A post on Gamasutra caught my eye:
To be able to establish a mascot character and product, like Mario, Sonic or Tomb Raiders for a game is the Holy Grail of game design and should never be taken lightly by any designer, if so tasked.
-William Anderson
While the post is aimed at electronic game developers there’s wisdom in it for board game designers as well: does your design lend itself to creating an ongoing franchise? If not, can you tweak it in such a way that it does?
Take a look at what AEG does with its shared world. These types of considerations are making their way into board games, too.
