Okay there are two things on my mind today that are bothering me.

1) Chris Daughtry has a really freaking weird beard. Am I the only one who notices this guy is like, way overwaxed?

2) The recent posts about CF administration as it pertains to marketing, staff development, playerbase shrinkage and immortal/mortal relations.

Honestly, I don’t know why I’m bothered so much! As a business person I feel like, why should I waste my time trying to talk to people who (I feel like) just want me to shut up? Why not use my energy thinking about my own stuff, instead of worrying about CF? Frankly, I don’t have a good answer for that. I guess I just -care-, you know? My first character was a warrior before warriors had specs… and I don’t even know how many years ago that was. So I’ve probably played this game for 10,000 hours, maybe more. I’ve made friends here, some online, and some in my area that I’m -really- close to now. One of them stood up in my wedding.

So I kind of feel like you guys are all my extended friend network, and that includes even you administrators that frustrate me. (Valg) I’m not trying to pick fights. I’m not trying to point and laugh. -Honestly- I want to -help-. Maybe that doesn’t come through in my posts, but that’s how I feel. I have volunteered not only my input, but my time as well. There is no reason for me to become immortal. I’m not a fiction writer, I can’t make areas for ####, and I’m probably not 50th percentile for interaction. But I -am- good at running organizations, and I -am- good at bringing people to a product or service. I would even say I’m very good at it.

I keep pointing out my credentials because I don’t what else to do to keep from being thought of as just another squeaky wheel with no face. I think that if Mr. Valg pulled into my parking lot in the affluent town of Northville MI, walked past my chrome wheeled, windows tinted, 12 speaker Bose, nav system, dvd playing RX8. (Or to a lesser extent my now more family oriented Explorer that I just paid cash for) Told Wendy (My PA) that you wanted to see me, and got a “Do you have an appointment?” Then got walked through my 4,000 square foot building to my office and sat down across the desk from me -- to ask for advice that I bill out at $500 an hour, for FREE… and I smiled and said, “I’m happy to help,” -- I think if that were the case you’d be listening to me a lot differently. Which, hey, while I’m at it… if you want to COME to my office, your welcome to. Call Wendy and make an appointment!

You guys are fond of saying that CF is different. That because it’s a volunteer organization, or that because it’s internet based or that because it’s free, it’s somehow exempt from the rules that every LLC has to play by to be successful. I know your Sunday School teacher said that your unique and special… but you aren’t that unique. (That’s a consulting joke.) Business owners are always fond of talking about how THEIR staff is different, how THEIR customers are different, how what we tell them won’t work in THEIR town. They fully admit it would work great somewhere else, but for whatever reason they are unique and special, and it won’t work for them. Just not true. *shrug*

This is a serious question - do you really care if there are only 50 or so people that play? I mean… if your happy with the current small playerbase dwindling to that, fine. I mean really… you can choose for that to be the way you do things. Not a wisecrack… if that’s what you want to do, do it. You probably have years left before it totally dies. Stop reading right here.

Okay, if not… let me try to gently and lovingly explain to you what CF’s problems are, so that they are off my chest and don’t keep popping up in the back of my mind all the time. In no particular order.

#1 Poor delegation.

In an ordinary small business you start with an owner who initially does everything. He’s product development, customer services, sales, marketing, janitor, receptionist - everything. From here he makes a decision to focus on what part of the business he would prefer to focus on, the product side or the “business side.” In CF’s case the product side would include area development, quests, code maintenance, skills, classes and all that. Basically the running of the game. On the business side of things you have the website, the customer service or player/imm relations, and marketing/sales. In CF’s case the ownership has decided to work on the product side, and totally ignore the business side.

This is not at all uncommon, and sometimes it works well as it did in our case. Sometimes the product is good enough to attract a customer (read player) base - but without focus put on the other side of the business it’s always temporary. It’s kind of like an engine that doesn’t fire on all cylinders… it can chug along for a while, but eventually if the other cylinders don’t come online, the engine will fail. This is what we are experiencing right now. ***The only reason that CF hasn’t collapsed is because people are literally psychologically addicted to it.*** It’s players are willing to put up with just a tremendous amount of crap, and still keep coming back. But even that is starting to fail.

I guess I need to know that you guys see it to? I mean, do you think that CFs playerbase is not the smallest it’s been in years and in decline?

Anyhow, no one has ever worked effectively in the -other- area of running CF. You are lacking marketing staff, and we all know that. I am totally baffled at the complete lack of urgency to do something about this. If you want CF to be around for another 10 years, your going to have to.

You are also lacking in customer service. The comments you give players often make me cringe. If I were uninvolved with CF and reading forums and saw some of your posts I’d never start playing. You should delegate staff members whose job it is to deal with the comments/questions/suggestions of players. People who are tactful, nice, and not prone to snotty when people are snotty to them.

I’ll give you an example. Mek recently wrote that post asking if he could contribute his ideas without coding and yada yada. Cyradia took offense (and I’m not arguing the validity of that) and wrote back a nasty post that upset Mek - who was really asking an honest question to try to help. Daevryn responded as well and politely made a good case for the immortal side, and Mek was happy. What Daevryn and Cyradia said wasn’t really very different, the difference was in how it was said. My point is, if Cyradia as a staff member can’t treat a player better than that, fine, just don’t have her respond to peoples posts on ask immortal. Leave that to a customer service immortal who can do it nicely.

What is the point of this? Well a number of quality players leave because they get pissed off at imms. Now be objective, it doesn’t matter whose right or wrong. If you want to retain players, you can’t have them get pissed off at staff. If you delegate that better you can cut down on burned players who quit playing. AND you end up with more polish on forums that potential players might be reading. Also fewer quality players get jaded and become asshole players that we don’t want here.

Right now your system of making staff doesn’t allow for people with customer service/marketing/sales talent to join the team. It is, in fact, built to exclude anyone BUT “product” oriented people.

You have a lopsided team.

Problem #2: staff development.

You can point out that I was heroimm for 11 days, and say I don’t know what I’m talking about, and ignore the fact that I have a staff of people that I train/motivate/retain every day. I have 4 paid employees, and a team of 14 people who not only work for free, but still pay me my fees. Now you can tell me that your Sunday school teacher says that your situation is different than mine because CF is unique and special, or you can just listen to someone who is good at team building.

In the last two years I’ve turned over two out of sixteen volunteers, and never lost a paid staff member. My team functions very well whether I’m there to direct them or not, because I’ve trained them well.

In business we play by the numbers. We don’t go based on our feelings or intuition. You guys have turned over CRAZY staff. Do you even know the % of success for heroimms? I know I keep saying this, and I’m sure I’m coming off like a bit of a prick, but you are not unique and special… any organization who is losing THAT MUCH staff is doing something wrong in the area of staff development.

Something about the way you operate, and I’m not really sure exactly what you’re doing or how to fix it because I’m totally uninvolved, drives away new staff members + mid level staff members (who the players love) and pisses them off. I’m sure you have reasons why, and I’m sure they are totally justifiable in every case, but that’s not the point. The point is your staff turnover is too high, and if you want to grow and to have fresh, unjaded, staff you have to do whatever it takes to change that while maintaining or even raising your standards of excellence. Period.

So I touched on a lot of different things as I vented, but to summarize.

1. marketing
2. staff development and turnover
3. customer service as it pertains to retention
4. appropriate delegation of non-game related things
5. you are not special

Now what will happen is that you imms will find a little point in here that you disagree with, and we’ll have a thread of 15 posts that are all about that one little thing. Let me ask you this, in the global sense is this post making sense to you guys? Do you think I’m talking out of my ass, or do you think I am making valid, professional points? I guess to see my point you have to start with the belief that CFs numbers are dwindling, and it’s a problem that won’t fix itself, and then want to actually DO something about it. That’s why I said, if your okay with the things are, don’t read anymore.

Truthfully, if you’d rather I didn’t give you my input, say so, and I won’t waist my time or yours.

