1. Sunnyside Up
4.5.2012
Thursday, April 5, 2012

2. Draw Something back at #1
• To the surprise of many, leading game company Zynga
purchased the developer of Draw Something, OMGPOP, on the
day that competitor Rovio released it’s newest game in the Angry
Birds series.
• But Zynga’s bet proved to be a good one: after losing the #1
downloaded iPhone app spot for 2 weeks, Draw Something is
back at #1.
• According to Zynga, the game has been downloaded more than
50 million times in 50 days, reportedly making it the fastest-
growing mobile game ever.
• The free version has ads; users can pay 99 cents to get rid of
them.
• Opportunities:
• Paid Media: In a given turn, a user could see 2-3 different
mobile ads (one small banner, and two full screen ads—with
video— before and after turns)
• Paid Media: Branded drawing: Perhaps not a company logo,
but perhaps a brand’s biggest celebrity sponsor (Smirnoff &
Madonna, for example).
• Source/ReadMore: http://allthingsd.com/20120405/zyngas-draw-
something-slingshots-past-angry-birds-in-app-store/
Thursday, April 5, 2012

3. what Draw something did differently to go viral
• From Nabeel Hyatt (ex-General Manager, Zynga):
• Synchronos vs Asynchronos
• “Draw Something was the only pictionary-like game that
adhered to the turn-based model pioneered by Words with
Friends.“
• “Many of the flows are almost directly adhering to the
design conventions of WWF. This is in contrast to most
other Pictionary online games, including OMGPOPs own
earlier title Draw My Thing, which were synchronous in
nature (the opponent is online at the time).”
• “The asynchronous style of play allows you to play with
friends, and it also creates a very natural viral need. You
have to wait for your friend to respond to keep playing.
Therefore, if you want to keep playing then you need to
start a new game with another friend.”
• Word choice
• “Most iPhone pictionary games have a fairly bland word
set. Partly due to OMGPOPs irreverent past Draw
Something included lots of pop culture words like Lady
Gaga and Frodo. These are the kinds of words that, once
drawn, have a much higher propensity to be shared on
Twitter, etc (for examples see:http://www.buzzfeed.com/
sandanit...).
• Source/ReadMore: http://www.quora.com/Draw-Something/
What-did-Draw-Something-do-differently-from-other-Pictionary-
apps-that-made-it-so-viral
Thursday, April 5, 2012

4. what Draw something did differently to go viral
• From Huy Hong (engineer at Blippy)
• Simple drawing tools.
• “The limited color palette and narrow paint brush choice
prevented the conundrum of choice. This gave players
the freedom to draw poorly without fear of not having any
artistic talent. This guaranteed your friends wouldn't be
disappointed in your stick figure drawings because of the
tools and possibly your fat finger.”
• Word choice.
• “Having a mix of traditional board game words alongside
pop culture references gave the game a fresh flavor that
kept up with the branding/design of the app, which in itself
was bright, cheery, and tastefully juvenile. This also gave
players a hint that they should try to be clever or
humorous with their drawings in order to convey a
possibly impossible word to draw based on the limited
drawing tools.”
• Focus on fun with a friend, not winning.
• “All of the above helped to imply the goal of the game was
for players to meaningfully interact with their friends in
the form of a game, i.e. "poking with a purpose", where
you could employ inside jokes, mutual knowledge, and
common world views to facilitate your drawing (stuff you
can't do with a stranger). This gave you additional fodder
with friends, more so like a social app than a game.”
• Source/Read More: http://www.quora.com/Draw-Something/
What-did-Draw-Something-do-differently-from-other-
Pictionary-apps-that-made-it-so-viral
Thursday, April 5, 2012

