GAMER and HIGH TECH RECRUITING!
- A lot of companies sell names, but we know games – I started as the first games producer in the industry, personally marketed near 80 games, and have done games research since 1992. We’ve done the recruiting for more than half of the 500 research projects we’ve done and more than 75 recruit only projects in the last five years.
- “Play Games, Eat Pizza, Make $50.” Back in the day, that headline for newspaper ads got us our first 10,000 names. Since then we’ve developed outstanding online recruiting methods to target individual games.
- After the digital work… we have our outstanding recruiters actually talk to the gamers in person before recruiting them for in-person studies. Only with the human touch can you get just the right people to trust with your game.
- Generally recruits take 10 days to 2 weeks, for in-person or online studies (but can be done faster when needed).
- While SF is our home town, we also have significant lists in Los Angeles, Seattle, Phoenix, Chicago, Austin and New York. And can build more in any major US city. Also have contacts with excellent international list brokers.
- Beyond games, we’ve done long term research contracts for Yahoo and Facebook.
Give me a call or send me a text, we’d love to help!
Hugh Bowen
Bowen Research
(650) 678-1543
[email protected]
MOBILE USABILITY
70+ mobile, Facebook and web usability studies done for Sony Networks and in long term contracts for Yahoo, Facebook, Zynga and Glu, and for DeNA, Atari, Konami, Bandai Namco and various startups.
Effectiveness: After 30 years of doing research, this is the most effective research tool I’ve ever seen. If you are live streaming the individual sessions even busy developers typically will keep the video running at least in the corner of their monitor - and often immediately fix problems that are revealed.
For a video of a sample usability session: Click here for YouTube video
REMOTE Usability Research in the Time of Covid – Bowen Research
Our clients have found remote testing approaches to be very effective.
NEW Moderated At-Home Usability Tests — I can talk to them as they use the app, which is very helpful, while you can watch the test real time, to comment/probe, etc. This most closely mimics our standard in person usability playtests.
"Mirroring" sends the testers mobile app screen to their computer at home, then they screen share to a Zoom meeting so the game team can watch live.
Mirroring works through the testers local network, much safer than the internet. Via an encrypted signal Zoom sends the gameplay screen to the Zoom meeting. There’s only a 1-2 second lag, and very high reliability – in our testing we’ve never found the signal to break.
ZOOM ID, Password and a waiting room where you approve anyone entering the meeting offer good security. (Publishers can add a kill switch and digital fingerprint to increase security)
We also have: Unmoderated At-Home Usability Tests, app Concept/Art/Character Studies, through PlayTest Cloud
Online Focus Group Discussions on Zoom. Traditional Online Surveys.
Further SECURITY: PlayTest Cloud has a kill switch and unique digital fingerprint for each tester. 3,500 PlayTest Cloud projects completed — no security problems.
Let's Talk!
Hugh Bowen, 650 678-1543, [email protected]