Superstar Session: How to Win in a Fragmented Mobile Market?

and the first uh talk that we're going to start with is also from unity um it's the superstar session how to win in a fragmented mobile market so i'd like to invite uh to the virtual stage nikita satspin sorry please correct me on your last name yeah yeah hi martin how are you hey nice to see you so uh when you're ready stage is all yours awesome well uh hello everyone and thank you for joining into the session today my name is nikita zanzegan and i work senior growth marketing manager at unity technologies for unity distribution portal and today i want to speak about new challenges that stand in front of mobile game developers and how to adapt to these new changes the error 2020 has changed the status quo dramatically and 2021 is going to be the

year of the most drastic changes in the mobile game industry during the past couple of years if not decayed first of all let me frame the context we will not speak about customer preferences new genres and shifts of gaming behavior you can find all this information in the recently released gaming report for 2021 presented by unity here we will speak about the first and foremost changes in game distribution and thought process around it here at unity we speak a lot with game developers let's try to summarize what developers are facing in the world of mobile game sales right now first of all discoverability millions of games are already presented on biggest digital outlets we all as humans have only 24 hours every day and actually even less as we still need time to eat sleep and so on however there are so many digital products that compete for this attention and even a great game can be missed easily

fragmentation last year was remarkable specifically because what was happening all over the world was a primary driver for growth throughout this industry it was also due in large part to growing interest and supervision from government bodies on the biggest digital app stores this particular shift creates opportunities for the new app stores to enter the foray of digital sales and opens the door to new audiences that are hungry for engagement in this app stores last but not least the performance new and seasoned developers alike are at the mercy of high-heeled low-visibility restricted up marketplaces a far cry from how things were decayed ago given the issues with data-driven approach we will cover in a minute it has never been more important to think strategically and make your game more performative by distributing further and wider from the start to get the engagement you will need to succeed let's take a look at these challenges more closely let's talk about discoverability first this issue remains one of the most painful for game developers and to put some color in it there are a

few hundred unity games being released on a weekly basis and the competition is quite fierce right now second the attention span of a player is very limited and very far in very high demand across the industry you have to invest a lot into advertising which isn't always a viable option particularly for independent developers as a consequence the smaller and more mid-market studios find themselves fighting for visibility on own channels like twitter or facebook and where in fact they need to think about how to meet several algorithmic requirements like how engagement from the get go or overall high engagement and history and account history organic posts simply don't work anymore the best chance is to get like 15 minutes of visibility and twitter for a portion of your followers and that's pretty much it having just a few minutes to showcase your game that's been in development for years the reality of today that said in order to get traction you need to invest in user acquisition and invest a lot into it the marketing budget can easily be

couple times bigger than the total development cost it's also about a very specific expertise that's not easy to gain and even if i have budgets you will face a huge competition with large enterprises who have been there for years so having money unfortunately isn't enough last but not least competition for platform support has also increased significantly and only well-developed relationships are able to get a featuring that unfortunately doesn't drive that many players as it was a decade ago and usually the choice is made towards games that are already successful so developer ends up asking for favor which is usually ignored next problem is increasing fragmentation itself there are two main reasons for this trend first regulation sorry so first regulations for digital accounting distribution have become much more strict in the past year and there is no sign that is going to stop anytime soon chinese market remains an edgy case and where you can fight a couple doses of android stores for example but if you read news then you know that more and more regulatory cases appear in

across the globe now with the regulations of big companies however a more region-specific approach has played largely in favor to companies that create local app stores to distribute gaming content precise understanding of local audiences combined with this new mobile game normal creates an opportunity for new app stores to compete on the local markets with big companies and provide a more tailored experience to local players you don't know by the way that in 2020 alone five new app stores were released to the market in different regions we expect this number to continue growing in the coming years another challenge has become against marketers marketer's unending headache how do you promote a game effectively in 2021 usual performance marketing strategies will not be relevant anymore with the new policies coming from apple and other companies will likely to fall before ios 14.5 the whole ecosystem worked pretty straightforward you feed traffic sources with app data and let them show you the right user for your game and battle is all changing right now you

won't be able to find your user that effectively anymore that means that games that use edge monetization models for instance very low gau with the higher very high average revenue per user won't be able to target these users precisely the same goes for games that rely entirely on ads ecpm will likely decrease for the same reason let formulations will become even more important as less opportunities will be left outside of the stores all of this means that scaling through only paid user acquisition will not be optimal anymore and developers will need to remember all product marketing days and channels that were forgotten we at unity see all these changes also as opportunities that are needed to be embraced and new strategies should be created while launching new games to the markets and supporting current projects one of the strategies could be to try new distribution channels for your android mobile game we see a growing interest in new markets which have been becoming more prominent into 2020 and now even more in 2021

here you may see just a few examples of global storefronts let's leave china alone but before we dive in let's discuss why these stores are important to consider in your publishing strategy first of all there are incredibly accessible markets that want more quality content that means if you have a great game there is a good chance to get quite some organic traffic from the stores and start monetizing straight away second the teams from these stores are usually very open and focused on creating long-lasting relationships with game developers as these stores grow being with them from the early years is very important from the long-term perspective third better terms by that i mean revenue shares incentives and everything that platform can do for a great game to ensure it gets what it deserves and last but not least these stores usually represent local markets and they know these markets well enough to create a competitive advantage for the both players and developers there

