Kicking off the afternoon session of Mobile Games Forum 2013 in London - after an excellent lunch it must be said - was the App Store Optimisation panel.

AKA How to be a Fruit Ninja or an Angry Bird.

But as Chris Hanage, GM Europe of Papaya Mobile quickly noted, "When Rovio succeeded it was a very different world. You can't build a game and then think about to market it. You have to build the ecosystem into the game from the beginning."

Ed Rumley, COO of Chillingo [which published the first Angry Birds] said, "As you can imagine, we get a lot of emails from developers starting 'This is the next Angry Birds...'

"We also see a huge amount of Fruit Ninja games that may be better than Fruit Ninja. But that was released two years ago. Things have moved on."

Bigger birds

Coming straight from the horse's month, Marja Konttinen, director of biz dev at Rovio, argued that the market has changed.

"The game is not the mechanics of the game," she said.

"It's the brand, the characters, the marketing. You have to look at your target audience and make something that works for them."

Refering back to the previous talk - from Oli Christie of UK developer Neon Play about marketing with no money - Hanage said, "You shouldn't be outsourcing your social networking and marketing. It's the core of your company."

Oscar Clark, an evangelist for engagement platform Applifier dug deeper: "Understand the process of how someone finds you and engages with your games. That's marketing. It's not just about advertising."

Of course, this is something that Rovio - no longer a games company, but an entertainment brand, as we're told - knows all about.

"We are not looking at downloads. We're looking at engaged fans, at active users," said Konttinen.

Chart attack

Moderator Richard Wilson, CEO of Tiga, then asked 'Can you build a sustainable studio with games ranking outside of the top 20?'

"I think you can, but it's that much harder," answered Hanage.

"You need to get into the charts to get the rocket [growth]. Only that level of attention to detail will get you there. It needs to be your focus. That should be your aim. Even if you don't get there. "

However, Keren Zemer, VP business development at AppsFire pointed out that only '0.18% of games released got into the top 10 chart in US.'

Yet, while making tens of millions of dollars like Clash of Clans is the 'goal' for the big VC-funded companies, it can't be for everyone.

"$150,000 can be life-changing for some indie developers," Rumley pointed out.