Mom's choice awards

News & General Discussion
1

hey guys I am just wondering if anyone has any experience with “Mom’s choice awards”. I received an email from them stating they played my iOS and Android game “Bird Drops: Birdies Revenge” and that I would be a good fit. Problem I am having is it costs a pretty penny for a free game.

my questions are
have you dealt with them before?
is this a generic email they send to everyone or just those who qualify?
are they worth it?

Bird Drops is my first ever game so I don’t have any experience with advertising and the emails that come in from them.

any help would be appreciated.

thank you,
Brice Caris

2

Hi,

You will get bombarded with scams as well as legit offers, and it’s common. I do not know about mom’s choice awards but if they aren’t asking for money then it’s a lot safer. I would mostly be really wary of anyone asking you to insert or money for services, or asking for anything from your product.

So it’s pretty much common sense.

3

The official site for Mom’s Choice Awards (MCA) mentions an entry fee. Either $500 or $1,500.

http://www.momschoiceawards.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/Entry-Levels-050715.pdf

4

I can’t see much point if you can’t monetize back the pay. If they picked the game cause it fits for kids then you probably don’t have any ads or IAP? Publicity does not help much if you don’t have much gain from it with one product.

5

It does use unity ads. So it is monetized.

6

Well if you’re not already making $500 or $1,500 regularly then I doubt it’s worth investing. But that’s just my position on the matter.

7

7 Likes
8

Reply & tell them it’s your first game, you haven’t made enough to cover their fees let alone your own costs yet & ask if they would negotiate. Maybe say you have download stats so far & will pay them $0.10 for each download over the current monthly average from when they run the ad up to their fee level. That way they know you considered their offer & you don’t completely burn the bridge.

9

never reply.

unless you like spam.

10

It doesn’t help if they already know your email.

11

Replying validates the existence of a human reader.

4 Likes
12

exactly

13

Send it from a brand new single use email account

14

500 to 1500 sounds like a lot of money to enter an award competition. Especially considering entering the PAX indie showcase competition cost me 50.

The publicity might be worth it if it’s a gaureenteed feature. There is a chance it could snowball an be picked up by other reviewers.

15

Why would anyone go to the effort of setting up a new email, just to email a scammer in the hope that it wasnt a scam.

just no.

1 Like
16

Because scammers need to feel loved as well

2 Likes
17

I’ve seen this kind of crap before.

Basically they’re selling a sticker to put on a box. And frankly gimick is only as strong as the brand recognition, which I am just learning about today.

I’d hold off on shelling out any money to them, but do it politely.

Also, this whole “Mom’s Choice Award” stinks of sexist bias that could be more damaging than helpful. For all you know they could be some whack-jobs that think all men are rapists that should all be locked up and not allowed any where near kids.

That may seem extreme, but you would be surprised what some of these groups believe.

18

That’s… rather a lot to read into the usage of the word “mom”, once, for a group who deal with “family friendliness”.

2 Likes
19

I suppose consider their influence. Are they talking to a minority? If so, are they a vocal minority that will believe what the site says & act on it in higher % than any other source? If so it may drive more numbers than a review from a more popular site who has lower influence over their followers.

I searched kid safe games & kid safe apps & their website didn’t come up so it won’t drive business from people using similar search terms (& most parents do, I use those when looking for stuff for my kids) so anything you pay for will only be on their site & maybe on sites of any affiliates or sites they sponsor or advertise on.

20

A quick poke around their website and it looks like a legit storefront.

So it just comes down to a value judgement as to is the possible publicity worth the cost? They should be able to provide you with some heavily biased analytics to help.