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News & General Discussion
1

Hey everyone,

I’m not sure where to ask about this.
I want to find information, but also give others an opportunity to share knowledge more genreically, and possibly benefit from this posting.

A little history on me, I have about 10 or so games released, and then some large MMOs, one is a social netowkring app, the other is an RPG in development (and doing very well!).

I have struggled from the start with advertising and marketing from both sides of the equation

  1. The ads I put in my games dont make very much revenue. I am getting about 360,000 requests a month with my most popular game, and am using iAds, which fill about 20-30% and a CTR (Click through rate) or 2-3%, with the average being about 2.5%.

The ads generate me about 10 dollars a day, sometimes less, sometimes more.
It used to be 20-50 dollars a day, but it seems like iAds are just paying less now, or something.

→ I have tried adMob, and other ones, but they seem to do way worse than iADs, I had almost 600,000 impressions through adMob and only made about 17 dollars with around 2% click rate. It wasn’t even worth the time it took to ad the Admob ads in.

At any rate, I am asking for people to respond to help everyone, and me, to the following questions

  • What are you making with Ads?
  • What are your fill rates, Click through rates, etc…
  • Do you think iAds are the way to go, or are there other means out now that make more money?

*** I am thinking of just taking out the iAds, and trying to sell impressions in my games for other people to advertise in.
Seems like I would make a lot more money that way. Any thoughts on this approach? Has anyone done that?

Does anyone want to buy ad space in my games (If so, let me know what you want to buy, I can offer up to 360,000 Impressions a month, or straight up static placement for the entire month??

Now, the second issue …

  1. No matter what marketing I try, or advertising for my own games, nothing works well.
    Ok, so I have read so many articles on this topic, and posts, and books, and just about everything I could get my hands on, and the sad truth seems to be …

Forums - Barely effective
Paid Ads - Barely effective
Releasing new versions constantly - Somewhat effective
Facebook/mySpace, etc… - Barely Effective

What are other people experiences with this?
I know there is always the exceptions to the rule, but for the rest of us, what works?

If anyone actually has the know how and proven track record of getting game sells and downloads boosted, please let me know and I will gladly hire you.

I hope this post will produce information that can benefit all of us,

2

I think in app pucrashes is the better way to go. If you look at the top grossing apps its not paid apps but free apps with in app purchases.

3

aiursrage2k has the right answer. Micro transactions are where it is at.

4

I’d stick with freemium monetization model too.

5

Lodsys hasn’t given up suing people, and has successfuly now taken ios developers to court. Apple’s warning didn’t do much.

Also, ad revenue can pay off. But as someone who has been living off ad revenue for over a year, I can assure you the rates are getting worse every month. I think its because there are so many idiots releasing really poor quality apps every single day, the sheer volume of adverts means each ad pays less.

6

I think displaying ads from various ad networks is a dead end to capitalize a game. Unless you force players to click the ads with ingame rewards or even with “Support this game by clicking the ads daily”.
Second: your game (the one in your signature) is not quite attractive. I’ve watched the video and it doesn’t sounds like i can interact in any way with that world. Streets are empty, the apartment looks boring and non-interactive and the dance floor, hmm I’ve seen better in real life. I bet this kind of “game” have their fans, but they will probably need more interactivity too, other than chat and dance.
Generally speaking you are on the wrong track trying to monetize the game from ads. If you focused on players and give them something to buy or sell, then you will have a natural request for advertising ingame.
Also you should investigate micro transactions too as a revenue flow.

Third: if you don’t pay attention to details, then you are not going to make a lot of money. Like the fact you posted this thread in a wrong category. Commercial Work is for people to advertise their services or the need for such services.

7

Scapelius,

Like in grade school, if you dont have anything nice to say, then please just be quiet.
this community gets less helpful everyday and just plain rude due to people like you.

I didnt ask you to go look at my games and say they suck,
For your information, my main game is in a closed beta, so you have a lot of nerve to go and insult my work and make an obivous hater of yourself.

I would comment on your work, but im not going to stoop to your level.

Thanks for nothing but making me cringe once again from poor attitude shock,

For the people that are putting usefull information, I thank you for that and I hope that others find this useful.

Thanks all,

8

So, in your world lives only people who applaud you for every move you make? That has to be a not so real world.

Like i said you are not paying too much attention to what i said. You choose to see my post as an attack , while in fact i pointed you to several methods to get more money for your games.

As for making an opinion about your game at which point I said it suck? It was just a possible customer opinion. The fact I have checked your site and used some of my time to watch your game video, in today world of saturated information must make you happier because you never know where your income comes. I fear that with your above post you just severed that connection between me as customer and you as a vendor.

I just hope that the game you work on have more professionals in communication and marketing, because if you do that, then probably you are going to learn it the hard way those professions.

9

@trevorchandler

First of all I have to say that I love the idea of the game, I watched the video and it looks great. I hope that you will have success with it.
But I have to point something. As a serious game developer, which by appearance of your web site and game I presume you are, you should take critique as a good thing because it can only help you to make the better game, it will show you opinion of the potential customer. To you as a person who spent many months working on the game, the game itself looks perfect, but to all other peoples it is just another game. It is like when I cook something it is delicious to me, but even the bloody dog wont eat it.
Again, I think that the game looks great and I wish you all best with it. Good luck!

10

From what I’ve seen in your game, the free to play model, with in-game purchases would be the way to make money.

One thing I’d add to your virtual friend finder video is some people to make the world more populated. Showing an empty world when the point of the game is to interact with people seems to defeat the point.

Otherwise it looks pretty good. Good luck.