Answered all of my questions to the best of his ability. We're moving forward, it looks like.

I am very glad to hear that! I really wish I was any good at anything that could help CF, but unfortunatly I don't even earn enough money to make some big donations... I'll have to stick with my PBFs on my own chars... (But with the number of chars I've worked through in a short period of time it'll amount to something perhaps.. heh)

Keep it up Stunna! And GO TEAM CF! (I love you guys for keeping this MUD in great shape! Just listen to Stunna, think she's got some really good advice to help you with!)

Always shoot first and then call whatever you hit the target.

Feel free to share some/all of that if you want. I'm taking a page out of the Zulg Bible and involving the community!

Firstly, I know we're all just in the brainstorming phases here, so I'm not going to put my little'ol cart in front of my tired old horse.

But would a common donation bucket for marketing purposes be anything any of y'all would think about pursuing?

I know that as some wise dude said once, mo'money, mo'problems, but I wouldn't be adverse to dropping a few bucks toward something good if it sounds like it would help if and when things get rolling a bit..

I would like to see something like this. Be it paypal or whatever. Just something set up for marketing only. I would like to donate, being as this game is teh shizz, and the more people the better. BTW I think my wife is finally going to break down and start playing. *cheer* So I'm doing my part! lol

And they're completely un-related.

Once you hammer out some details, Stunna, would you be willing to poist the gist of it here so I and/or others could critque/contribute/add?

Also, Imps, can you give me an idea of how many users/unique users per month come to carrionfields.org? If its private, thats fine (though I signed an NDA a while back and I'm still perfectly willing to keep things private).

I ask because I currently work for an online advertising network, used to work in an ad agency, and that kind of info would help me get an idea of some things.

Stunna, imms, etc if you want to chat things over, use the link in my profile here.

We will certainly be in need of what you do, if things move forward. Right now there are no guarantees this will lead anywhere. :/

treebeard treebeard treebeard... must remember this name.

Exchange phone numbers and talk like people used to before cyber-tone made everyone sound like a ####.

Hell, it'd probably be a lot easier than writing essays back and forth.


Anyways, I really like the post and I hope something comes of it. Good luck.

sd

A chat room would be a good step in the right direction. A conference call would be better.

What I think needs to be avoided is, like I mentioned, "cyber-tone." Honestly, people tend to take everything the wrong way when it is written (ESPECIALLY in CF and on forums related to the game). What Lyristeon said about Heas as a HeroImm probably would not have been the case had he been able to hear a tone of voice (which, seeing how good-intentioned you are, I imagine was spoke in goodwill, not bossiness).

It would be weird for a sec. Hell, it is weird for me to talk about CF at all in real life because I know only one person who plays (well, played) it. Trying to with strangers is bizarre. But, the weirdness would pass for you guys because the game is the tie that has bound us all.

I really, really think it would be a good idea.

asdf

>1) Chris Daughtry has a really freaking weird beard. Am I the
>only one who notices this guy is like, way overwaxed?

What the hell is with his beard?

So long, and thanks for all the fish!

Heh. I am the person who doesn't watch American Idol. I had to google his name just to see who he was.

But not the only one.

I hate American Idol. This guy just happens to have videos on MTV and Vh1.

nt

I didn't know who he was, but it doesn't look that weird to me when I goggled him.

I think he probably either hangs out with a lot of urban gay men or has one doing his makeup/hair/fashion.

Personally, I don't really have an opinion as to whether you take on some cf marketing or not. What you could do, if you wished to conduct a marketing campaign, is set out what you would propose to do and how much budget you would need to do it, then detail the expected benefits and how you came to this conclusion. Having done that, the imms could essentially decide whether or not to contract you for this work.

That said, your post seems to overlook some really fundamental points, and left me with the general impression that whilst your management technique and experience might be valuable in the businesses you conduct in real life, they would be less so in the cf context.

For example, your pool of potential employees (whilst restricted to amateurs who know the game of cf), is not really an ideal match to the roles required by the immortal team. In real business, you have hiring and firing to help deal with this, and in most cases you have a significant enough volume of business that you don't have to worry about the applicant and customer being the same person. In cf, you do, because when you reject an applicant you risk losing the customer (i.e. player). Therefore there is an additional pressure to accept applicants, and you need some sort of process to further test the people that you take on.

I would also add that the arguments you put need to be able to stand on their own merits. I'm not sure that it is helpful to list your successes in real life to bolster your case. Personally, I could come up with a similar list, but I believe that the cf market/business model is completely different from almost any other that you find in real life, with the possible exception of a mutual or co-operative. Even they aren't expected to recruit exclusively from their customer base without paying anyone.

It makes me go crazy to have 'successful' people have a junior-high grasp on English. Think through your contractions. You're in consulting and marketing, to many extents, so how do you think it looks to write (mildly) poorly and unprofessionaly?

Just keep an eye on your yours, you'res, itss, and it'ss!

Good post, though, I hope it enables mucho discussion.

And this is not meant to be demeaning, but I bet we can both agree that the presentation of the package is just as important as the content.

Seriously. What is stopping you from doing what you want to bring people to this game without being a part of the staff? What is behind the curtain that we don't want players to know that you need to use to sell your ideas? If you are who I think you are, which I am about 99% sure, then all you did was spend your week and a half telling everyone else what they should be doing instead of doing what you should have been doing.

I play this game to for fun. I do what I feel interests me. If someone is going to tell me what I need to do, it is no longer a game to me. It was explained fully to me at the beginning of what was expected and I agreed to that. I don't get involved in things for the game that are about my work. I too am in Sales and Marketing. I have been for years. I recently just received a patent for my business and I work on marketing the product all the time so that when the manufacturing end of it is complete I can do my job. When I log in to CF, I want to be the imp. That's it. If the staff were to agree to bring someone in so that this someone can tell me what to do to use my RL talents, I will tell them to buzz off. This is my escape and getaway. If I feel I want to do something, I will. I am my own boss, I don't need another one for my hobby.

You want to promote CF, go ahead. Nobody is stopping you. Just don't expect to join the staff to do such.

Its not about being IMMed in game, as I understand. But what stops from actually starting is the absence of "welcome" from IMM staff. Even by words. Maybe Stunna sees its in different way, but as for me it should be some discussion of what to do first, doing some things for second (no need to give access to the site even) and so on.

Npw the attitude look like "ok, we admit that we need some marketing, but do it on your own if you wish, and we stay aside" wont work

When I proposed my help a month ago, I did not tell that I wish to be Immed or get paid. Same for Stunna, as I understand.

What is stopping you? You need someone to say go ahead and promote it? Who is going to stop you from promoting something you like? I like Jif Peanut Butter better than Skippy. There, I just promoted Jif. Is Jif going to say stop?

First (and most important one) I've mentioned above.

I am web marketing specialist and quite successful (though, not the best in the world) but I am work in a bit different area (SEO/PPC mostly, but some other things like hidden marketing as well). There are some common things, there are some different. I have no confidence to try and spend quite a lot of time doing this alone, which can result in mistakes or such. Maybe I harm my image of a "cool, mega competent marketer" but when I am going to work in some field, I am not totally familiar to, I speak with client. Sometimes for a long. Some people dont do this. I do.

When I was offered to promote the bank via Internet forums (hidden marketing) I spoke with my client about it a lot. I read and spoke with others a lot. And only then I've started first steps.

So, to summarize this reason, I _can_ help with something (and with some money even, I will make a donation again when I improve my health a bit and do some work before), but I am not really expert in the game promoting in English speaking Internet to do it all alone and be sure about success.

I offered my help twice before (and there are were not phrases "IMM me before I start" or "Pay me") and got no answer. I would not offer my help since last time (I hate to be obtrusive), but as Stunna raises this question, I join it again. Since you dont post "Oh, what a luck to find you Stunna" and ignore me, I think that its not about finding my skills inadequate and uncompetent. If I mistaken, well...hint me about it, and I will keep silence about _my help_, but still speak about Stunna

I sense this attitude like I said above "Do it on your own if you wish so much, we dont care much about your efforts and stay aside". This demotivates as well.

