Story
Out of runway, OMGpop bet on a corner-project game instead of dying quietly
Dan Porter's gaming startup OMGpop had millions of users but got crushed when FarmVille's 100M-player Facebook games sucked away the attention and the money. With months of runway left, he refused to be in the 'runway-extending business' and instead made a last-ditch game off in the corner.
“And so at what point do you come back to the board and you're just like, well, we're You know, we're kind of running out of money and they're like, well, why do we want to invest in something that is good but not great? And so I remember we went back and we were like, okay, so let's say that we cut all the snacks. Like, how much runway would that increase for us? And the answer was one day. And at some point you're just like, well, am I in the runway extending business?”
Tactic
Playtest your own product weekly and make one simplifying tweak at a time
Not a game designer, Porter built Draw Something by playing a new version every Friday on his subway ride home and asking only 'how can this be simpler?' He simplified relentlessly until even grandmas could play, which is what made the word-of-mouth so powerful.
“And basically like every Friday we would make a version of it and I would try to play it. And I'm really dumb and I'm not good at games and I can't read instructions and I have a lot of limitations in that space. I obviously, I clearly can't even hoop really. And so I'd just play the game and I'd just be like, how can this game be simpler? I don't really understand it.”
Steal thisShip a build weekly, use it yourself, and force one simplifying change every time.
Tactic
Playtest your own product weekly and make one simplifying tweak at a time
Not a game designer, Porter built Draw Something by playing a new version every Friday on his subway ride home and asking only 'how can this be simpler?' He simplified relentlessly until even grandmas could play, which is what made the word-of-mouth so powerful.
“And basically like every Friday we would make a version of it and I would try to play it. And I'm really dumb and I'm not good at games and I can't read instructions and I have a lot of limitations in that space. I obviously, I clearly can't even hoop really. And so I'd just play the game and I'd just be like, how can this game be simpler? I don't really understand it.”
Steal thisShip a build weekly, use it yourself, and force one simplifying change every time.
Number
Draw Something: 1M downloads in 9 days, 50M in 50 days
After the backend fix, Draw Something hit a million downloads in the first 9 days and 50 million in the first 50 days. The only app ahead of it in the App Store was a Flashlight app, since early iPhones had no built-in flashlight.
$50M
App downloads in first 50 days · downloads
“I would say literally day by day, like in the first 9 days, we got to a million downloads. And then in the first 50 days, we got to 50 million downloads. The only app that was in front of us was fucking Flashlight.”
Number
Draw Something: 25M daily players, 250M total downloads
At its peak Draw Something was the number one game in nearly every country for six months straight, with at least 25 million people playing daily and 250 million total downloads — without any built-in sharing feature.
$250M
Total app downloads · downloads
“So I would say on a DAU basis, we had at least 25 million people playing every day, which was gigantic at that time. We ultimately were downloaded 250 million times.”
Tactic
Leave sharing OUT and let users screenshot — they'll spread it themselves
Against everyone's advice, Draw Something shipped with no sharing capability. People screenshotted their drawings and texted and posted them anyway, and celebrities like Miley Cyrus tweeted about it unprompted — proving that not asking people to share can drive more organic spread.
“Number one, like we didn't put any sharing capability in it. So there was just no way to share. And that was like the antithesis of what everyone did. And so what happened was people just took screenshots of their drawings and they just texted and posted. And in this weird way, because you didn't ask celebrities to talk about it, they talked about it. Because you didn't ask people to share, they shared it.”
Steal thisMake the artifact screenshot-worthy instead of bolting on a share button; let users distribute it for you.
Tactic
Leave sharing OUT and let users screenshot — they'll spread it themselves
Against everyone's advice, Draw Something shipped with no sharing capability. People screenshotted their drawings and texted and posted them anyway, and celebrities like Miley Cyrus tweeted about it unprompted — proving that not asking people to share can drive more organic spread.
“Number one, like we didn't put any sharing capability in it. So there was just no way to share. And that was like the antithesis of what everyone did. And so what happened was people just took screenshots of their drawings and they just texted and posted. And in this weird way, because you didn't ask celebrities to talk about it, they talked about it. Because you didn't ask people to share, they shared it.”
Steal thisMake the artifact screenshot-worthy instead of bolting on a share button; let users distribute it for you.
