Mastering In-Game Monetization: Establishing Your Framework

In the earlier, premium, model of game development, a studio would make a game, and leave it to the retailer and marketer to promote and sell. With free-to-play (F2P) mobile games, the retail store has moved into the game itself.

That means development studios are now required to master a whole series of sales tactics. Some developers find this off-putting, while others seem to enjoy the new challenge. From my time at Nokia to founding Tribeflame now, I’ve learned a lot about what’s important (and not) when it comes to monetization.

I’m excited to share this ongoing series with game developers to master their monetization — though before we dive into key salesmanship tactics, developers must establish their basic framework.

First, adopt a luxury mindset

Developers need to think about what they’re selling as luxury goods, like a vendor of fine wine or expensive watches, for example. In 2014, the Swiss exported 29 million watches: this was only 1.7 percent of all watches bought globally, but 58 percent of the total value. A dev’s in-game economy will work very similarly. There is a small group of superfans who spend large amounts, which makes up for the over 90 percent of players who will never spend anything. To make F2P work, devs have to create an easy path for their superfans to engage with in-game purchases.

To accumulate that worth requires a huge amount of gameplay: sustaining multiple six-minute sessions per day over a long period — at least six months — and then some, considering some gamers will pay to accelerate their gameplay. The luxury good game devs are selling, then, is not just the game: it’s progress within the game.

Next, focus design on player progression

Imagine going for a hike: it’s often easy to be overly optimistic about how quickly you can summit the great landmark in the distance. That logic applies to F2P games, as well. Players need to see a glorious mountain in front of them that they want to conquer — the game. This should be a long-term goal that could take months or years to accomplish, even though it seems easy at first.

Broadly speaking, there are four ways for a player to progress: skill, luck, time and money. The money option is there to allow a player with less time or less skill to keep pace with their friends who have more time (or skill) on their hands. It also allows them to pay to catch up to a friend who started playing weeks earlier.

To make the journey even more enjoyable, a good F2P game will create smaller sub-goals to reach. Think of them as interesting villages on the way up the mountain. The player still sees the mountain top in the distance (though a little closer), but is able to enjoy the journey along the way and is incentivized to continue.

Towards successful monetization tactics

The best F2P games set up a goal that the player has a desire to reach. Monetizing those games require devs to effectively sell faster progress towards that goal. Stay tuned, next we’ll delve into specific techniques about how to think about selling in-game, driving in-app purchases, and apply some of those techniques to ad revenue.