I need some help from your back (by words and some work, though quite short, no need in spending hours, no)


I would be happy to see you gathering with Stunna and discussing things that should be done. If you need my help, I would be happy to offer it and participate as well.

Actions speak louder than words. When someone is spending their time talking about doing something and they don't follow through, it is just words. Not to be mean or anything of the sort, but, when people tell you they can do something but don't offer anything to prove they can do it by actually showing something, it is just words. If you have experience playing this game, you or anyone who has an interest in doing such can put together a plan of attack. Otherwise, it just comes across as a lot of hot air.

Let me put this into CF terms. I have only been an Imm since 2003. There are over 40 heroimms that have not made it in that time. There are another 10 imms or so that have come and gone. Since my time as a heroimm, there have only been 3 that have come up and are still around. For the players, they see this as either another heroimm who couldn't cut it or another imm who has left for whatever reason. For the imms who are on the staff, these are the people we have gotten to know and have either given them a chance or have formed some good relationships with. When someone wants to come in and be a part of that, some of the imms have made it their rule not to get to close to them just in case they don't make it. I don't do that because it is hard and boring enough in the beginning. Well, maybe that's my fault for trying to see the better side of them in the beginning. But, when they fail and drop the ball, you can't help but feeling like ####. So, excuse me or any of us who think that if you want to get somewhere, you have to show us something.

You are being idiotic here. They are trying here. Not asking for anything but a little info to get started. I know nothing of marketing, but I do know it costs money. To start a marketing campaign I'm pretty sure they need to have some concept of what they can and can't do. I never talk #### about the imms, but you are being very... Well, I'll stop there.

If I were either of them, I would have stopped a long time ago and said #### it, I offered to help. They didn't have the time. And forgot it and kept playing my ####ty characters and having fun. But that's me and I'm a bit of an ass sometimes. Kudos to you two for trying to help. Don't break a sweat if they aren't willing to even move a finger.

I understand your stance of being skeptical, but atleast give them something to go on. In the time it took for you to post all these obtuse responses, most likely the info they were asking for could have been provided and they could work on something to offer you all. I seriously hope something gets worked out because I love this game as many others do.

Once again, thanks for this game and what you all do as Imms.

Bryan

This is simple. If you have an idea to market a product and you know the product, you put together your ideas and present them to the company. It's that simple. You don't go to the company first without any ideas. There haven't been many movies out there about advertising and marketing but, there is one that shows you a brief glimpse. It's called "What Women Want". They put together their ideas of what they want to do before they go to the companies and say 'Pick me!" And we aren't talking about a product that he doesn't know. If he's been playing for 10 years, he knows what to say. Believe that I am just picking on the guy still? Let's take a look at his last post and compare that to my concerns in my posts.

>>Marketing/Sales/Customer service "people" people don't have any reason to climb the current immortal ladder. Their purpose is not to interact with the player, or to code and develop. So what difference does it make if they are immortal, not immortal, 51 or 59? They wouldn't be, nor should they be, climbing the same ladder as the current staff.

**Exactly**

HOWEVER, you can't say "Marketing is the most important thing outside of the game itself," but then turn around and say, "But you guys do whatever you do, get no recognition, don't expect to have any input, you aren't really a part of the CF staff, your just a highly motivated player." That's not right either.

**You haven't done the Marketing yet, right now you are just talking the game, not implementing anything. Marketers and advertisers get the job if they bring something to the table, not before.**

In the real world most companies develop products that start in the Marketing dept. I have a friend whoes a marketer w/ an MBA who works in finance. Basically when they want to develop a product to sell, they go to marketing and say, "figure out what people will buy." When staff in other areas of the business have ideas, or people want to change something within the function of the company, Marketing weighs in with their opinion. For instance, someone might have a great idea that would be a tremendous help to the customers, but Marketing might say, "Yea, that's great but we have no means of articulating the benefit of what your talking about so that customers will buy right now, so we're not behind your project."

On CF this would probably work more like a lower level imm would need a project. Valg or Daevryn or whoever might then go to the marketing folks and say, "Okay, based on your research and the results of focus groups and polls, what do you guys feel could be done within the game to reactivate players or bring new players in?" At the same time, when ideas are being kicked around Marketing might come in with input that doesn't have to do with game balance or functionality, but is very valuable in terms of how to spin it to the playerbase in an appealing way, or to use it some way to promote the game.

**When the positions of Marketing or Advertising have been filled, then yes. As you can see, he already considers himself the person for the position and yet, right now it is still all talk and no action.**

So it's not that we would need an immortal CHARACTER, it's that we need to have access to the same communication media as the rest of the staff. What if I'm thinking about what might be a cool ad, and I want to kick around my ideas with someone the same way that Braemir (cameo!) might kick around an idea for his area? Well, Braemir isn't posting about his area on Gameplay, he's talking in the Gathering Room or on Hamsah.<<

**And there it is. Access to the Gathering Room and or Hamsah. Why not just a closed mortal forum so you don't have access to the imm related stuff? My concerns were all about this. Not about the effort. I know for a fact that a person who is truly a marketing or advertising person who knows the product can put together a concept outline to present to a company without speaking to anyone within the company. You don't need to see behind the green curtain to sell Oz. Just sell what you know about that game to the staff and let them aid you if they can.

>This is simple. If you have an idea to market a product and
>you know the product, you put together your ideas and present
>them to the company. It's that simple. You don't go to the
>company first without any ideas. There haven't been many
>movies out there about advertising and marketing but, there is
>one that shows you a brief glimpse. It's called "What Women
>Want". They put together their ideas of what they want to do
>before they go to the companies and say 'Pick me!" And we
>aren't talking about a product that he doesn't know. If he's
>been playing for 10 years, he knows what to say. Believe that
>I am just picking on the guy still? Let's take a look at his
>last post and compare that to my concerns in my posts.


Are you retarded? Honest to God. You are saying that "What Women Want" is an example of how an advertising firm runs?? What the hell is wrong with you?


>
>>>Marketing/Sales/Customer service "people" people don't have
>any reason to climb the current immortal ladder. Their purpose
>is not to interact with the player, or to code and develop. So
>what difference does it make if they are immortal, not
>immortal, 51 or 59? They wouldn't be, nor should they be,
>climbing the same ladder as the current staff.
>
>**Exactly**
>
>HOWEVER, you can't say "Marketing is the most important thing
>outside of the game itself," but then turn around and say,
>"But you guys do whatever you do, get no recognition, don't
>expect to have any input, you aren't really a part of the CF
>staff, your just a highly motivated player." That's not right
>either.
>
>**You haven't done the Marketing yet, right now you are just
>talking the game, not implementing anything. Marketers and
>advertisers get the job if they bring something to the table,
>not before.**

Dude, I'm not asking for anything right now but a ####ing dialogue. I'm telling you guys that your never going to motivate people to work on your crap without making them a part of the team. Do you freaking disagree with that? Am I asking that it happens NOW? NO! I'm making a comment, and a helpful one at that, for the future.



>
>In the real world most companies develop products that start
>in the Marketing dept. I have a friend whoes a marketer w/ an
>MBA who works in finance. Basically when they want to develop
>a product to sell, they go to marketing and say, "figure out
>what people will buy." When staff in other areas of the
>business have ideas, or people want to change something within
>the function of the company, Marketing weighs in with their
>opinion. For instance, someone might have a great idea that
>would be a tremendous help to the customers, but Marketing
>might say, "Yea, that's great but we have no means of
>articulating the benefit of what your talking about so that
>customers will buy right now, so we're not behind your
>project."
>
>On CF this would probably work more like a lower level imm
>would need a project. Valg or Daevryn or whoever might then go
>to the marketing folks and say, "Okay, based on your research
>and the results of focus groups and polls, what do you guys
>feel could be done within the game to reactivate players or
>bring new players in?" At the same time, when ideas are being
>kicked around Marketing might come in with input that doesn't
>have to do with game balance or functionality, but is very
>valuable in terms of how to spin it to the playerbase in an
>appealing way, or to use it some way to promote the game.
>
>**When the positions of Marketing or Advertising have been
>filled, then yes. As you can see, he already considers
>himself the person for the position and yet, right now it is
>still all talk and no action.**

Holy ####! What the hell is wrong with you? Where do you get off thinking that I'M considering myself that person? NOWHERE! I volunteered to help, it wasn't accepted. I sent an email with some of the things I would need to know, what else do you want me to do right now???




