Jia Shen

Maximize % of paying users

3-5% of paying users on average

High end is 10-15%

50% of these users rebuy

People either don’t spend or spend a lot

Free-2-Play -> it’s a user acquisition funnel

Number One Monetization Strategy:

Create Perceived Value

Perceived Value

– The key to all monetization

Create higher value on actions, items, and events due to variables such as difficulty, rarity, time, artwork, and social functionality

The Physical (or Virtual) Manifestation of Perceived Value is: Currency

Castle Age

Perceived Value

Self Expression Items

Competitive Items

Stats– Upgrades

– Temporary stats

Consumables

Progress / Level

Ultimately converts to currency

Time creates desire

You want what you can’t have

You want it NOW

If its too easy, you don’t want it

Limited and Premium Items

Premium– You just gotta pay to play

Limited– Get it now or you’ll never see it

again. Maybe

Social City

Warstorm

Level Locking

Providing the Hope of Future Entertainment

By providing visible goals and achievements, users are given a clear incentive to continue gameplay

Allows for a tightly-regulated system of item release and pacing of users

Frontierville

Nightclub City

Chance

First ones free

Collectibles– Age old mechanic to extend out

perceived value

Roulette– Maintain pacing to fit hardcore

and casual users, as well as new

feature release cyclesSocial City

Frontierville

Time Savers / Boosters

Speed it up

Quick Refill– Every Stat can be filled right now

so you can progress NOW

Time Boost– Less tangible than instant, but

makes for better balancing

Backyard Monsters

Level Tuning

Throw users into a “lifetime” to earn value

New User Flow– Level up a new user quickly in

order to create a sense of quick

accomplishment and value

– Start with instant gratification

Growth Curve Dynamics– Maintain pacing to fit hardcore

and casual users, as well as new

feature release cycles

User Loss– Monitor user levels and tweak

according to user drop off

Nightclub City

Frontierville

Nanosiege

Summaries…

Design Perceived

Value

Limit access to

value

Creates demand

Maximize % of

Paying users

Ups retention because user derives value

Thank you!

Create difficulty ramp and barriers

Time with perceived value creates demand

Determine acceptable rate of increase

Create many different interacting barriers– Allows for value creation

in the future

– Harder for exploitation of one state

Dual Currencies

Dual Currencies – Created to combat in-game inflation

By pegging one currency to gameplay functionality and one currency

to the dollar, this allows much finer control over the in-game

economy

As people level up and standard currency becomes more plentiful,

the use of a secondary currency that does not inflate allows for

continuous monetization, or cross-application functionality (a

proposed advantage of FB Credits)

Avoids potential loss of paying customers to gameplay loopholes or

bugs

Translate to Chinese– Higher percentage of

paying users

Optimize paying user experience