User Acquisition reports and market data
Documents
Panel: Mixing it up - Latest Techniques for Innovating in User Acquisition & Retention PGCD#2
Modern user acquisition strategies are undergoing a significant evolution, shifting from a heavy reliance on established platforms like Facebook, Google, and Apple Search Ads toward a more diversified approach.
- A day-seven retention rate exceeding 30% is the critical benchmark for determining the long-term viability of a mobile game.
- User acquisition strategies must shift from a reliance on the Facebook, Google, and Apple Search Ads duopoly toward diversified channels like TikTok, Snapchat, and influencer marketing to achieve scale.
- Ad creative must be directly aligned with the actual game experience to manage player expectations and reduce churn, as quality of users is more important than raw install volume.
Influencers as Part of Your Video Creative Mix PG Connects Digital #2
The modern mobile gaming landscape is shifting away from traditional influencer marketing, which often suffers from high costs and unpredictable performance, toward a strategy centered on Influencer Generated Content.
- Shift from traditional influencer marketing to Influencer Generated Content (IGC) to use creators as actors for scalable, authentic video ads rather than relying on their personal reach.
- Leverage IGC to improve click-through rates and lower costs-per-install across major advertising platforms including TikTok, Snapchat, Facebook, and Google.
- Prioritize micro-influencers over larger personalities to achieve more cost-effective, reactive content that resonates with mobile gaming audiences.
Hyper Casual Gaming in 2020: Charting the Rise of a Blockbuster Genre
Hyper-casual gaming emerged as a dominant force in the global mobile market during 2020, fueled by a massive surge in consumer demand during early-year pandemic lockdowns.
- Between December 2019 and March 2020, global hyper-casual game installations more than doubled, with session counts increasing by 72%.
- The optimal monetization strategy for hyper-casual titles is two to three ads per minute, as exceeding four ads per minute causes a sharp decline in user retention.
- Hyper-casual games maintain the lowest cost-per-install metrics in the industry, enabling rapid scaling despite lower long-term retention compared to complex genres.
The Mechanics of Explosive Growth
Roblox achieved a transformative inflection point in 2016, transitioning from a decade of steady development to a period of 300% year-over-year growth.
- Roblox achieved a 300% year-over-year growth rate starting in 2016, transitioning from a decade of steady development to rapid scaling.
- The 2014 introduction of the Developer Exchange program incentivized high-quality content, establishing a self-reinforcing cycle where improved creator tools directly drove better player experiences and increased user acquisition.
- Expansion onto the Xbox platform served as a primary catalyst for growth by enabling cross-device play, which triggered powerful network effects and organic word-of-mouth acquisition.
Death of Performance Marketing: End of a Career in UA?
The landscape of user acquisition is undergoing a fundamental transformation, moving away from manual, tactical media buying toward a more strategic, integrated growth model.
- The traditional manual media buyer role is becoming obsolete as algorithmic automation from platforms like Facebook and Google replaces routine campaign optimization tasks.
- Growth strategy must shift from siloed marketing functions to a unified model that integrates short-term performance metrics with long-term brand health.
- To ensure profitability and relevance, studios must involve growth experts early in the product development lifecycle rather than treating marketing as a reactive, final-stage effort.
Understanding the Publishing Funnel | PGC Digital #1
The hyper-casual gaming sector is undergoing a strategic evolution, shifting away from the pursuit of fleeting trends toward a model defined by long-term engagement and sustainable innovation.
- The hyper-casual sector is shifting from short-lived trends to a model focused on long-term engagement and sustainable innovation to combat razor-thin profit margins.
- Hyper-casual titles that rely on replicating fleeting fads typically lose market relevance within a three-month window.
- Publishers are moving away from prioritizing simple download volume, as high acquisition numbers often fail to offset the costs of thin profit margins.
Six Steps Your Competitors are Taking to Grow Their Games | PGC Digital #1
This presentation outlines six strategic steps for mobile game developers to optimize growth through monetization and user acquisition.
- Calculate true user lifetime value (LTV) by integrating ad revenue data with in-app purchase data to enable more accurate bidding per source.
- Transition to in-app bidding to improve performance and reduce manual labor, while maintaining a hybrid model that combines bidding with manual waterfall management.
- Balance system-initiated ads, which drive revenue, with user-initiated ads to optimize the trade-off between monetization and player retention.
How to Prepare for the Future of Mobile Marketing! | UA Coffee Talk
The mobile marketing landscape is undergoing a fundamental transformation as machine learning and automation consolidate the technical aspects of ad management.
- The role of the media buyer is shifting from manual campaign trafficking to strategic oversight as machine learning and automation from platforms like Google and Facebook increasingly handle bid and budget optimization.
- Success in mobile marketing now requires a transition toward creative strategy, product integration, and high-level storytelling rather than reliance on granular, device-level tracking.
- Privacy-driven changes and the erosion of traditional tracking necessitate a convergence of performance and brand marketing to maintain growth.
User Acquisition Under Crisis | UA Coffee Talk
Effective user acquisition during periods of economic volatility and environmental crisis requires a fundamental shift from long-term historical modeling toward a conservative, short-term focus on immediate performance metrics.
- Shift user acquisition strategy from long-term historical modeling to a conservative, short-term focus on immediate performance metrics like day-three or day-seven return on ad spend (ROAS).
- Avoid reactive, across-the-board budget cuts by segmenting performance data by geography, platform, and specific game design to identify pockets of sustainable growth.
- Maintain a proactive, competitive spending mentality during economic volatility to capture market share while competitors retreat, rather than defaulting to purely defensive budget reductions.
Ad Creatives Framework: Optimization Deep Dive (Matej Lancaric SuperScale)
Ad creatives serve as the primary engine for profitable user acquisition in the mobile gaming industry, functioning as the most effective lever for reducing cost-per-install.
- Ad creatives are the primary lever for user acquisition efficiency, with optimization capable of reducing cost-per-install from four dollars to fifty cents.
- A balanced creative budget should allocate 70 percent to video content, with the remaining budget split between static images, carousels, and playable ads to combat creative fatigue.
- To ensure a continuous pipeline of high-performing assets, 10 to 15 percent of the total creative budget must be reserved for testing experimental concepts.
Mobile Gaming Markets Overview | Latin America (With Jam City Bogota, Lockwood/Avakin Life)
The Latin American gaming market is defined by a youthful demographic and a strong preference for free-to-play experiences, with mobile gaming serving as the primary driver of regional growth.
- Mobile gaming is the primary growth driver in Latin America, where a youthful demographic heavily favors free-to-play experiences on low-to-mid-tier Android devices.
- Developers must optimize for constrained data environments and older hardware due to economic volatility and high import duties on gaming consoles and high-end devices.
- Monetization strategies require adaptation to low credit card penetration and a reliance on prepaid plans, favoring low-cost entry packs, subscriptions, and ad-based models over traditional in-app purchases.
Superstar Session: Ready to Scale? What to Focus on Before Pushing the Button
Scaling a game development business requires a disciplined, analytical approach to user acquisition (UA) and capital management.
- Scaling success depends on identifying the point where marginal revenue equals marginal cost and operating just before that intersection to maximize profitability.
- Developers must transition from rigid budget-based planning to a dynamic model where finance and user acquisition teams are integrated for rapid, data-driven scaling or contraction.
- The core objective is to treat a game as a repeatable 'money-printing machine' where capital invested in user acquisition yields a predictable, positive return.