🚢Launch
Preparing for and launching a product on Steam
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Introduction
This article is a loose collection of considerations and tips to account for when launching your game.
For the sake of this article; "Launch" doesn't just mean release: "Launch" means you have made the existence of this thing public, be that a store page, a blog, a product they can buy, a Kickstarter ... doesn't matter If people can publicly talk about your product ... it is "launched" and there are some things you should consider/do.
Discovery aka Visibility
So let's start with this finger in the air: Have "more than" 7,000 wishlists by the time your game is 1 week out from launch.
Why?
In reality, it's not the number of wishlists that matters but your "rank" ... for upcoming games (1 week out) Steam ranks those games by wishlist count. You want to have enough to be ranked, and you want that rank to be as high as you can so you can get your game on the "Popular Upcoming" list.
7,000 is simply a nice achievable number that should usually be enough to get you ranked and thus on that list.
My Publisher wants 10s of thousands ... 7k sounds too low!
Your publisher knows your game and your target market better so they are probably right. They however are focused on the New and Trending and what they are doing is estimating the conversion rate for your kind of game and estimating how many wishlists you need in order to convert enough to hit New and Trending.
The 7k number we give is to get you on Popular Upcoming ... if you're on Popular Upcoming ... and marketing your little game dev heart out you should manage 1000+ wishlists a day putting you into the 10s of thousands by the time you launch.
Your conversion rate and your wishlist rate will vary... a lot ... based on time of year, the number of games you are competeating against and of course you're target market e.g. your genre and sub-genre and how well that targets players and what players it targets.
How?
In order you will need to capitalize on each of the following
Festivals Put your game in any and every festival that it qualifies for. Don't be a jerk and put your game in a festival it doesn't fit that can have an adverse impact. DO put your game in every festival it does qualify for. Steam runs festivals all the time but so does the wider gaming community so look around and submit your project everywhere it qualifies.
Steam Next Fest Your game can be included in 1 Steam Next Fest, you want to choose the Steam Next Fest that -ENDS- more than 1 week out from your launch but as close to your launch week as you can. Steam Next Fest is a free thing you can do to get some easy wishlists. It does require your game to have a playable demo so ... do that. This should help you get those 7,000 wishlists that you need to get on the Popular Upcoming.
Popular Upcoming <- Absolutely HUGE This wants around 7,000 wishlists and for your game to have a release date within the next week. These are ranked by release date and time .... DO NOT change your release date to always be 1 week out you will be banned 👍
New and Trending Once your game is live you need to make "more than" $7,500 gross. This should land your game on the New and Trending list which will boost conversions and wishlist nicely.
Discovery Queue This one is harder to target but is your chances of being served in the Discovery Queue is higher, the higher your conversion rate is. A conversion rate is simply the ratio of people with interest in your game that went and purchased your game.
From Discovery Queue front page and listing become things your game will get and those will all drive further discovery and visibility. By listing, we mean ranking in the various lists Steam has like Top Sale, Most Popular, etc.
When?
As soon as you have set in stone what your game is and can thus fill out all the required store page fields
Capsule images
Screenshots
Teaser (NOT a trailer ... a teaser)
Short and Full Description
Content Rating
System Requirements
Feature List
Note you DO NOT want to release your Store Page until the above information is set in store ... you really do not want to be making major changes to the above before release.
Why?
You can't get wishlists, until you have a store page ... so get a store page ASAP, and start working on your wishlist so you can hit that magic number at least 1 week before your release date.
How!
We have a whole article dedicated to the Steam Store Page ... give it a read for more details.
Coming Soon
Once you have your store page live you NEED to set a release date. Try not to be vague, the goal here is to get your game listed on the Popular Upcoming ... to do that Steam needs to know when the game is "upcoming".
Why?
Steam has "Popular Upcoming" lists and it shows these lists A LOT to players. You get on these lists based on your release date and wishlist. You want to be on this list long enough to earn enough wishlist that your game can convert well enough to hit the "New and Trending".
To end up on the list, you first need to have a solid number of wishlists and your game needs to be "upcoming". While Steam doesn't tell us how close to release a game has to be in order to be considered for the list, it seems to be about a week forward as of the time of this writing (Sep 2024).
Demo
Yes, right now if you can.
You require a demo in order to participate in Steam Next Fest and most festivals really. So having a demo is just a basic requirement to avail of those features. Even if your game is going to be a free-2-play and thus has no use for a post-release Demo ... pre-release demo is a great way to build initial interest and wishlists.
Unless you're a professional small studio with enough staff to deliver on this VERY well ... don't do it.
Early Access is a "double-edged sword" If done well it can really set your game up for success ... it is however EXCEEDINGLY difficult to do well and it requires significant staff and management to do well something most indies do not have.
This can be useful for some games though is more effective as a testing tool than a marketing tool. That said Valve and some others have used Playtest to great effect as a marketing ploy. It really depends on your game. If your game has a "hook" that needs to be played to experience then absolutely... though I would argue Demo is a better channel than Playtest for most use cases but Playtest for MOBA, and other event-based or social-based games can really drive early community development.
Not really ideal for marketing and launch prep but great for testing and technical. If you want to "test" publicly as a marketing ploy ... look to Playtest and Demo ... if you want controlled full-bodied testing ... look to Branches (Alpha / Beta)
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