My father and I are in the last stages of our game and we are having a discussion about the adds in our game. My dads opinion is that we should remove the adds when someone does an in-app purchase. Doesn’t matter what the purchase is (for the record we do not have an in-app purchase for removing adds on its own). I believe this would not be necessary because it is just one add on the main menu and hopefully people will be spending most of there time in the game itself
We were wondering what your opinion is on this matter?
I would agree as a developer and player. I think its pretty bad customer treatment and also not helping the experience if I still get annoyed by the advertisement despite funding you with an IAP.
But that to a given degree also depends on the type of ad. A loadscreen ad for example is not nearly as bad as something that takes away screen space
Yeah I would remove the ads, you want to treat your paying customers better then your freeloaders, so now there is at least 2 reasons for getting IAP remove the ads and get some currency.
It is a Full screen add only on the main menu when you start the game and when you return to the main menu. We have no ads in the game itself so they do not interfere with the game.
Ads say “we haven’t made enough money off you”. It doesn’t matter where they are in the app, they make it look cheaper just by existing. When it’s the only monetization, it’s tolerated. But when you’ve made money from an IAP, too, it’s pretty much expected that you’ll treat them as a paying customer now, and not a freeloader.
There are also two ways you can advertise this, before they buy anything or after.
You can have a disclaimer that states that any purchase removes the adds, this is an incentive for people to buy something in your game if they simply want the adds gone.
Or you can surprise anyone who buys something from your game with a thank you for buying something they get the adds removed for free without telling them in advance.
The first one adds an incentive to buy by removing adds but after they buy there is no more incentive to buy other than what your selling, the second adds a pleasant surprise to anyone who buys which should increase there rating of you and your game which could lead to more purchases from the goodwill you show them,
You just got to pick which one suit you and your game and how you want to monetize it.
I’d remove them, and let them know in advance. A paying customer is likely to make you far more money with one purchase than you’d ever make from them with ad revenue, so you’re most likely still profiting from it, and it’s a good show of respect for those who value your work enough to pay money for it.
Having said that, plenty of paid games (even the $50+ dollar ones) have advertising built in. Not necessarily overt banner ads and such, but product placement and stuff like that.
The player does not pay for the ad-removal alone but for in-game items and features he/she actually wants to use. No matter if that is by the means of general coins or some special item or whatever.
Now - say you have such low payments that 0.99$ is not enough to justify removing the ads. Why don’t you just add some kind of “achievement counter” for ad-removal? Let’s say the arbitrary number for your product is in the 2,99$ range to remove ads permanently but you have lots of cheaper in-app purchases. Why not add a permanent counter that goes up for every payment the player does? At 2,99$ the ads are gone no matter what he/she paid for.
I would really much love to make a dollar of every person through advertisement but honestly I have no idea what to expect. This is our first game ever and I must say, now that we are coming to the point that we can almost release it is very exciting and scary at the same time. Because lets be honest without downloads neither the ads nor the IAP’s will generate anything. Thanks for all your response it has helped me to make a better decision.
Here’s what you can expect. Few will download your game, fewer will purchase IAP, and the ads will net you pennies.
Failure is part of the journey toward success and this is your first step on that path. What’s truly wondrous is that very soon, you’ll be among the elite few who have finished released a product. With almost a million apps, made by 200,000+ devs, used on ~500 Million devices, you will soon be 1 in 1000!
Pre-Congratulations! Savor this moment - it’s a wondrous accomplishment! And also the time to prepare yourself to be one of 700 new apps a day (40% of which have < 10) downloads). And knowing that success is tied directly to the number of apps you’ve released, you’ll be ready to learn from your mistakes so you can roll up your sleeves and start on #2! Finish; Improve; Repeat!
Shouldn’t put ads in there in the first place really, it’s spammy, sucks your battery life and always get accidentally pressed loading up loads of unnecessary tripe
Thats why you have to get millions of downloads to make it worth your while with freemium, the only other option is to crank out quick games if you get around 100k plays per platform which could be possible. You can look at the unity thread of android releases, hardly any break million but breaking 100k is not that hard.
Lets say you spent 6 months on a project 100k free downloads is a failure but if it was only a month its not that bad
I agree with this. If you have ads, just leave them in. But if you have In-App-Purchases, don’t bother with Ads. Spend your time making your game better, and your IAP’s more compelling. When I see ads, I just close the app. But I will buy things in-game if it means something (a better sword in an RPG for example).
Oke yeah I get that it would be a lot better without any ads in the game because nobody likes ads me neither I get that.But the thing is because this is our first game and we didn’t want to make tons of different characters that you can buy because this would have meant a lot more work without even knowing weather or not the game was going to be a success. So at the moment we have just one IAP that when the player does not get through a level he can unlock all the level with this IAP. Besides that the game will be free. So even though Gigiwoo2 said ads will make me pennies well then pennies it is, we have a saying in the netherlands “Wie het kleine niet eert, is het grote niet weerd” which if you transelate it to english. It literally means “Whoever does not honor the small, is not worthy of the great”.
Also Gigiwoo2 was talking about all these numbers and of how many apps get released every day and how many there are available at this moment. Of course I was already aware of these facts. I am not just blindly thinking “O I’m going to make apps, and make millions of dollars with them”. Trust me I really am not that stupid. Though I do believe that if those numbers are the things that you worry about all the time it will be very depressing. And why on earth would you even start making games if beforehand you believe you are going to fail? I know failure is part of life, trust me I know, but I believe that if you create a product no matter what the product is you will have to believe in this product. Otherwise I think you will see this in the product because why put your hart and soul into a product that you believe is going to fail?
Releasing your product is a success. And, having built it with your father, is a success of family. The learning that got you here is a success of persistence. And the desire to honor the small, is a success of greatness. There are many types of success. Money, downloads, reviews, changing a life, or simply having finished the project you started with your father.
You are accomplishing what few ever do. So, even knowing your app will earn few downloads and just pennies, I think you’re successful already. And once your product is released, you’ll reach your own conclusion - to judge yourself a success by your deeds or a failure by the numbers.
