MARKETING PLAN

WARZONE INSIDE – A MOBILE GAMING APP

The current work is to closely understand the mobile app market emphasizing on gaming apps and lay down a marketing plan for a new gaming app, “Warzone Inside” and carrying a comprehensive and extensive study of its “Freemium Model” and marketing strategy which further includes studying its market segments, competitors, pricing and promotions strategy.

APP• It offers

ultimate multiplayer counter strike experience with real locations and for the first time incentives to winners.

• Game same as pc game, “Counter Strike” but with additional features which include real maps(location identical to some historic fight spot), any two teams can play from any part of the world(Given internet is available :P), Additional weapons available(which varies with country’s traditional weapons used).

• You can play both offline and online.

• Game will have different stages(difficulty wise – only while playing with bots) and anyone can play the game either individually or with a team.

• Online connectivity maintains your score and show your position in a leaderboard.

• There will be different local servers running and anyone may connect to any server given the person who created the server allow that person to get in the server.

• There will be two sides terrorist and counter terrorist one can choose to be in either of two.

• There will be different maps in which you can play.

• The game will continue with different maps randomly at certain difficulty level(to be selected when you are playing with bot) and the more you win/kill your counterpart, the more points you have.

• There would be range of guns available at different costs, which you can buy depending on your score.

• Even if your score comes down to zero and you still want to buy a gun as you are in the middle of the game, you can do that by buying some credits.

• So you can also play the complete game for free or can use your money to sustain in the game.

INCENTIVE FOR OUR “WHALE” USERSAny team/individual who is registered will keep appending

to their score so the more you play, better will be you score and this way after every 1 month(usually on last day of month) there would be a big fight between the highest

scoring terrorist team and the corresponding counter terrorist team.

The winning team among the two will be given back full

of their credits spent in the last

month.Offer a discussion forum to our

most involved users wherein they could make up strategies and also

offer some suggestion to the company for improving the user

experience.

SITUATION ANALYSIS

Our mission is to offer an ultimate gaming experience to all with supreme quality graphics, user interface and animations. We aim to bring the best game enthusiast from around the world to our gaming platform and offer them a mobile gaming experience like never before.

=> To reach out to 1,000,000 downloads after launching in India within a year.=> Expand in other markets viz. US, Canada, European Union Countries, South Asian Countries by the end of 2nd year.=> Top gaming app, in terms of growth after one year of its entry in the market.

There are n numbers of apps offering fundamentally similar to what we offer but following are the POPs and PODs analysis with any generic mobile gaming app:-

POD/POP WARZONE INSIDEPOP Framework same as that of pc game counter strike

POD Let gamers buy credits by pitching in some real money to buy newer weapons.

POD Offer real life maps with some real historic mission significance.

POD Offer single player/multi player game with an access to fight anyone around the world connected to the app. A challenge option available.

POD Maintaining the scorecard and make the leaderboard visible to all, to track the highest scorer in both terrorist and counter terrorist group.

POD The top scorer at the end of every month from both groups terrorist and counter terrorist fights and who wins is reimbursed his all the money used to buy credits

POD Can work both way with internet and without it.

SEGMENTATION AND TARGETING

MOBILE GAME USERS WORLDWIDE

TOTAL 1.5 BILLION CUSTOMERS

MARKET SIZE

GROWTH OF MOBILE GAMING MARKET

OUR TARGET MARKET – DEMOGRAPHIC WISE

WHY COUNTER STRIKE ONLY??

• As per current gaming trends counter strike is the 6th most played game in the gaming industry.

• The current gaming apps available do not offer the quality experience that one experiences while playing the pc Counter Strike – SO AN OPPORTUNITY TO DO BETTER.

MARKET NEEDS

People want thrill, excitement, challenge, competition in their game and that’s what we offer with our high graphics, real life locations which dates back to some historic fight/mission in real life, multiplayer experience, and earning credits to buy newer weapons.

SO FROM ABOVE STUDY – THE TARGET MARKET

• Everyone out there, a gaming enthusiast is our customer base, with special emphasis on the counter strike gamers.

• Demography, Behavior and Psychology wise we target everyone/mostly boys at an age above 12 years.

TARGET MARKET SEGMENT STRATEGY

• Our strategy focuses on launching the game country wise starting with India. Upon launching the game, we will stay in regular contact with our customers via numerous online methods, including social media and email marketing.

• Further we plan to launch in other parts of the world viz. US, China, European Countries.

OUR DISTRIBUTION CHANNELS

• Google Play Store for Android

• Apple App store – iphone

• Blackberry App World – Blackberry.

• Microsoft Store

AVAILABLE AT FOLLOWING PLATFORMS

• Social Media and Word of Mouth primary leverage for vast majority of our marketing.

• Email Marketing• Facebook Fan Page, Twitter Handle.• Game release video to be reached to all customers

through various viral videos network.

