Live Mobile 2013, day 2: Simon Podd, Flurry, "Smartphone & tablet games: by the numbers"
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October 2013
Smartphone & Tablet Games:
by the numbers
Simon Podd, Director Sales EMEA
@FlurryMobile
@FlurryMobile
3. Increasingly, mobile means global
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Source: Nielsen- State of the App Nation 2012 Report and June 2013 Cross Platform Report
4. Size Matters for Connected Devices
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Genre Usage and Demographics
@flurrymobile
7. Top Free iOS Games – Genre Demographics
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@flurrymobile
Source: Flurry Analytics
8. Top Free iOS Games – Genre Groups by User “Relationship”
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@flurrymobile
Source: Flurry Analytics
9. Top Free iOS Games – Genre Groups’ Usage
Genre
Group
Sessions
Minutes
= Total Minutes per Month
X
per Month
per Session
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345
Infatuated
63
5.5
Committe
d
37
5.3
Going Steady
15
5.1
76
Playing
11
6.5
71
195
-
@flurrymobile
200
400
Source: Flurry Analytics
10. Top Free iOS Games – Usage by Device
Device
Sessions
per Month
X
Minutes
= Total Minutes per Month
per Session
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Tablet
20
Phone
26
138
7.0
4.7
119
-
@flurrymobile
50
100
150
Source: Flurry Analytics
11. Top Free iOS Games – Genre Usage by Device
Minutes per Month
500
400
+7%
+32%
300
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+34%
Phone Tablet
+16%
200
100
-4%
-
-17%
-51%
Note: only top performing free games included in analysis
@flurrymobile
Source: Flurry Analytics
12. Takeaways
1. Understand the relationship users have with your genre
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2. Build for genres that you can effectively service
3. Consider device prioritization on a genre-by-genre basis
4. Utilize audience and device targeting in user acquisition
5. Design retention tactics around predictable usage patterns
6. Regardless of genre you can monetize aggressively
@flurrymobile
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October 2013
Thank you!
simon.podd@flurry.com
@FlurryMobile
@FlurryMobile
Editor's Notes
I work for Flurry, the leading mobile applications analytics and advertising business.Over the next 20 minutes or so I would like to draw upon the vast wealth of data available to Flurry and provide you with some insights and observations by looking closely at how age, gender and retention vary across different game types and devices. All incredibly useful information that could help you as developers plan your acquisition, monetisation and retention strategies more effectively. Look at:market data to set contextdata on Devices and Demographics. Benchmark free2play metrics for top games by genre and discuss aligning tactics w/ those. By leveraging this information and understanding user behaviour and patterns you can plot your business strategy with more confidence.
So, as you can see from this chart Flurry is big on data and big on analytics…..tracking app usage on 90% of all smart phones and tablets in the world. Our SDK is intgerated into 400,000 apps…..We’re tracking over 1.3 trillion unique actions every month. More data than anyone bar FB
And increasingly, mobile means global. Flurry measured a 47% increase in active smartphones and tablets in the United States between April of 2012 and April of 2013. While that number sounds impressive, it actually puts the U.S. in the bottom 5% of countries for connected device growth in the past year. Worldwide, growth of these devices is exploding. To be in the top 5% of countries for growth over the past year, a country’s number of active connected devices needed to more than triple.Over 30 countries growing at 200%+ CAGRAfrica, middle east and parts of latam growing at insane ratesChina the largest active smart-device market with over 300m MAU
Flurry detects about 1 billion smart phones and tablets in use around the world every month. In the last month we saw activity from 2000 different devices. As the device base grows, we’re seeing an increasing variety of screen sizes from sub-smartphones to full-size tablets and beyond. Obviously this poses both challenges and opportunities for developers who must consider how audiences, usage behaviiour and app category affinities vary by form factor. We ran a recent study and we focusd on the top 200 devices models, as measured by active users in Flurry Analytics, which repreent more than 80% of all usage.1. Small phones (e.g., most Blackberries), 3.5” or under screens2. Medium phones (e.g., iPhone), between 3.5” - 4.9” screens3. Phablets (e.g., Galaxy Note), 5.0” - 6.9” screens4. Small Tablets (e.g., Kindle Fire), 7.0” - 8.4” screens5. Full-size tablets (e.g., the iPad), 8.5” or greater screensMid-sized Smartphones dominate. Phablets are a Fad. 16% of the devices in the market are small phones but they only account for 4% of sessions. The opposite is true for tablets, which account for 7% of the top 200 devices but 15% of all active users and 13% of all app sessions. This can be easily explained by the fact that smaller devices such as blacberries are not as well suited to apps compared to tablets which have a disproportiantely high per cent of sessions.Phablets (is it a phone? Is it a tablet have attracted interest but their share of active users and sessions is low.