>
>So it's not that we would need an immortal CHARACTER, it's
>that we need to have access to the same communication media as
>the rest of the staff. What if I'm thinking about what might
>be a cool ad, and I want to kick around my ideas with someone
>the same way that Braemir (cameo!) might kick around an idea
>for his area? Well, Braemir isn't posting about his area on
>Gameplay, he's talking in the Gathering Room or on Hamsah.<<
>
>**And there it is. Access to the Gathering Room and or
>Hamsah. Why not just a closed mortal forum so you don't have
>access to the imm related stuff? My concerns were all about
>this. Not about the effort. I know for a fact that a person
>who is truly a marketing or advertising person who knows the
>product can put together a concept outline to present to a
>company without speaking to anyone within the company. You
>don't need to see behind the green curtain to sell Oz. Just
>sell what you know about that game to the staff and let them
>aid you if they can.

Oh MY GOD! There isn't anything behind your little curtain! This is an online roleplaying game and nothing more, dude. It is NOT someone's privilege to work on this game. It's the lowest of charity work. If all I wanted was access to the Gathering Room and Hamsah to see behind your little "curtain" I -had- that. Let me tell you chief, I don't have any fascination with what's back there. I don't know how many times I've said now that I don't care about the game side of the game. I'm talking about the business side of the game.

I said SPECIFICALLY that access to these things was needed for COMMUNICATION. What the hell makes you think that I care to see anything about the game?


Basically man, it comes to this: You don't know what you are talking about. You may or may not have done the things you say you have, I don't care. But I can tell you one thing from this little swapping of threads, chief, you aren't a marketer. You might have done some marketing as part of another project, but consulting has never been your job.

Look, how the HELL can you even begin to talk about what you are going to do for marketing when you don't know how much money is there to do it? Don't you freaking start there? Ummmm, yes, you do. Should we put CFLLC's financial reports up for everyone to see? Yea, let's do that. No money, fine, what are we comfortable with doing to get marketing specific donations? Oh wait.... there's an idea we might need to bounce around.

Oh, how do we create a marketing campaign without talking what their first FREAKING step should be?? Are we going to send them to this piece of #### website, chief? Not like it is right now, we aren't. What are we going to do about that? Oh gee, I guess we might need to COMMUNICATE about that.

Who is our traget player? Is he 14 or 40? What else do we know about him? How can we niche him down even more? Gee, might want to DISCUSS that.

I don't know what kind of haphazard grabasstic #### you've been doing that you call marketing, but in the REAL world you make a plan, and you work the plan. You don't start at ad construction. In fact, ad construction is toward the end of what needs to be done. You'd know that if you knew what the hell you're talking about.

Let me tell you something else. You aren't contributing ANYTHING right now. You're just adeverserial. Why don't you go work on an area or immteract or something you enjoy doing, and quit pissing me off?

Stunna:

People are concerned what the price is. Just put the "reward" as an item for discussion in your action plan. My suggestion (like I said before but somehow it is a different thread) is a community place on the Official Site - some type of special access board for communication, some kind of recognition, and a special designation for when they post. I have other suggestions but I don't want to complicate this even more - I think the best way to proceed is through you gathering the information you need and creating an action plan. Elmeri was right that these are details that can be worked out around the goal (communication and incentive). And you obviously recognize that an Imm char is a non-starter.

I think the bottom line is (1) this is breaking new ground for CF so a lot of people are going to have trust issues, (2) you are an unknown quantity, and (3) the fact that looks best on your resume is that you are eager to help and have repeatedly offered your help.

I think you should also make Daevryn and Valg your Imm liasons. Valg in particular is very good about following-up in a straightforward and honest manner.

If Lyristeon would stop posting. Sorry Lyr, but look at the whole of what you have written here. It is all about stonewalling good, honest intentions and/or prick the ears of Stunna. Maybe you don't realize it. Maybe you didn't mean it (I think you DO and you DID, but I am open to being wrong here), but that is the way it is.

nt

I think after reading this basically, you are all obstinate prideful braggarts who are offended by people that have the audacity to offer aid..

Here, let me spoonfeed you:

If people want to help market, make it happen. Don't cause problems. And, at the very least, after this whole debaucle, if they don't perform or don't get results, then they're shut up. Good hell, why has it come to this? It's like you're a bunch of overdramatic emotional teenage girls on your periods that *can't* let anyone have the last word.

I'm seriously thinking about going to a different game and moving on. Somehow, that seems like the antithesis of what this original post was about. Ugh. Grow the hell up, people that are supposed to be in charge.

::patiently waits for the imm with such a huge chip on their shoulder that they HAVE to have the last word::

nt

Being part of staff does not have to be an imm. Working behind scenes with marketing does not mean an imm. He even said.....

"There is no reason for me to become immortal. I’m not a fiction writer, I can’t make areas for ####, and I’m probably not 50th percentile for interaction. But I -am- good at running organizations, and I -am- good at bringing people to a product or service. I would even say I’m very good at it."

I think thats clear enough. He's not asking to be an imm here unless I missed something here in the post.

Bryan

asdf

>>Being part of staff does not have to be an imm.

>"But I -am- good at running organizations"

I read this and it's easy to see: I don't have to be an imm, I just get to tell them all what to do.

So long, and thanks for all the fish!

All I can do is put my input out there. I can't TELL anyone what to do. I'm offering my input because I like to, and it's good input. But I'm not asking to run ####... for crying out loud. Really the only point of contention is on word1 of marketing - let's talk about a few things before I make a plan to be reviewed.

The first thing that happens is lyristeon flies off his rocker and says WE DON'T NEED TO TALK ABOUT ANYTHING JUST DO IT WHA WHA WHA. Or at least that's how it appears to me. I'm sorry if I sound bitchy, but I'm astounded right now... and frankly i'm pissed off.

What a consultant does is look at all the information available (that pertains to what he's consulting on only, jeeze) and make a suggestion. From there it's up to the consultee to take action on the plan they are given. (Which is not to say that I can't do some work on it too, I'm just making the point of saying that I'm not asking to run the god damn show.)

>All I can do is put my input out there. I can't TELL anyone
>what to do. I'm offering my input because I like to, and it's
>good input. But I'm not asking to run ####... for crying out
>loud. Really the only point of contention is on word1 of
>marketing - let's talk about a few things before I make a plan
>to be reviewed.

All I was doing was pointing out how people could read what you're saying. It is by no means a stretch to take that opinion out of your writing. I never said that's what I thought you were doing. I know all about consulting, I've used them with varying degrees of success.


>The first thing that happens is lyristeon flies off his rocker
>and says WE DON'T NEED TO TALK ABOUT ANYTHING JUST DO IT WHA
>WHA WHA. Or at least that's how it appears to me. I'm sorry if
>I sound bitchy, but I'm astounded right now... and frankly i'm
>pissed off.

Everyone is entitled to their opinion, don't forget that. It's obvious based on the responses, Lyristeon's opinion is not the same as others on the staff.

So long, and thanks for all the fish!

Let me preface this by restating that marketing CF is the most important CF-related job that, in general, no one seems to want to do.

>You guys are fond of saying that CF is different. That because
>it’s a volunteer organization, or that because it’s internet
>based or that because it’s free, it’s somehow exempt from the
>rules that every LLC has to play by to be successful. I know
>your Sunday School teacher said that your unique and special…
>but you aren’t that unique. (That’s a consulting joke.)