but how big is this market let's dive in the numbers according to new zoom an estimated 1.7 billion of mobile gamers will be using alternative app stores by 2023 across all platforms that will be equal to 5 billion revenue outside of china in 2021 with china this number will likely to be multiplied by several times another important fact though is that alternative app marketplaces are growing faster than the biggest stores obviously though they're all as similar and small there are smaller in comparison but this doesn't mean they are empty and there is no demand for such stores but what's behind this growth how do they scale there are multiple reasons for that and i've already mentioned a few above however the two most important factors are emerging markets growth and payment availability in these markets let's dig deeper into this emerging markets are growing faster than other regions according to nuzu middle east and africa grew up by eight percent and let them by 7.4 percent

comparing to 2.6 percent in the us and very important to mention low credit card availability in some of these regions and no surprise that majority of in the majority of traffic and demand for alternative app stores go out from there another very important reason for alternative markets to grow they effectively solve the last mile problem of a potential customer as they support lots of local payment services that are relevant to that player one of these payment methods is direct carrier billion or dcb let's take a look at the numbers by 2023 39 of smartphone users will be using dcb globally the majority coming from africa and middle east the revenue from this payment method is also skyrocketing up to 59 growth is expected from 2020 to 23 globally and biggest contributors will be emerging markets again for example africa alone is going to reach 130 million of gcp users and over 1 billion revenues by 2023 which is a 60 increase from 2020 but there is an

obvious battle neck here for releasing your game so so many stores you would normally need to create builds for each of them and each has its own specific set of requirements as such you will have to create several store-specific sdks and test them follow me and only then you will need to deploy them and please don't forget about each update of your game right it will need to go through the same process again doesn't sound too exciting does it what can you do with all of that well there are a couple of different ways you can go for instance going for a publisher is a classic not only it can help you with your studio credibility it can also help if navigating local markets contribute to your studio overall operations and face any of the bureaucratic processes head on while you sit back and relax but all of that comes at the cost namely a lower revenue share a lack of control over your games and above oils it's really hard to get a publisher

similarly a distributor can help greatly they already have the established platform relationships and they to stem the tide of bureaucratic and operational troubles but they can also take a sizable chunk of your revenue and they make you dependent on them for growth leaving your no room for you to promote your titles the way you would like on the stores well also you won't be able to establish relationships on your own with your partner platforms and again not easy to sign such a deal as distributors usually aim for the top five ten percent of the games that means that most likely 90 of all the listeners of the speech will likely not be able to sign such a deal then you can do it yourself quite simply this maximizes your studio autonomy allows direct access and um allows you to build direct relationships with platforms it also offers the least complicated and highest yield of revenue returns and doesn't demand a certain game type or studio reputation for app store publishing but again

while the doi approach is clearly the most rewarding it typically requires many more resources than you have at least this is typically the case that's why unity has created the unity distribution portal and the unity distribution portal it's a free self-serve solution that allows publishing to multiple android app stores simultaneously and also automates build deployment it supports free to play iep enabled games and also premium made with unity games it was launched in august 2019 udp has integrated 10 international app stores into its platform ensuring quicker and more efficient entry into new and established markets with as little resource drain as possible this made udp an attractive option to developers and studios across the globe in fact a lot of developers already use udp as a part of their publishing strategy since august 2020 till january 2021 more than 900 studios spanning the globe

opted into udp for its resource considerate distribution capabilities those 900 studios published more than 1300 games through udp you can use udp in any phase of your game's life but most exciting results could could be if udp was considered at the launch this was the typical lifespan of a mobile game only a few years ago usually you softline on google play then release it on app store and then you buy traffic for the stores today the situation is different so it requires a moisture streamlined self-serve approach with udp you can create incremental revenue growth without without the extra hassle and due to being able to do it yourself your game trajectory can look more like this another strategic though could be to launch on alternative app stores first this is how the developer of game dystopia decided to do and this is his story first

let's pick up let's tell me let me tell you a few words about the game itself right it's a mid-core art race rts in the dystopian cyberpunk world which features conor mcgregor as a hero person with a really nice graphics and engaging game place the developer beetroot lab was interested in how they can maximize organic users before heavy investment in user acquisition udp launched just about time and the decision was made to release the game first on huawei gallery and samsung galaxy store that are the largest android app stores outside google play now the idea was to get as much platform support and possible traction as possible the efforts were well paid off the launch helps to prove the monetization potential at scale and set proper benchmarks for massive ua launch but let's dive into the numbers okay so day 14 since the launch 42 of all android registrations in the first 14 days

came from galaxy store and app gallery but what's more importantly it was about 40 of total android revenue but you might ask okay 14 days what happens next even after four months after launch app gallery and galaxy store together drove the same number of registrations as google play and from the revenue point of view it was about 14 of total revenue of the game or 30 if looking at android revenue only so in order to sum it up udp significantly reduces the obstacles of self-publishing first it allows you to enter markets with less competition less competition for now also it creates incremental revenue channel without additional investment third it provides a single console for reporting and deployment to all of the stores connected to udp and last but not least it reduces the

costs needed to create and maintain builds and do you remember the slide that is that i've shared with you just few minutes ago with udp wheels this slide will change dramatically udp takes all the hard lifting allows you allowing you to focus on creating great experiences for your players and build long-lasting relationships with platform owners thank you for your time and please learn more at unity.com udp and you can always reach me out through the social media that is stated on the slide thanks right thank you so much nikita yeah thank you you