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Overview

Jellyfish Parade is an independent game studio creating romantic visual novels (VNs) with ethnically diverse casts.

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This ongoing partnership has led to a myriad of projects including the unification of brand identity, market research,

and webpage design.

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Challenge

Although the company has published 7 studio projects, lack of visibility and engagement was their primary pain point. 

 

How can we increase overall brand visibility & engagement?

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Research

An initial look into the client's existing digital presence

revealed a common sentiment amongst players

that resurfaces with each new project announcement:

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Community members noted they rarely encountered VNs with diverse casts - the client's niche - or when they found out who the developer was, they were surprised to discover the link between their current and previous work.

 

To best approach this challenge, we needed more data to

establish what kind of players the company was reaching, determine whether they aligned with their target audience, 

and how they interacted in the VN community.

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Research Analysis

Over a 2 month period, I conducted a player survey that aggregated 180 responses. The subsequent written report revealed a few key insights:

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While player age and gender aligned with the client's expectations, they were surprised to find that the data indicated they were reaching less of their target audience

 than expected. With the gathered intel,

I set out to craft some solutions to our challenge.

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Solutions

The aggregated data assisted me in crafting a 4-prong

plan to increase brand visibility and engagement.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 - Unify logos:  A seemingly minuscule, yet integral change. 

A unified brand look not only fosters easy recognition in the fast-paced, digital world but also facilitates trust-building between the client and consumer. 

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2 - More diversified content on Twitter: As 77% of VN players

 get game development news from Twitter, posting more was a no-brainer. Retweeting press links, posting more images, sharing voice-acting auditions, and instituting social media challenges make players feel as if they are involved in every step of the development process. Thus, encouraging them

to engage with content more frequently. We've implemented the use of Tweetdeck to schedule 7 pieces of planned

content per week to ensure consistent engagement. These updated strategies have greatly contributed to the +41% increase in the client's Twitter followers.

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3 - Leverage SEO: The survey revealed that roughly 53% of respondents that had played a Jellyfish Parade game before found it via Steam and itch.io algorithms. Of that 53% percent, half of them had played the company's most popular title,

War of Roses - the most optimized title for itch.io's search engine. Leveraging both popular and unique keywords in a game's description and tags will aid

 projects in appearing at the top of search results

and in players' recommendations.

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4 - Seek events and organizations for more exposure: 

Other than product press, one of the best ways to gain exposure is to position yourself as a thought-leader in 

your industry. Our research on events & organizations dedicated to amplifying indie game developers is ongoing as they double as opportunities to showcase current projects. So far, my client has spoken at the 2022 Black Card Gala, 2023 Game Devs of Color Expo, and has been featured guest on the She Plays Podcast. I assisted in outlining talks about the character development and worldbuilding process.

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Other Projects

Researched & planned 2 successful Kickstarter campaigns. 

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Designed & drafted store pages on Steam and itch.io

and created a website for Belle Automata.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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