The fact that it's a non-charitable volunteer organization isn't unique, but it is different from most organizations.

If people work for me for money, they'll do unpleasant work for me because if they don't, I won't pay them.

If people work with me to help feed the poor, they'll do unpleasant work because they believe in the goal.

If I ask people to do unpleasant work as part of a hobby to support a game that's supposed to be fun, generally, they just won't do it and they'll find something else to do with their time. I include myself in that. During time periods in which CF isn't fun for me, I just do something else with my free time. There are exceptions to this generality of course, but they are just that -- exceptions, not the rule.

>This is a serious question - do you really care if there are
>only 50 or so people that play? I mean… if your happy with the
>current small playerbase dwindling to that, fine. I mean
>really… you can choose for that to be the way you do things.
>Not a wisecrack… if that’s what you want to do, do it. You
>probably have years left before it totally dies. Stop reading
>right here.

I care, but most of the time, I don't care enough to work CF like a second job vs. just doing something else fun with that free time instead. Like most of us, I've accrued additional responsibilities and demands on my time over the years, and I prize the fun-ness of my hobbies more than I once did. When I was 19 it wasn't a big sacrifice to spend a day busting out a bunch of CF code for something I wasn't personally interested in for someone. (Or whatever un-fun-for-me CF task you care to throw out there, be it administration or marketing or process analysis.) That's the perhaps ugly truth for me at this point in my life.

>I’ll give you an example. Mek recently wrote that post asking
>if he could contribute his ideas without coding and yada yada.
>Cyradia took offense (and I’m not arguing the validity of
>that) and wrote back a nasty post that upset Mek - who was
>really asking an honest question to try to help. Daevryn
>responded as well and politely made a good case for the
>immortal side, and Mek was happy. What Daevryn and Cyradia
>said wasn’t really very different, the difference was in how
>it was said. My point is, if Cyradia as a staff member can’t
>treat a player better than that, fine, just don’t have her
>respond to peoples posts on ask immortal. Leave that to a
>customer service immortal who can do it nicely.

Man, it's a sad day when I'm the good cop.

I'm all for people marketing CF and helping out on the forums. Where I think we have a problem/disconnect here is that being staff of CF traditionally means having an immortal character.

I'm cool with there being marketing/administrative staff at my hypothetical nuclear power plant who have no talent for or interest in the technical guts of the plant. I'm not going to give them security access to the reactor core, not because I think they're terrorists who want to blow up my plant, but because they have no idea what they're doing in there or how to keep themselves or others safe.

>Right now your system of making staff doesn’t allow for people
>with customer service/marketing/sales talent to join the team.
>It is, in fact, built to exclude anyone BUT “product” oriented
>people.

We have and have had in the past people whose careers are in those areas on staff. We haven't generally had such people who also want to be filling those roles as their hobby.

>You can point out that I was heroimm for 11 days, and say I
>don’t know what I’m talking about,

For me, the point there isn't so much that it indicates that you don't understand the inner CF workings as it perfectly counterpoints so much.

You immed. You were asked to do something to make CF better that you didn't feel personally interested/talented in. (Area writing.) You quit after a week and a half without having done it.

But you think I can tell someone else on staff who doesn't have a talent or interest in marketing to do it and they just will?

>and ignore the fact that I
>have a staff of people that I train/motivate/retain every day.
>I have 4 paid employees, and a team of 14 people who not only
>work for free, but still pay me my fees. Now you can tell me
>that your Sunday school teacher says that your situation is
>different than mine because CF is unique and special, or you
>can just listen to someone who is good at team building.
>
>In the last two years I’ve turned over two out of sixteen
>volunteers, and never lost a paid staff member. My team
>functions very well whether I’m there to direct them or not,
>because I’ve trained them well.

I'm sorry, but just because some people will do work that you want done for free doesn't mean that I will. Again, you didn't want to do work someone else thought was important put in the same position.

>Truthfully, if you’d rather I didn’t give you my input, say
>so, and I won’t waist my time or yours.

Ultimately, I agree that marketing is important and that more of it should be done, and that we as a game/company/whatever could do better in those areas. I disagree with you on some of the realities of what people will and won't do for CF.

>Let me preface this by restating that marketing CF is the
>most important CF-related job that, in general, no one seems
>to want to do.

Um... hello? I WANT to do it.


>

>The fact that it's a non-charitable volunteer organization
>isn't unique, but it is different from most organizations.
>
>If people work for me for money, they'll do unpleasant work
>for me because if they don't, I won't pay them.
>
>If people work with me to help feed the poor, they'll do
>unpleasant work because they believe in the goal.

I see your point, but I don't think your people know what the goal of CF even is. If they were interested in the goal, and you were able to properly motivate them to do mucky work to achieve said goal, they would... well they would do it. Heh. Being able to structure your staff systems, and having that motivational skill is just something that is lacking from the team right now.



>Man, it's a sad day when I'm the good cop.

This is both funny and true.



>
>I'm all for people marketing CF and helping out on the forums.
> Where I think we have a problem/disconnect here is that being
>staff of CF traditionally means having an immortal character.
>
>I'm cool with there being marketing/administrative staff at my
>hypothetical nuclear power plant who have no talent for or
>interest in the technical guts of the plant. I'm not going to
>give them security access to the reactor core, not because I
>think they're terrorists who want to blow up my plant, but
>because they have no idea what they're doing in there or how
>to keep themselves or others safe.


Exactly!!! Exactly exactly exactly. So why isn't there a staff member path for the non-nuclear people. Hey, for the love of God don't let ME near the code. I can't even navigate the Crumbling Road without ending up in the sodden marsh, for Gods sake.



>>You can point out that I was heroimm for 11 days, and say I
>>don’t know what I’m talking about,
>
>For me, the point there isn't so much that it indicates that
>you don't understand the inner CF workings as it perfectly
>counterpoints so much.

Which is part of why I'm limited in how much I can help you guys out. I'm also not interested in learning about nuclear reactors so that I can be allowed to answer the phone at the plant. However if I were to become a staff member you guys are going to start me out building a reactor core... and then move me on to answering phones? I don't get it.

Also I'd like to reiterate that CF isn't THAT different from any other orginzation.


>
>You immed. You were asked to do something to make CF better
>that you didn't feel personally interested/talented in. (Area
>writing.) You quit after a week and a half without having
>done it.
>

Well, you guys never gave me the area file stuff, but I got it from another imm and had about 50% of the area done and waiting for you guys to let me do it. I was willing to pay the price of doing an area, what turned me off was the treatment from more senior staff.



>But you think I can tell someone else on staff who doesn't
>have a talent or interest in marketing to do it and they just
>will?

Nope, you need someone who knows marketing and is interested in doing it. You just don't have an open door for a person like that to come on board. But I guess my point too is that you NEED to do it. So whether someone bites the bullet and does it, or you guys find someone like me who'll do it... it doesn't change the fact that you need to take the necessary steps to get it done.



>I'm sorry, but just because some people will do work that you
>want done for free doesn't mean that I will.


They work for me for free because I'm good at articulating the benefits of doing that work.

Most of this is touched on elsewhere in the thread. One thing:

>Exactly!!! Exactly exactly exactly. So why isn't there a staff
>member path for the non-nuclear people. Hey, for the love of
>God don't let ME near the code. I can't even navigate the
>Crumbling Road without ending up in the sodden marsh, for Gods
>sake.

I think it comes down to what Adhelard was saying about the mindset that doing something to make CF better doesn't strictly equal being an imm. In my opinion, for nearly all of the jobs you need to be an imm for (area writing obviously, but also quests, running a cabal, running a religion, etc.) having been through the whole area process and understanding how all of its pieces go together is a big big help. It will help you do cooler things easier, and it will help you do more cool things without needing someone else's help.

I can go more into that on demand, but hopefully I've more clearly stated my essential point on that issue.