Nearly a third of time spent playing on games takes place on larger device. And while they command consumer time spent they only represent 15% of all devices models in use in February.Looking at books and video, It’s surprising to see that tablets and their larger screens do not see a larger proportion of time spent. It seems people are opting to watch video on the go on their phones currently. As OEMs experiment with an ever growing array of form factors, developers need to remain focused on devices most accepted and used by consumers. From our stud:consumers most prefer medium sized phones (iPhones and samsung Galaxy) and full-sized tablets.Smaller phones under index in terms of app usage compared to their install base,phablets appear have an insignicant install base and do not over index on app usage to justify support Tablets show the most over indexing of usage, especially in gamesThe success of some game developers with a tablet-first strategy, like Supercell, may also inspire developers of other types of apps to to consider focusing on tablets.
In a recent study. Flurry looked at how age, gender and retention varied by game type and device.Understand this, and a game developer can design a more engaging game that appeals to the right audience.Flurry looked at the top 200 most succesful free iOS games according to Flurry analytics with a combined MAU of 465m. For comparison purposes we then grouped these games into different genres.
Here we have a grid of iOS genre-by-genre showing Gender and AgeFrom left to right we have the percentage of users that are femaleFrom bottom to top the age of the usersSo games in the top right are preferred by older women and those in the bottom left by younger men.Tightest cluster appears in the lower left….As an overview, men tend to gravitate towards more competitive games and women prefer to play more social, turn based gamesI – as suspected, older females playing slots. Familiarity of social-turn based gamesII – Guys grow up and only play poker – generally the industry is not capturing this attractive demographic, except for poker.III – Dudes are in their man cave ripping through all the games you’d expect them to.IV – The youngest females aren’t concentrating on games, except everyone seems to play runners. Mid-age females getting a lot of satisfaction of building and matchingThe higher level point here is – KNOW YOUR AUDIENCE – don’t waste advertising dollars with overly broad campaigns. And, if you can crack the nut on drawing the 35+ male audience, riches await!
X-Axis – 30-day rolling retention (Flurry defines as 30-days or after first play) Y-Axis – sessions per weekWe find that mobile gamers tend to prefer playing a few kinds of games and demonstrate highly predictable play patterns. In other words, they form relationships with their games. Savvy publishers understand these dynamics and use them to inform acquisition strategy, gameplay design, and both in-app purchase and ad-based monetization tactics.To make sense of this, we’re grouping the genres by the “RELATIONSHIP” users have with them“In mobile games, Women are loyal, Men are Promiscuous”Committed – long-haul, immersive relationship with game – see each other multiple times a day e.g. draw something - Appointment mechanics critical to get those metricsFind right balance of IAP and ads – high impression count – high quality interstitialsRTB b/c of valuable audience Re-engagement adsInfatuated – madly in love, can’t get enough of each other, but might flame out fast if it doesn’t stay freshCan’t wait to develop new content well after launch. Content releases need to be complete, submitted, and ready near initial push of the gameTake advantage of intense play with offers and new content early and often (and at times of key emotional investment)Focus on IAP, Increase frequency of use via competitive play (PvP)- Slots showdownPlaying the field – dating around – likes to get what it can out of a game, and then move onLook to max revenue early in lifecycle of game (finite window)Focus on IAP + Rewarded VideoDifficult to find right kind of user. Targeting pays off in user acquisitionPicky audiences, but those that stay…pay (card-battle)Going Steady – not living together or overly obsessed. Just seeing each other once a day Can generate high impression count over timeMediation and Direct Sold Ads – max fill on banners and interstitialsX-Promo to higher ARPDAU
“The key to engagement on mobile is prompting high session frequency”Breaking down usage by Time Spent per MonthSessions X Time per SessionAs expected – Infatuated and Committed lead heavilyAll about # of Sessions!Turns out Minutes per Session doesn’t vary significantly
First, at a high level let’s look at Tablet vs. Phone for usage characteristics across all games.Then we’ll dive into genresFewer sessions on tablets, but they are quite significantly longer.Players get more immersed, and more committed to an experience, willing to spend…More opportunities to present ads or get users to watch videos for ads
Now Looking at Genres where Tablet vs. Phone shows some interesting variance (if not shown, they are roughly equal, or tablet with slight lead)Use this knowledge to target User Acquisition by DeviceStrategy genre – a bit surprising to not see Tablet significantly ahead given that “Tablet First” for immersive strategy games has been a hot topic lately.BUT – this doesn’t mean that the time spent in tablets isn’t higher quality and more apt to lead to monetizationBut – also b/c of appoitment mechanics across phone and tabletSlots and Solitaire – Older women settling in for long sessionsWhere Phone is better than Tablet quick experience while on the train.Motion controls Card-battle perfect for the phone portrait view
