Cellular promoting firm Liftoff has invited inspirational girls engaged on a number of the largest cellular video games to debate their achievements, challenges and future aspirations. This time the main focus is on Laura Savickaite, a Communication Specialist at Nordcurrent.
Laura Savickaite has all the time been a gamer however by no means imagined getting a job within the video games business. That’s why she calls her place at Nordcurrent, a cellular recreation studio she joined final 12 months, the “dream job.” Being paid to work with video games was one thing she by no means thought potential, but she out of the blue had the chance to market highly-successful video games with hundreds of thousands of gamers like Cooking Fever and Pocket Styler.
A lot of the shock stemmed from the early days of her profession. “I used to be all the time informed that I should not pursue a profession in video video games,” Savickaite explains. “These older than me stated that video video games are for youngsters and that it would not make sense to construct a profession round them.”
Savickaite believed the naysayers, placing her video games business profession ambitions on maintain to pursue a profession in advertising and marketing as a copywriter as a substitute. She studied artistic industries at college earlier than writing voiceovers and scripts for a well-liked YouTube channel—a job that taught her the right way to seize the viewers’s consideration in only a few phrases.
I used to be all the time informed that I should not pursue a profession in video video games
Laura Savickaite
Round two years in the past, Savickaite determined it was time to provide a profession in gaming a go. “I simply thought, ‘Why am I doing one thing I do not actually need to do once I may simply go and do what I like?’” Savickaite says. “I began looking out on-line, and that’s how I got here throughout Nordcurrent.
“I checked their profession alternatives, however they’d nothing for me. They had been on the lookout for programmers and different improvement roles somewhat than something to do with advertising and marketing. I wrote them a letter saying I assumed I’d be an ideal asset to the staff. I bought a response inside about three days.”
Preserving gamers engaged utilizing social media
So what’s Savickaite as much as as a copywriting-focused Communication Specialist? Nicely, she spends a big portion of her time maintaining in shut contact with Nordcurrent’s gamers. She provides a serving to hand via the studio’s social media platforms to make sure everybody enjoys the studio’s portfolio of video games equally. At the moment, her focus is on hospital administration sim Completely happy Clinic.
She additionally creates month-to-month content material plans that hold gamers up to date with the most recent occasions coming down the road. That features creating participating posts for social media and writing weblog content material for the Nordcurrent web site. Savickaite additionally writes all of the app retailer copy, comparable to product descriptions.
“Now we have a devoted platform that I take advantage of to see all of the messages we obtain on our social media pages, and I reply to each considered one of them,” Savickaite explains. “That is a part of the job that I like as a result of I like serving to gamers, like after they’re caught someplace. When they do not know the right way to cross a stage or have some form of concern in-game, I like aiding them.
“Generally we additionally get praises, and I’ll reply to these messages too. It’s helpful to ask gamers what they notably appreciated so we will use that suggestions sooner or later, and we’ll ship them a present as thanks for being such loyal gamers and speaking with us.”
I wrote them a letter saying I assumed I’d be an ideal asset to the staff. I bought a response inside about three days.
Laura Savickaite
Savickaite can be accountable for reputational administration, responding to consumer evaluations throughout numerous storefronts. Gamers usually use consumer evaluations to vent their frustrations, particularly in the event that they’ve gotten caught in a fancy recreation space. Right here, Savickaite steps in to assist alleviate their issues by providing recommendation or pointing them towards additional help—one thing Savickaite wouldn’t have the ability to do if she wasn’t an enormous fan of Nordcurrent video games herself.
“Normally, the issues our gamers encounter are the identical ones I’ve confronted myself, so I can inform them exactly from my very own enjoying expertise the right way to progress,” she explains. “Sometimes, somebody may have a uncommon concern I’m unfamiliar with, so I’ll contact the event staff straight.
“The primary factor to recollect when speaking with gamers is to maintain issues informal somewhat than formal. They are going to perceive a proof higher if we use the language they’re aware of, somewhat than overloading them with technical data.”
Overcoming neighborhood administration challenges
In at the moment’s period of fixed reside service updates, the occasional hiccup is certain to occur in a recreation’s lifecycle, even with rigorous testing. Savickaite’s expertise has taught her that having a disaster administration technique in place for these difficult moments is invaluable.
Savickaite recollects one incident the place a recreation she labored on obtained an replace that appeared to wipe sure gamers’ progress. A repair was shortly deployed, however as you may count on, gamers had been outraged when all their saved information mysteriously disappeared.
“In a single hour, we bought over two thousand non-public messages from gamers,” Savickaite says. “It was difficult to answer to everybody and calm them down. By assuring gamers that our technical staff was working laborious on a repair, we stored issues calm whereas we waited out the storm.”
With so many various duties maintaining her busy, the opposite difficult facet of Savickaite’s function is time administration.
“I’ve a number of pursuits,” Savickaite explains. “I prefer to handle our neighborhood. I take pleasure in copywriting and sometimes nonetheless present voiceovers and scripts for a few of our video games. I need to do many various issues, however solely have the capability for a lot, and sometimes have to decide on rigorously.”
The expertise of being a lady in gaming
In keeping with Ukie, simply 28% of the video games business workforce within the UK is feminine, with related numbers reported throughout the globe. Even so, Savickaite solely has constructive issues to say about her expertise within the business these previous few years.
Savickaite additionally factors out the gender variety at Nordcurrent as a complete, notably of their senior administration staff—together with their CEO, Victoria Trofimova, and Head of Digital Advertising, Gintare Slezaite. Maybe that’s becoming, as most of Nordcurrent’s cellular video games goal feminine audiences, notably the fashion-focused Pocket Styler.
“I’ve personally by no means had any issues regarding my gender,” Savickaite says. “Perhaps prior to now, these points had been extra frequent, however my expertise has been that if you will work laborious, you possibly can undoubtedly show your abilities and obtain something you set your thoughts to.
“Many individuals assume you’ll want to be a gamer to work on this business. That could be the case for me, however I feel that crucial factor for anybody, no matter their gender, is to have that drive to make video games. You need to be captivated with creating one thing hundreds of thousands will love.”