>>I think it comes down to what Adhelard was saying about the mindset that doing something to make CF better doesn't strictly equal being an imm. In my opinion, for nearly all of the jobs you need to be an imm for (area writing obviously, but also quests, running a cabal, running a religion, etc.) having been through the whole area process and understanding how all of its pieces go together is a big big help.

People like to be credited for their efforts. It's not so much about whether you can or can't help with cf related things outside the current imm scope as a non imm, but rather how much effort you want to put in. I will give you an example. The Finnish Ski Association is real hard pressed for cash so they don't have big money to pay for assistant coaches. The work is a #### job really, early mornings, lots of bad weather, carrying gates, wrenching them in, preparing skis, having to travel a lot. But still they get young guys working for a very low pay. In fact, they have hardly any trouble finding these guys. I get payed roughly equal coaching kids, and I still have time to study and pursuit various interests. So, what's in it for them? They are in the team, they get to be on tv every once in a while, they are recognized to be in the national team. Now sure, these guys COULD do the same job without the national team jacket, but would they honestly?

If you had staff members who were in fact staff members for the sole reason of being willing to work on customer oriented things, you would be able to expect results. Whether this post as a 'marketing staff member' would include an imm char, imm forum posting tag, or whatever else is just details. Traditionally in volunteer held happenings, like a charity event to sell old stuff for the benefit of sick kids, there's some sort of a small snack involved, mayby a sandwitch and a coffee or whatever. Sure, nobody probably works a full day for a sandwitch and a coffee, but imagine the motivational effect, if the holder of the event said that only salespersons were entitled to a snack, and everyone else can do their work just aswell without.

The obvious problem ofcourse is how to determine who is suitable/qualified for such a position, since the current procedure of qualifying applicants will not handle cases like these. But I am certain that if a marketing management side of cf staff would be created, the system could somehow sustain itself.

asdf

>Whether this post
>as a 'marketing staff member' would include an imm char, imm
>forum posting tag, or whatever else is just details.


I think it is a key detail actually. Because based on the Imm response, an Imm char as a reward for non-administrative volunteer work is a non-starter. Clearly, the only way to get an Imm char is to go through the standard Imm process (i.e., create an area, do in-game admin work, etc.). That is not going to change.

Choosing non-Imm-char rewards should probably go into the action plan, and a suitable "reward" could probably be a page on this website dedicated to the Non-CF-Imm Volunteer Association. They can get special posting tages like the Imms do (e.g., "Vol"). I know that on Dio's, several of the VIPs are extremely active and extremely underappreciated (e.g., Dur) and their only "reward" is the "VIP" tag on their posts.

Anyway. All of this is a tailspin of talk without someone willing to put out an action plan.

Marketing/Sales/Customer service "people" people don't have any reason to climb the current immortal ladder. Their purpose is not to interact with the player, or to code and develop. So what difference does it make if they are immortal, not immortal, 51 or 59? They wouldn't be, nor should they be, climbing the same ladder as the current staff.

HOWEVER, you can't say "Marketing is the most important thing outside of the game itself," but then turn around and say, "But you guys do whatever you do, get no recognition, don't expect to have any input, you aren't really a part of the CF staff, your just a highly motivated player." That's not right either.

In the real world most companies develop products that start in the Marketing dept. I have a friend whoes a marketer w/ an MBA who works in finance. Basically when they want to develop a product to sell, they go to marketing and say, "figure out what people will buy." When staff in other areas of the business have ideas, or people want to change something within the function of the company, Marketing weighs in with their opinion. For instance, someone might have a great idea that would be a tremendous help to the customers, but Marketing might say, "Yea, that's great but we have no means of articulating the benefit of what your talking about so that customers will buy right now, so we're not behind your project."

On CF this would probably work more like a lower level imm would need a project. Valg or Daevryn or whoever might then go to the marketing folks and say, "Okay, based on your research and the results of focus groups and polls, what do you guys feel could be done within the game to reactivate players or bring new players in?" At the same time, when ideas are being kicked around Marketing might come in with input that doesn't have to do with game balance or functionality, but is very valuable in terms of how to spin it to the playerbase in an appealing way, or to use it some way to promote the game.

So it's not that we would need an immortal CHARACTER, it's that we need to have access to the same communication media as the rest of the staff. What if I'm thinking about what might be a cool ad, and I want to kick around my ideas with someone the same way that Braemir (cameo!) might kick around an idea for his area? Well, Braemir isn't posting about his area on Gameplay, he's talking in the Gathering Room or on Hamsah.

(Uh, this post might not make sense. It's 10:13 in Michigan and that means I've been home for an hour and put a couple glasses of red wine down.)

Being a staff member isn't necessarily about imm powers, being an imm character or whatever, but having access to direct communication with the imm staff.

My thoughts are as follows:

1. The Imm response has largely been clear and defined: They recognize a need, they are interested in a solution. But no one has the background and/or experience to efficiently come up with a solution.

2. I am not sure you are seeing the response I just posted above. Every time you post, it almost reads as though it is the first time you posted - you identify problems but do not provide actionable solutions.

3. I think if you want to help, the way you should do so is to write up a clear action plan to implement whatever goals you are talking about. This plan can not be vaguely worded (up until this point I haven't seen you lay out an action plan). It must contain identifiable steps that can be delegated to others (and may well be implemented in its entirity by you). Include your email so that people interested in taking on clearly identified tasks can contact you.

4. I think at this point you should not tie "becoming an Immortal on CF" to "taking steps outlined in your action plan" - basically, marketing CF is not a path to Imm'ing on CF. It is a volunteer effort without extrinsic reward (other than continued CF). Like volunteer political groups.

Those are my suggestions.

>My thoughts are as follows:
>
>1. The Imm response has largely been clear and defined: They
>recognize a need, they are interested in a solution. But no
>one has the background and/or experience to efficiently come
>up with a solution.


Okay, see, I guess I'm missing the posts where a need is recognized. Furthermore, no one has ever asked for my help or given me the tools or authorization I need to do what I do.


>
>2. I am not sure you are seeing the response I just posted
>above. Every time you post, it almost reads as though it is
>the first time you posted - you identify problems but do not
>provide actionable solutions.

I'm not going to take the time to create an action plan when I'm not sure if anyone is interested in using it. We're talking about hours of work that could well be time spent finding my own customers or with my family. Or playing my shifter, for that matter.



>
>3. I think if you want to help, the way you should do so is
>to write up a clear action plan to implement whatever goals
>you are talking about. This plan can not be vaguely worded
> up until this point I haven't seen you lay out an action
>plan). It must contain identifiable steps that can be
>delegated to others (and may well be implemented in its
>entirity by you). Include your email so that people
>interested in taking on clearly identified tasks can contact
>you.

I can't market CF without their co-operation and permission. I also need more information (hard statitistics instead of my intuition) to complete any sort of an action plan. I also need help... I don't run my companies on my own, I have Wendy and others to help me.

>>My thoughts are as follows:
>>
>>1. The Imm response has largely been clear and defined:
>They
>>recognize a need, they are interested in a solution. But no
>>one has the background and/or experience to efficiently come
>>up with a solution.
>
>
>Okay, see, I guess I'm missing the posts where a need is
>recognized. Furthermore, no one has ever asked for my help or
>given me the tools or authorization I need to do what I do.
>


Here was Daevryn's response to one of your posts a few threads below. You even responded back to him:

"Heck, I'd be interested in seeing any kind of marketing going on. It's the most important thing for the future of the game that I have no talent for or drive to produce. Alas."

I think Daevryn (1) clearly recognizes a need - in fact, it is "the most important thing for the future of the game," and (2) recgonizes that neither he nor anyone else on the Imm staff have the requisite background/experience to implement a solution to that need.

As for asking for your help, the Imms have repeatedly stated that CF is a volunteer organization where players make as much impact as Imms. (Please tell me you do not need me to find you quotes on this as well ). The door is wide open for you to step up to the plate and contribute something productive. I am interested to see if you do.

