Market Research

Javier Botero, Vice President of Evolution Research, a quantitative market research consultancy, discusses marketing in "Marketing: Get Dangerous with Research", from Next Generation.

For the first phase of research, test as many concepts as budget will allow—10-15 shouldn’t be out of the question. Also, keep the test simple: just examine basic preferences, using a game description as context for the designs. In-depth qualitative data will come later; the key at this stage is to find the most promising designs to develop.

Next, have your ad agency use the research results from this first phase to focus upon improving the most promising 3-4 designs. Have these designs refined to something near production-quality. Then perform a second round of testing on these concepts. This second round should accomplish several objectives: First, it should determine whether there is a clear “winner” or “loser” among the final designs. Second, it should collect comprehensive qualitative data that will help the artists put the finishing touches on the chosen concept. Finally, it should use multi-choice response tools to allow gamers to indicate an optimal combination of screens and copy to use in the final design