Facebook is one of the most powerful content creation, sharing, and curating tools on the planet. Last I checked, Facebook has more than 1 Billion monthly users.
I’m curious to know how many of you use Facebook regularly, and how many of you also use it for anything related to gaming.
- Do you join Facebook groups related to gaming?
- Do you follow gaming companies, influencers, or any organizations related to video games?
- Would you in the future be open to the idea of using Facebook for gaming related interaction?
Facebook is a major component — perhaps even the most important part — of the types of marketing I do for my work. I can use Facebook’s tools to identify key demographics, identify customers using retargeting, and essentially find my customers on Facebook 100% of the time.
However… for some reason, unlike any other industry, I have always doubted that Facebook resonates with gamers.
Please let me know if my instinct is wrong. I want to know if it’s worth using Facebook as a medium to really increase the blog’s reach. I’m looking at using Facebook lives (since those have the highest organic reach on Facebook) to hook readers who might not otherwise know about the blog. I could lead with live streams on Facebook just talking about the top games of each month on mobile, PC, console, etc.
I would also use Facebook more actively to talk about what’s happening on the blog and in gaming, and starting a Facebook group for gaming is something I have always wanted to do. Facebook groups are incredibly powerful for growing a community in other industries.
I’d love your feedback and ideas on Facebook, whether you use it, and whether using it for gaming interaction/community is something you do/would do.
I use Facebook solely to stay in touch with family members and friends.
I don’t join Facebook groups related to gaming, or follow gaming companies, influencers, or any organizations related to video games .. but then, I don’t join ANY Facebook groups, or follow any companies, organizations, or “influencers” (whatever the hell they may be).
You’re not alone! Heck, I don’t even use Facebook myself for anything but business-related interactions. I don’t even follow family! 😛
I don’t use Facebook at all. Never have. If companies use it as a main access point then I don’t use their services.
It’s also a platform in decline, particular among the young. Google “Facebook Decline” and see for yourself. Under-20s are either leaving it or not joining in the first place, not least because of its reputation as the social network their parents – and grandparents – prefer.
I doubt it would be in your interest to jump on board just as the ship is beginning to flounder.
While it’s in decline with millennials — who are opting for more the Instagram route — it’s ramping up in its ability for marketers to reach the 35+ crowd.
For example, one of my clients was doing all of the traditional things for his brick and mortar business except he wasn’t using Facebook at all for ads or reaching customers. I set him up with Facebook ads, uploaded his email list of 2000 customers and created a lookalike audience (Facebook finds people like your customers), and retargeted his website visitors who would then see his ads on Faceook. He’s seeing a 20 to 1 return on ad dollars because his customers are all on Facebook.
Another example is blogging (non-gaming related). I’m part of several really, really active groups of bloggers and content creators on Facebook who share ideas, tools, and ways to improve blogging. There are 10,000 active members of the group who post every week — a little too much activity really.
Yet all that said, my gut definitely told me there wasn’t a niche for gaming there. Thanks for your input! 🙂
I used to be a prominent Commodore 64 scene coder in the 80’s and 90’s and because of that I have hundreds and hundreds of oldskool home computer fans as my friends. It’s a curse and a blessing. Whenever I post anything related to C64, old PC (AdLib) and so forth, there’s a ton of attention and discussion.
However, I’m more interested in modern gaming today and they’re for the most part not. So if I dare post anything about that (e.g. a blog post about a game I just completed) or something new I added to my web site GameDeed.com, I can hear tumbleweeds rolling.
It’s like one of my friends said about it – I’ve somehow been “typecast” and thus they expect only one thing from me.
I know that feeling of being pigeonholed into a topic. When I had a much larger audience here on the blog — talking 10,000 a day+ — they’d riot when I didn’t post about games. Heck, they’d riot when I didn’t post about the game they wanted me to post about.
I fear you might have a big bias as i belive the blog community is not so much into facebook. But that does not mean there is not a gaming community on facebook. I would belive they are slightly younger ( 20 – 30 ? ). Check the facebook page of your prefered games to see how they react.