As far as "tools and authorization", those may come after the Imms have seen your action plan. Think of it like a beauty pagent (do you do those in your work?) - as in, several firms approach a prospective client, lay out their portfolios, pitch their strategies, and the client signs on if interested.


>
>>
>>2. I am not sure you are seeing the response I just posted
>>above. Every time you post, it almost reads as though it is
>>the first time you posted - you identify problems but do not
>>provide actionable solutions.
>
>I'm not going to take the time to create an action plan when
>I'm not sure if anyone is interested in using it. We're
>talking about hours of work that could well be time spent
>finding my own customers or with my family. Or playing my
>shifter, for that matter.
>
>



Well, that's a problem. Because you taking the time to create an action plan is the only way for you to constructively contribute to what is, as the Imms say, "The Most Important" thing for the future of the game.

At this point you've spent several months posting various vaguely worded ideas. There is expressed interest. Now is the time to step up to the plate and show what you've got. How many hours are we talking about?


>
>>
>>3. I think if you want to help, the way you should do so is
>>to write up a clear action plan to implement whatever goals
>>you are talking about. This plan can not be vaguely worded
>> up until this point I haven't seen you lay out an action
>>plan). It must contain identifiable steps that can be
>>delegated to others (and may well be implemented in its
>>entirity by you). Include your email so that people
>>interested in taking on clearly identified tasks can contact
>>you.
>
>I can't market CF without their co-operation and permission. I
>also need more information (hard statitistics instead of my
>intuition) to complete any sort of an action plan. I also need
>help... I don't run my companies on my own, I have Wendy and
>others to help me.
>
>
>


Put them down in your action plan. I am talking about clear, identifiable steps. One action item is: Follow-up with Valg on getting statistics re: X". As far as "permission", no one is going to give you "permission" without seeing what you have in mind.

Seriously. If you want to help, pick up a shovel and start. I think the most efficient and productive way for you to start is to lay out an implementable action plan for marketing CF. Delegatable, clear, easy steps. Start small.

Step 1.

We don't need to chat that it needs to get done. Put it in outline form and we will review it. If anyone who is on the staff has an interest in your game plan, they will contact you.

You claim to be in marketing, yet you think you can create a marketing plan without ever talking to the freaking client? Are you nuts???

Lyristeon, you're in marketing and don't want your job to bleed into your hobby, then you're probably not the one that ought to be talking to me, are you?

If you guys can't sit down for a preliminary discussion in a chat room I have no idea how you can say that this should be a priority.

You have 10 years of experience playing this game, but, you can't outline what you wish to propose to make it more attractive?

Doesn't make me ready to consult with them.

What part of CF are you comfortable making attractive? You're in marketing, but you don't understand market/message/media. (that's not fair to say, in general, but just in this post) your talking about starting with message, and have not yet defined market or media.

Look at who plays the game. Take it from there.

There is a kid playing this game who is 14. You're 40. Who should I start with?

Honestly man, let's not upset ourselves. You don't want to do marketing, that's cool, I respect that - so don't do marketing... I can work this stuff out with someone else.

The same thing I stated in Outline is the same thing that Daevryn asked for. You went on the offensive about mine and agreed with his. My point is that if it is going to be done under the guise of having to take direction for something that I have done for 20 years and it feels like work, I won't do it. The game plan needs to be seen before it is accepted by anyone. I worked as a Ford Fleet Manager for quite a few years, but, early in my career I cam up with a way to make it work better. I used my method af the dealership I worked with and word got around about our dealership sales going from 125 units a month to 300 units a month. The dealership was awarded a new state of the art dealership, and I was asked to train other stores with this new program. Ford then put it into works nationwide under the Ford Business Preferred Program. I started this on my own without any input from Ford itself. I know for a fact that if you have any knowledge about the product, you don't need to talk to the client to come up with an idea.

But it was YOUR dealership.

I took Daevryns post to mean send an email about what needed to be covered at a meeting, and they would make the time if they thought it was appropriate. Your post is asking me to do hours of work for free with out giving me any information or support. Sorry dude, no. D

Let's just squash this... I used to think you were cool, and enjoyed getting to know you a little bit. I'm not sure why your coming off all hostile now.

I was an employee there, I didn't have access.

It was the same thing. An outline on what you want to discuss, or an email on what you want to discuss. Same thing.

I thought you were cool until you tried to boss everyone around when you heroimmed too. I guess it goes both ways.

Who do you think I was? I was Heas... I don't recall bossing anyone around at ALL. I think I was pretty much doe eyed and wondering what the hell was going on.

Okay, you were an employee there, not a customer.

I'm beating a dead horse here... I need to knock it off.

Daevryn was asking for an outline of the meeting - you were asking for an outline of a marketing plan I don't have enough info to do.

I mean, if nothing else I have no idea what we're capable of for budget. That's probably the first or second question I'd ask a new client.

I think I was going more at wanting a rough idea of what kind of information you'd want to construct a plan. But that's ok!

I was right in thinking who you were. And that's exactly how you came across. You were the new heroimm for like 10 days and all you wanted to do was make suggestions on what to do instead of doing what you were supposed to.

There is probably a lot of that misconception towards new heroimms. I know when I was one I was all jazzed up and bursting with ideas...I don't know if it came off as bossy or as me trying to alter a system that was well-established...it wasn't. I was just happy to be there.

A few pincers, assassinates and canoewhacks later and I was in line.

I am pretty sure, there are some different sources of new visitors to site. Which are effective in terms of conversion and which are not? Do you know this?

We can make some flier advertising CF and ask people to post it in schools, university and such. I can not make it alone, since my English poor like hell for this. I can write some ads and my linguist will 'polish' them but anyway, I need someone to check it.

Do you agree to try PPC for a few dozens $? I can donate them. Do you agree to measure effectivenes of each ad and see is it working or not?

We can try to join some MMORPG lists and see, how much traffic they will bring. Then drop uneffective and keep effective. Do you agree to share this knowledge with me, Stunna or whomever will help you with marketing?

I can try to search for theme forums and make some hidden ad on them. Do you agree to tell me is this working or not?

There are dozens of things that are probably better not discussed in open forum, is my point. I'm working on an email.

You got to share with us how things progress, would be nice to know what sort of forums the advertising will be done in and such. Maybe this will even lead to someone chipping in on certain things, if it appeal to them.

>You claim to be in marketing, yet you think you can create a
>marketing plan without ever talking to the freaking client?

To be fair, you have a much more intimate knowledge of the product in this case than I'm sure you do with most of the marketing you do professionally. That's not to say that our input is useless or meaningless, but you're starting with a lot of knowledge on who the product might appeal to, etc.

to not come across as a ####. Would you like me to create a chat room so we can cover those or just go ahead and lay it out here?

Seriously.

nt

Adhelard, I might should buy you a beer the next time I'm back in your part of the world.

Stunna, re: post below, I'm open to the idea of making time to talk about this, but honestly with the way my time's been lately and Valg's time's been lately, etc., starting out in e-mail with some rough idea of what you need and/or what you have in mind might be easier than trying to get assorted schedule constallations to align.

If I'm being crappy about reading my e-mail, poke me on the forums.

daevryn@carrionfields.com?

.

Heh, that's the same thing I proposed in my Outline post.

"Something about the way you operate, and I’m not really sure exactly what you’re doing or how to fix it because I’m totally uninvolved, drives away new staff members + mid level staff members (who the players love) and pisses them off. I’m sure you have reasons why, and I’m sure they are totally justifiable in every case, but that’s not the point. The point is your staff turnover is too high, and if you want to grow and to have fresh, unjaded, staff you have to do whatever it takes to change that while maintaining or even raising your standards of excellence. Period"

I'll argue a point or two here. First off, mid-level imms typically leave because of real life. Heroimms leave because of burnout. It's like Cyradia said, there's a lot of stick with very little carrot, and some people don't get that when they heroimm. They go from constant interaction and the game side of the mud to the other side where it's just not as much fun. Especially at 51 and 52.