THE BEST WAY TO ANALYSE APP’S POSITIONING IS THROUGH SWOT ANALYSIS

STRENGTHSa. Idea of connecting everyone and competing to reach at the top is

comparatively new in the market and is branded new for Counter Strike Game.

b. Monthly competitions – A unique innovative idea to engage people more in the name – A completely new idea in the mobile gaming industry.c. Offering incentives to the topper of leaderboard – A unique idea to communicate our customers that we value the quality of your game.d. Connecting gaming world to the real world by offering real fighting locations – A unique idea to make customer feel like more attached and known to the game.e. Our USP(Unique Selling Proposition) is our all above qualities and our “Freemium Model” wherein one can play the entire game for free as well as pitch in money to enhance the experience.

WEAKNESS

a. The app is on its own, unlike other giant games viz. clash of clans which are under gaming company Supercell, so will have serious crisis of promotion initially.

b. The app’s capacity to handle such a huge network of people connected simultaneously not tested yet.

The most important aspect of any marketing strategy is to identify self- strength and at the same time weakness.

OPPORTUNITIES

• Counter Strike 6th most played pc game.

• No competitor available in the market offering counter strike with a worldwide connectivity and incentives to winners.

• Releasing game in the respective country on the day of some historic fight significance like in India releasing it on 26 July 2016. Since 17 years back India made a historic win over Pakistan in the famour Kargil War.

THREATS

• The foremost is offering real map locations of fight scenes which could be a bit difficult in countries like India wherein such places are highly restricted.

• Presence of competitors like Clash of Clans, angry birds who have already occupied the gaming industry to a great extent.

• Inability to protect model due to less intellectual property rights created for apps.

AFTER DISCUSSING THE GOALS AND ANALYZING THE SITUATIIN LET’S LAY DOWN THE STRATEGY FOR THE COMPANY’S MARKETING PLAN:-

STRATEGY FOR TARGET MARKET

• All above age of 13 years from the statistics discussed above.

• Offerings – Free access to all from downloading to playing the game both individually and as a team.

• Offering tutorials and brief information about the game’s functioning to the beginners and also during the course of game.

• Further targeting more involved users for revenue collection by popping up a notification(which user can disable too) whenever there is devoid of credits in the users account.

POSITIONING STRATEGY

• We plan to position it as a completely new experience unique and different than what one may have experienced before in any previous apps.

• We want to be the “Apple” of gaming industry.

KEY ASPECTS OF MARKETING MIX

WARZONE INSIDE.

Offers Ultimate multiplayer counter strike experience with real locations and for the first time incentives to winners.

PRICING OBJECTIVE MAXIMUM MARKET SHARE

DETERMINING DEMAND 1.4 BILLION MOBILE GAME USERS

ESTIMATING COSTS ONLY PROMOTIONS COST

PRICING METHOD VALUE BASED + GROWING RATE PRICING

• For buying 1000 credits one need to pay $4.99• One can unlock a map on reaching a score of 50,000.• The initial credit one will have will be 5,000.• Buying the most expensive weapon costs - $1,000.

So, the price is equivalent to what other gaming app competitors charge and

thus is a suitable price for accessing the premium services and benefits.

• Social Media and Word of Mouth primary leverage for vast majority of our marketing.

• Email Marketing

• Facebook Fan Page, Twitter Handle.

• Game release video to be reached to all customers through various viral videos network.

Through Strategic Alliances –

Partner opportunities exist witha. Universities, colleges, academic institutionsb. Professional associations, clubs, industry affiliation groupsc. Entertainment Channels both television and Internet.

PHASED APPROACH – SHORT TERM PLANS AND IMPLEMENTATION

TOTAL TIME – 6 WEEKSINCLUDING TIME FOR TESTING THE BETA VERSION

PROMOTION CHECK

IMPLEMENTATION SCHEDULEOBJECTIVE TIME

MARKET RESEARCH 1 MONTH

APP DEVELOPMENT 6 WEEKS

PRE LAUNCH PROMOTIONS 3 WEEKS(INCL. DURING DEVELOPMENT OF APP)

FINDING INVESTORS, COMMUNICATION PARTNERS

3 WEEKS

LAUNCHING APP IN INDIA OCTOBER 2016

POST LAUNCH FEEDBACK ANALYSIS TILL NOVEMBER 2016

MARKET RESEARCH OVERSEAS JANUARY 2017 ONWARDS

THE FINAL STEP

MONITORING AND ANALYZING FEEDBACKS

MAKING ADJUSTMENTS AND CHANGES AS PER THE FEEDBACK AND REVIEWS RECEIVED.

THIS CONCLUDES OUR MARKETING PLAN.

CREATED BY VISHAL NAGARKOTI, IIT PATNA, DURING A MARKETING INTERNSHIP BY PROF. SAMEER MATHUR, IIM LUCKNOW