Hi Ettesiun,
Not sure it’s fair to say I have a big bias. My post is about a gut feeling that gaming probably isn’t very big in the Facebook ecosystem, and the reason I’m posting is to try and glean insight into whether that’s true or not.
I want to reach people where they hang out. My goal is to attract new readers, but to reach my existing readers in different ways (though still important).
Of course I realize the answers I get here will reflect a much older audience. The average reader of this blog is in their 30s with most of the active participants in comments closing in on their 40s. People already reading the blog and especially those willing to comment are probably not likely to be in the same demographic as a new reader on Faceook.
Again, no bias. I’m seeking information to help reach new audiences.
No, I’d rather have Facebook have as little insight into my personal life and hobbies as possible.
Tip: Never create a Facebook account if you don’t want Facebook to know you.
Reason being is that Facebook cookies your browser (most people don’t clear their cookies). When you visit a website, chances are they have the Facebook pixel installed. When your browser pings that Pixel, it sends Facebook information about you.
The owner of that website can then use their Pixel to reach you — and people who act like you — on Facebook.
Log into your Facebook account on a phone too? They associate your device and create a mobile and desktop profile on you.
It’s a creepy world we live in.
There’s extensions to block that behavior though.
Yep, true. The vast majority — Facebook’s average and majority — do not.
I use it to keep up with family and friends. I’ve joined the fan groups of 2 authors I really like, and the local Comic Con group. Nothing game-related, though. Never even occurred to me, tbh.
Facebook is mostly for keeping up with my friends and family for me. I do follow a couple of gaming groups. I do like to see an announcement or discussions about games and a few other hobbies I have. What I do not like if a company only uses Facebook or Twitter for there communication.
My main gaming partner and I coordinate on FB and share news there, instead of steam, which doesn’t have those features.
I don’t actually follow game news there though. I have experimented following a few companies, but news on FB just doesn’t work for me. I’m used to rss though, so perhaps not the target audience.
Late 40’s demographic.
I don’t use facebook for anything except the messenger service to stay in contact with friends who no longer live near me.
I have never liked it, its just drama and attention seeking most the time, however recent events have made me see it in a different light. The ability to spread a message and get mass public response is a great thing if used right.
I don’t use it for game stuff however, mostly because I see no reason to.
I originally started an account to keep in contact with friends I made during my world travels, then killed my profile after I felt it had greater anti-social community effects, only to restart a different profile after becoming an officer in our local US Bartender’s Guild chapter, as FB is a large organizational tool in the hospitality field.
Nonetheless, I rarely use it anymore, especially since each new day is more politically divisive than the last, and my perception is there are few, if any, guaranteed barriers to governmental data collection and profiling, a statement which I would have felt to be an expression of anti-establishment paranoia just 15 years ago.
Additionally, it is no secret that FB has been involved in experiments designed to manipulate users’ emotional states. If this sounds conspiratorial to you read this article about one of their experiments in January of 2012.
Experimental evidence of massive-scale emotional contagion through social networks – Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2014 Jun 17;111(24):8788-90
http://www.pnas.org/content/111/24/8788.full
“Emotions expressed by friends, via online social networks, influence our own moods, constituting, to our knowledge, the first experimental evidence for massive-scale emotional contagion via social networks.”
I feel it’s true purpose is as the world’s largest data mining device, where people voluntarily provide the most intimate details of every aspect of their real-time interactions in time and space.
In a sense it is like one of those teddy bear nursery surveillance cameras, where the fuzzy exterior belies the true function of the device.
For a more humorous take on FB data collection I’ll refer you to this Onion video that recognized the potential for abuse back in 2011:
http://www.theonion.com/video/cias-facebook-program-dramatically-cut-agencys-cos-19753
…but if you are asking whether it can be utilized to reach gamers, yes, in my mind undoubtedly so, as evinced by the intensive and extensive involvement of my gamer friends.
No, I don’t use FAcebook because of its EULA don’t like the idea that anything I post there is theirs to use any way they want without my knowledge.
To me, that is a big privacy issue, so after reading the EULA, i did not click accept.