Ask HN: What's the best marketing effort for $1000?
Let's say you have $1000 to spend on marketing in the US for an iPhone/iPad puzzle game. What would you spend it on?
While your game is free make sure they spread the word on any of the social sites and also get the players who like your game rate it in the AppStore.
Also try to get in contact with other indie game devs and cross promote with them.
- Have in app purchases.
- Facebook Ads. First test out multiple versions of ads for Facebook and see which one gives you best results and then spend more money on it.
I would put the $1000 purely into getting direct downloads as opposed to any brand/awareness building campaigns.
Embrace online communities that might like your app. Market to them.
Use Twitter to spread the word. Tumblr is also a great place to help something go viral.
Which might be a really great deal or not depending on how OP values their time.
Out of interest, how many hours would you expect to spend on this kind of project?