Last week at the [a]list summit in Napa, one of the panels investigated how marketing gets directly tied to selling digital titles. The panel featured Min Kim (VP at Nexon), Jerome Lalin (VP of Marketing at Turbine) and Leo Olebe (Director of Marketing at BioWare).

Lalin began by emphasizing just how critical user feedback can be. Even throughout the development process, getting feedback can be hugely important – it’s ultimately all about building up a direct relationship with customers. Olebe added that BioWare talks to customers all the time, and the developer launched a Star Wars Old Republic website to connect with fans as far back as 2008, and now they consistently update it. Olebe said he believes in back to basics marketing and being completely honest with customers (or potential customers).

Another important point that Olebe stressed is that marketing needs to be connected with the development team from day one on a project, so that the marketing group can adjust messaging and stay on point. Everyone should have a consistent voice and message about the product.

Min Kim chimed in and noted that in today’s marketplace, the trick is to build up brands. Obviously Star Wars is a long existing brand for BioWare, so that’s not a problem, but for Nexon, not many people had even heard of Maplestory for a while. Now Maplestory is up to 7 million players. Kim also said that part of the strategy is to meet the gamers where they are, so Nexon created a Facebook page to feed customers content, which they can then disseminate to friends. Keeping Facebook in mind, Lalin added that some customers definitely need social pressure, to be pushed by peers into buying games, and marketers should keep this in mind.

Kim also made the point that digital is the first touchpoint to creating dialogue with a consumer. And while it’s better to reduce the friction online where possible, consumers will put up with more clicks and ads to play something for free, especially if it’s become a well known brand.

And when selling games online, companies can now track everything. Kim talked about living in an age of accountability; the company knows exactly where the money comes from. Olebe noted that with the data, marketing and selling digital games should absolutely be a science. That said, he believes there’s still an art behind the messaging too; essentially, digital allows marketers to try out more things.

For certain online games, it’s also important to be able to stage your audience, Olebe commented. That’s because the core audience will likely play very differently from the mass market that (hopefully) follows. Regardless of the type of online game, Lalin said it’s all about reinforcing and amplifying the right message. The days of simply throwing a press junket and expecting that to get results are over, he said.