Second - A lot of the falloff in the player base (just my opinion) is due to the same thing I said before. People getting sidetracked by real life. Ultimately we're not drawing the 14 year old crowd anymore because the graphical appeal of mmo's is larger to some extent. They don't remember the days of bbs and surfing the web with lynx. They don't imagine well, and to them it's just a lot of text. Play out a halo 3 fight next to a log of hunsobo for example. Obviously this doesn't apply to all of them.

Third - I agree that some imm responses can seem harsh, but they're usually full of valid points. For every single one of these logs crying cuz the imm was "a total asshole" over some valid blah blah blah, there are 10 things the imm did well that could be argued the other way. People don't post the good stuff, it's boring to talk about.

Ultimately the true nerds (hey I'm one of them) are still out there rolling dice and eatin pizza rolls until 4 am with their buddies, and they haven't got here yet. I like your points don't get me wrong, and I'm not an imm, anymore, but really that open mind thing goes both ways.

>"Something about the way you operate, and I’m not really sure
>exactly what you’re doing or how to fix it because I’m totally
>uninvolved, drives away new staff members + mid level staff
>members (who the players love) and pisses them off. I’m sure
>you have reasons why, and I’m sure they are totally
>justifiable in every case, but that’s not the point. The point
>is your staff turnover is too high, and if you want to grow
>and to have fresh, unjaded, staff you have to do whatever it
>takes to change that while maintaining or even raising your
>standards of excellence. Period"
>
>I'll argue a point or two here. First off, mid-level imms
>typically leave because of real life. Heroimms leave because
>of burnout. It's like Cyradia said, there's a lot of stick
>with very little carrot, and some people don't get that when
>they heroimm. They go from constant interaction and the game
>side of the mud to the other side where it's just not as much
>fun. Especially at 51 and 52.

Okay, if you know what the problems are you put systems in place to overcome them. What the problems are doesn't matter, you are not special , you just find out how to overcome them. I'm not talking about 100% retention, I'm talking about doing better than 1%. That's not too hard.

>Second - A lot of the falloff in the player base (just my
>opinion) is due to the same thing I said before. People
>getting sidetracked by real life. Ultimately we're not drawing
>the 14 year old crowd anymore because the graphical appeal of
>mmo's is larger to some extent. They don't remember the days
>of bbs and surfing the web with lynx. They don't imagine well,
>and to them it's just a lot of text. Play out a halo 3 fight
>next to a log of hunsobo for example. Obviously this doesn't
>apply to all of them.

There are millions of people playing MMO's right now. We only want maybe 200 or 300 of them. How many people are playing magic cards? D and D? Those are lower tech than CF. Of the millions of people doing similar things I'm sure we can capture .0001% of them. That's not a real agressive marketing goal, and totally achievable given the "niche" quality of CF. A bigger challenge is actually taking a company that has mass appeal and finding it a niche to thrive in. Niche nich niche, you always need a niche. CF already gots one.



>
>Third - I agree that some imm responses can seem harsh, but
>they're usually full of valid points. For every single one of
>these logs crying cuz the imm was "a total asshole" over some
>valid blah blah blah, there are 10 things the imm did well
>that could be argued the other way. People don't post the good
>stuff, it's boring to talk about.

Welcome to the world of customer service. See: you are not special.

>
>There are millions of people playing MMO's right now. We only
>want maybe 200 or 300 of them. How many people are playing
>magic cards? D and D? Those are lower tech than CF. Of the
>millions of people doing similar things I'm sure we can
>capture .0001% of them. That's not a real agressive marketing
>goal, and totally achievable given the "niche" quality of CF.
>A bigger challenge is actually taking a company that has mass
>appeal and finding it a niche to thrive in. Niche nich niche,
>you always need a niche. CF already gots one.

This has long been my thought of where to start marketing CF. It's nice to have a presence on something like TMS but it's better to focus outside the MUD community. My goal would be to get new players that existing players would actually want to have, people that are interested in the game and might stick around, but also inclined to judge it on its own merits and not just complain about the ways in which it's *not* like the kind of hobby you're drawing them from.

Basically, pitch the game in some way to people with interests in all these hobbies, ideally in a way specialized to each of them, so you can explain the ways that CF is 'better' than what they're doing, and also cushion the blow on the way things are different. For example, most MMOs (and most MUDs, really, if we were going to till that field) are set up on the mindset that you'll make one character and keep them forever. CF isn't that kind of game. I think you'd get a much better rate of drawing people who would actually stick with the game if you could convey early on that CF is different and some of the implications and benefits of that. Not necessarily that CF's way is better in a general sense, but that it yields different things and works for the kind of game that it is.

There are probably tens of thousands of people who would play CF and get totally addicted that will never, ever hear of it. You have to make two really convincing sales just to get someone to make it to level 20 or so. One is that they should come to a website and find out why they should give it a try, and the other is to sell them on the idea of continuing to try after they realize how hard it's going to be to learn.

(That's the bucket thing.)

There has to be IC ways of getting them through the learning curve. We are way better at this than we used to be, fo sho, but could probably still do better.

For every satisfied customer you get 3 mouths, for every unsatisfied one you get 20. It's a rule that applies to every service producing organization. Not just cf.

In my opinion, this is one of the most thought out, well-executed, sincere postings I've seen on these forums. All the arguments presented valid points.

Sadly, the imms who play "Father knows best" are going to look at this and say "This guy just doesn't get it. We're awesome. We know we're awesome. Let's all go be the Super Imm Friends and ignore that there is a problem at all."

I know imms and heroimms and I know they are hard-working people that put a lot of time and effort into this for free. It's really frustrating to be told how much of a jerk you are when you're putting all this time in for nothing. But, here is a thoughtful post meant to put the problems on the table and offer a way to fix them. A marketing consultant for free? That sounds great. Why would you not take him up on this offer?

The current IMM staff reminds me of work. In my current job, my less-than-agile-minded boss decided that his nephew would be great at a very important, critical job that he has no training and experience for and didn't ask for. So, he's thrust into the job, though his strengths lay elsewhere, all the time bumbling his way through something that he can't do well.

I've been a manager before, I know it's tough. Part of being a good manager is knowing how to play people's strengths rather than just say "Here's a bunch of legos, I know you're not an engineer, but build this and make it awesome if you want to be considered for promotion." I would LOVE to contribute to CF in a more meaningful way because I really love the game, but because I know some of what is going on up there, I don't have the motivation to get involved.

"Sadly, the imms who play "Father knows best" are going to look at this and say "This guy just doesn't get it. We're awesome. We know we're awesome. Let's all go be the Super Imm Friends and ignore that there is a problem at all.""


I'm sorry, but if you really believe this, you're pretty much off your rocker. No one's ever used the term "SUPER IMM FRIENDS" on imm channel that I've seen. Believe it or not, not even Valg.

There will be no white flag above my door. - Dido

Stones taught me to fly
Love taught me to cry
So come on courage
Teach me to be shy
Cause it's not hard to fall - Damien Rice

What doesn't kill you makes a fighter, footsteps even lighter - Kelly Clarkso

>The current IMM staff reminds me of work. In my current job,
>my less-than-agile-minded boss decided that his nephew would
>be great at a very important, critical job that he has no
>training and experience for and didn't ask for. So, he's
>thrust into the job, though his strengths lay elsewhere, all
>the time bumbling his way through something that he can't do
>well.

It's really not like that.

It's more like: If you're going to work for a branch of my company that's based in France, you're going to need to take some time and work on your French skills, even if the job you're doing is as say an engineer or customer service representative rather than as a translator. There isn't a job I can think of that someone can do to help CF that requires them to be an imm, that doesn't also strongly benefit from the knowledge gained in writing an area.

I'm not opposed to the idea of people doing some kind of smaller area project as a new imm if they were making big contributions in some other way, but without a good grounding in some of those areas, just about anything else you can do will either A) be much harder for you or B) make lots of work for other people on staff, offsetting some or all of your contribution, or both.