Number
Zynga bought Draw Something for ~$200M, 6 weeks after launch
Zynga acquired Draw Something for around $200 million just 5 to 6 weeks after the game burst, at the peak of Zynga's own valuation. It's one of the fastest launch-to-acquisition timelines on record.
$200M
Acquisition price · USD
“That was like 5 to 6 weeks after the game really kind of came out and burst. Like we sold it, it happened so fast.”
Number
Two law firms in 12-hour shifts closed the deal in 9 days
To move at the speed Zynga needed, the acquisition used two law firms working in back-to-back 12-hour shifts around the clock, and the whole deal closed in 9 days.
$9
Days to close acquisition · days
“So they hired 2 law firms. One worked the first 12 hours of the day on the deal, and then the other one worked the second 12 hours of the day of the deal. And the whole deal got done in 9 days.”
Framework
Price off the buyer's pain, not your own metrics
When the board was thrilled at a $120M offer, Porter pushed back because the strategic buyers were bleeding daily users to Draw Something right before reporting earnings. His leverage was their pain — understanding they were playing a much bigger game let him extract far more.
“You know, somebody like EA was invested in sports games. Somebody like Zynga was overinvested in FarmVille. You know, you have strategic imperative to people. So, Sure, you're super valuable, but they're all playing a much bigger game. And if you can understand that, that's where your leverage is.”
Steal thisIn a sale, find what the acquirer is desperate to protect and price against that pain, not your own multiples.
Framework
Always leave a little extra on the table for the next deal
Citing former Time Warner chairman Dick Parsons, Porter pushes back on the internet's 'extract maximum value' negotiation advice. Parsons always left a bit extra on the table because you never know when you'll want to do another deal with the same person.
“And he said, listen, whenever I do a deal with somebody, I always just leave a little bit extra on the table because You never know when you're going to come back and want to do another deal with them.”
Steal thisLeave a small win on the table in every deal to protect the relationship for future deals.
Framework
Sell community and belonging, not just content
Building Overtime, Porter bet that in a sea of interchangeable content, audiences actually crave a sense of community and belonging. He studied soccer clubs, cults and religion — ancient 'growth hacks' for making people feel part of something — and engineered that into the brand.
“And so I was like, maybe what the audience wants is a sense of community, a sense of Being part of something, you know, belonging to something. I think that was clearly a growth hack for religion thousands of years ago. Like, let's get a place where people can get together and make them feel part of something. And I think people wanted that.”
Steal thisCompete on community and belonging, not content quality, when your content could come from anywhere.
Tactic
Turn content theft into free distribution with a logo'd shirt
People constantly ripped Overtime's videos and cropped out the watermark, so Porter put the brand's 'O' on a shirt worn by everyone they filmed — a permanent, un-croppable watermark. Then they refused to sell the shirt for two years to build pent-up demand and cachet.
“So I was like, you know what if we just made a shirt with our O on it? Then we have like a permanent watermark in our thing. And if they rip our video, then that's fine. Then our O is actually everywhere. We've turned our biggest challenge into our biggest opportunity.”
Steal thisBake your brand mark into the on-camera wardrobe so every ripped clip distributes your logo for free.
Framework
Strip the metadata: every fact you remove makes content bigger
Overtime found that the more stats and context they stripped from a highlight, the more it spread. 'Sean shoots 50% from 3 for George Washington High' shrank the audience; 'Sean is dope' let everyone love it. Like Draw Something, simplification widens the audience.
“Every single time I removed one piece of metadata, it got bigger down to the fact that it was like, Sean is fucking dope. Boom. Everyone can love that because as soon as you tell me Sean went to George Washington High School, I'm like, I don't know where that high school is. I don't care anymore.”
Steal thisCut every stat and qualifier that narrows the audience; the simpler the framing, the wider it travels.
Framework
Sell the dream of the clean house, not the vacuum's features
Porter's core sales lesson: the salesman who pitches suction power and features sells a few vacuums; the one who sells the dream of a clean house wins every time. The more expert you become, the worse you get at telling the simple story at the core.
“And then the next guy comes around, he knocks on the door and he just fucking sells you the dream of a clean house. And every time, like, you find your own salespeople and they're in how many views we have, and this is why our product is so great. And I'm always thinking, just gotta fucking sell 'em the dream of the clean house.”
Steal thisSell the outcome and the dream, not the spec sheet — especially for B2B and 'nerdy' products.