Mobile gaming is more popular than ever, and whether it’s the Pokemon Go phenomenon or the Angry Birds feature film, these games have captured consumer attention and dollars. By 2020, mobile phone gaming penetration in the United States is forecasted to hit 63.7% – an increase of 8% from 2016.
Typically, mobile games operate under a freemium model meant to draw in players to the initial gameplay at no cost and then upsell with unlockable content behind paywalls. Although these games are considered “free,” usually vital game content is unattainable without money and the gamer is often limited in gameplay unless players make in-app purchases. We’ve found nearly 50% of the mobile game users on Softonic would be willing to pay to unlock more content and so we did some further digging to determine if they’d also be game (pun intended) for ads.
While there is plenty of TV and online advertising designed to inspire mobile game downloads and participation, like Arnold Schwarzenegger plugging Mobile Strike between plays during Super Bowl 50, another prominent avenue for advertisers involves displaying ads within mobile games themselves. With in-game advertising becoming a more widely used monetization tactic for both developers and brands, we were curious to hear what mobile gamers had to say about these ad displays inside of free-to-play games. After polling nearly 5000 free-to-play mobile gamers from our community, we’ve uncovered some interesting findings to share.
Developers serve up in-game ads as a way to turn a profit – and nearly 70% of mobile gamer respondents have encountered these types of ads before. A surprising finding is that roughly 51% of mobile gamers will pay attention to in-game ads while only one in four reported being “very unlikely” to do so. In terms of ad content relevancy, 54% of mobile gamers believe in-game ads are accurately targeted to their interests. Ads within mobile games also aren’t a prominent reason why gamers stop playing either, as only 17% listed in-game ads as the biggest detractor from a given title.
When it comes to gameplay frequency there is a sharp dichotomy between different gamers after the initial game download. While 43% play freemium mobile games every day, 15% will almost never play even after downloading to their phone. Though there appears to be an “all or nothing” mentality for many mobile gamers, most of them are logging on consistently (another 15% said every two to three days) and therefore receiving frequent exposure to in-game advertiser messages.
The Pokemon Go phenomenon and the other AR/VR games that will inevitably follow it have the potential to change the paradigm for mobile game advertising, as marketers move away from banner and interstitial ads as a way of reaching into gamers’ pockets and towards more native placements. These types of gaming experiences provide tremendous opportunities to leverage location-based advertising strategies and reach gamers with offers relevant to them in their physical location and immediate context. Will marketers be successful in meeting the customer where they are in these new environments? That will depend on their ability to achieve an authentic interaction within the game, one that weaves itself seamlessly into the experience with little to no distraction for the user. For those who do this well, AR and VR games can represent a huge return on ad investments as users interact with advertising that appeals to them as part of the game play itself, leading to higher engagement with products.