giveaways. Some people even use automated script to enter every giveaway available.
I put some links promoting Divinity Original Sin on Kickstarter on my first public giveaway, lets see if people actually read the description..

"100 preorders is potentially $1,500 to them".. assuming every winner of that giveaway was going to pre-order it in the first place, this is a rather farfetched assumption. In the same way you can assume no one would.
I think the best way is to offer an older title as a giveaway to promote the new ones though for small developers, since you will have had most of the sales at any rate.

I feel it is worth it. Before the giveaway i did not know about Starbound and now i do want to buy the game.

As Suits said, making the assumption that every winner would have bought the game is far fetched. On the other side, if i win games here i have friends who buy the game to play it with me.

Next to all this, it is all about creating awareness of the game. Bloody trapland can make a huge giveaway but if noone likes the game then it won't get greenlit

Word of mouth has a big impact on selling products. If one person likes it, it's very likely that he or she will tell their friends about it.

Worth it.
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