5. facebook timeline engagement stays the same (or
decreases) after the switch
• Edgerank Checker, Hubspot, and MagicBean Lab have
published reports that question Facebook’s original
claim that the new Facebook page would increase user
engagement by 46%
• Edgerank reports that “Roughly 60% of the [Timeline
Pages] analyzed experienced a Decrease, while roughly
40% experienced an increase. It should be noted that
converted Pages did experience slightly better results
again, however, the difference is minimal.”
• Both old Facebook pages and Timeline pages saw
roughly equal degrees of engagement decreases by,
which suggests that Timeline is less critical for
influencing consumer engagement.
• Most consumer-brand engagement continues to occur
on the user’s news feed, which means that marketers
should continue to prioritize their Facebook strategy and
their Facebook paid media buys.
• Source/Read More: http://www.readwriteweb.com/
archives/
brands_see_fan_engagement_drop_in_first_month_of_f.
php#more
• http://edgerankchecker.com/blog/2012/04/how-does-
facebooks-new-timeline-impact-engagement/
Thursday, April 5, 2012

6. new facebook brand pages engagement drops
• Blue = Facebook Timeline
• Red = Previous Facebook Brand Pages
• Source: http://edgerankchecker.com/blog/2012/04/how-does-
facebooks-new-timeline-impact-engagement/
Thursday, April 5, 2012

7. instagram comes to android
• After a preview at 2012’s South by Southwest,
Instragram has released an Android version of the
popular photography app.
• The App hit over 1 million downloads in the first 24
hours of its release.
• A year and a half after Instagram was released
(exclusively on iOS), it reached 30 million users (out of
180 million iPhones sold).
• The Android releases promises to bring a new audience
of over 500 million activations (or installations of Android
on multiple devices such as Samsung or HTC), making it
more or more likely that Instagram will hit the 100 million
users mark well before the 4 years Facebook took.
• Source: http://techcrunch.com/2012/04/03/instagram-
android-demum/
Thursday, April 5, 2012

8. start-up of the week: Urban airship
• What is it? Portland, OR’s Urban Airship is a technology
that powers Push Notifications, In-App Purchases, and
Subscriptions for mobile applications on various platforms
(Android, iPhone, Blackberry).
• What problem is it trying to solve? Urban Airship makes it
easy for app publishers of all sizes—but especially small
and medium publishers—to keep their apps in use via push
messaging and earning recurring revenue from their apps
via in-app purchases. This would otherwise require a
complex, tailored cloud infrastructure.
• Push notifications keep uses engaged by reminding the
user of a particular event even (or especially) when the
app is not open.
• In-app purchase are important for publishers to quickly
monetize their apps: buying new levels in AngryBirds,
accessing new colors in Draw Something, and perhaps
buying extra features in apps like Nike Fuel band.
Thursday, April 5, 2012

9. start-up of the week: Urban airship
• Why does it matter? At first Urban Airship relevance • Or as a media implication, “Media sites could use Urban
was limited to a set of app publishers (and brands Airship’s Segments to define custom segments, like
with very robust Apps), Travelers or Movers, identifying them based on their
In Jan ’12, the company bought SimpleGeo, in an change of location over time and pushing local news
effort to “combine its push notification platform with content only to those who would find it contextually
the ability to segment audiences by location, time, relevant, i.e. the people actually living there.”
context, and preferences,” which creates interesting
opportunities for branded apps. • In the future, a partnership with start-up Meridian is
planned, which will allow push messages to be targeted
• TechCrunch surmises: by geo-located indoor spaces, so a consumer could be
“So that a national retailer could, for example, offload targeted at the point of purchases (deciding between
excess inventory from stores in San Francisco by individual mall stores or roaming the aisles).
targeting its offers to people who live in the Bay Area” • Source/Read More: http://techcrunch.com/2012/04/03/
urban-airship-segments-meridian/
“Or, as another example, a concert hall with a bunch
of extra tickets for a show on a slow night, could send
push notifications offering deals to all users who
happen to be near the venue.”
Thursday, April 5, 2012

10. Thank you.
Profero New York
206 Fifth Avenue,5th Floor
New York, New York 10010
T. +1 646 381 3500
F. +1 646 843 8424
Thursday, April 5, 2012