Over the years I’ve been writing about video games, I’ve often seen a peculiar division drawn that separates the process of making games and the methods of distributing and monetising them. Game design, art, coding, audio, and other such specialties are rightly considered defining parts of the process of creating a game. Monetisation techniques, user acquisition technologies, and retention theory? Those specialties form part of the ecosystem of distributing and maintaining a game. It goes without saying that developing a game [...]

Whether your mobile app is ‘just’ another extension of your long-owned and monetised media property, or a brand-new, standalone product that you are launching as a new developer, you have a few immediate choices to make – choices that, while not set in stone forever, will chart the course of your app’s life. Writing exclusively for TheGamingEconomy, Ryoksuke Izumi (pictured below), VP – Japan, Korea, SEA, AdColony, outlines the key considerations for monetising your app. The first is – to be free, [...]

A report released by Liftoff and Leanplum on the state of mobile app marketing suggests that app marketers are coming under increased pressure to improve ‘deep-funnel interactions’, specifically around usage and in-app purchases. While CPA has dropped around installations and usage, the cost of getting users to make in-app purchases has increased by 56% year-on-year.   Compounding this increase in the CPA is the drop in the conversion rate to 2.8%. This is a huge concern for a lot of big gaming publishers, [...]

Segmenting your audience effectively is one of the most important components of a mobile retargeting strategy, writes Alexei Chemenda (pictured below), CRO for apps and managing director, U.S., Adikteev, exclusively for TheGamingEconomy. It sounds like digital advertising 101, but most marketers – even seasoned ones – repeatedly make mistakes that gravely impact their results. These missteps include segmenting their audiences ineffectively and using suboptimal KPIs to measure and optimise their retargeting campaigns. Marketers, you may not even be aware you are [...]

ExchangeWire has been running events in Germany since 2013; and in that time I have had a firsthand look at the workings of the local digital advertising market. Like in most markets, Google, Facebook, and Amazon dominate in Germany. But there is an interesting split between the remaining 20 percenters. The German 20 percenter market can be described as a tale of two ecosystems: the ever-evolving in-app ad market, which is mostly based in Berlin; and the slow-moving, legacy web-based ad [...]

Gaming certainly isn’t what it used to be, and as it storms increasingly into the mainstream, there’s one thing that the gamers of the world need to keep front of mind: security. Writing exclusively for TheGamingEconomy, Paul Lipman (pictured below), CEO, Bullguard, explains why the risks are greater than you think, and how tackling cybersecurity in gaming needs to be a team effort. Not long ago the term ‘gamer’ evoked images of a young man, perhaps holed up in his parents’ [...]

With thousands of video games coming out every year, standing out from the crowd can be a major challenge for studios and publishers. While there’s always temptation to go over the top with a crazy PR stunt, there’s a lot of risk involved. Sure, PR stunts can make your game memorable, but it may be memorable for the wrong reasons. Writing exclusively for TheGamingEconomy, Simon Spaull (pictured below), MD EMEA, AppLovin, takes a look back at some of the biggest [...]

Despite a monumental build up, the EU GDPR may not have made quite the splash the industry expected – it rather depends on who you ask. However, what it has done, is set the wheels in motion for other countries, such as Brazil, to adopt similar legislation. One in particular, which is starting to take data privacy very seriously, is the US. Multiple states have started updating their consumer privacy acts, and the state of California, the home of ad [...]

Opportunity in the hyper-casual gaming space is burgeoning. Independent game developers need support in many areas to be able to maximise this opportunity. For this reason, AppLovin recently announced the launch of Lion Studios – a media devision to help indie game developers in a number of different areas. TheGamingEconomy speaks with Lion Studios’ president, Rafael Vivas (pictured below) about how Lion Studios intends to support them. TheGamingEconomy: Why has AppLovin launched its own media division, Lion Studios? Rafael Vivas: We saw the [...]

Retargeting is a hugely powerful tool within mobile gaming to reactivate lapsed players, but there are many gaming marketers who get it wrong. TheGamingEconomy speaks exclusively with Alexei Chemenda (pictured below), chief revenue officer for apps, and managing director, U.S., at in-app retargeting specialist, Adikteev, about the concept of the ‘Day 0 Dilemma’ in retargeting campaigns. Chemenda outlines the common mistakes gaming marketers make when attempting to reactivate lapsed players, and why in-app retargeting needs to be considered as one [...]