There are a few things you can say about the mobile gaming industry that you kind of know to be correct without having any actual facts to get in the way right?
One is that the industry is enjoying exponential growth and that some games like Clash of Clans, Candy Crush Saga, The Simpsons and others seem to have taken the world by storm.
And the other is that most people are either: A, Not paying for their games at all or B, paying very little.
And if that’s your snapshot view well, you’d be largely correct. But because there’s such a mad scramble amongst every company with any kind of involvement in this area, there have been various studies as industry analysts, investors, publishers, marketers and literally millions of other business people around the world try to read the rules of where the market is headed next.
And the latest stats are really interesting – though limited to the US it has to be said. The most recent industry report of particular interest from Everplay shows that just one percent of users pay almost 30 percent of all mobile gaming revenues.
What the report doesn’t say is exactly which game they’re playing. People playing serious games for cash on their mobiles, in online casinos or at poker, for example, are different “animals” altogether from people playing games for the sheer fun of it and a little manual dexterity mixed in with mental agility – as with the aforementioned games.
Gamblers take life more seriously and hope to win, obviously. But some games like mega fortune slot, Poker, Blackjack, Cards and Bonus Chips are regularly in the gaming charts – up there with the more readily recognised ones. So maybe the revenues are generated by the serious gamblers? Games from providers like 888, 32Red, skybet and others seem to be making real inroads and are fun. But they can also appeal to more seriously-minded gamblers. After all, the mobile is just another tool; it doesn’t dictate who we are or what we play. So games like www.32red.com/games/blackjack.html with free cash offers may well make greater inroads into markets. The users seem likely to be part of the “one per cent club” known within the industry as “whales” – more for the way they spend than for any physical resemblances hopefully!
The Everplay report also reveals that mobile gamers tend to play more than two games each month, on average, and spend a mean average of $4 each – each month. The so-called “super whales” spend over $20 each month on average.
What’s particularly interesting as well, is that those users at the top of this particular food chain, spending the most cash, are also those people most likely to share games with one another – either via free video links or by good old-fashioned word of mouth. This has enormous implications for providers looking to promote their games virally and get a real head of steam in doing so. The critical mass in these situations is, well, critical!
Around ten percent of US players who spend over $10 each month makeup somewhere around 66 percent of the total revenue from mobile gaming in the US – whilst people who play ten hours a week tend to pay over three times the amount of the average spender. And finally – mobile gamers on iOS spend more than those of us on Android.
What all this tells us about the future is probably very little! But providers and anyone else making a big investment have to try and understand where this is all headed. The latest projections from sector research company Newzoo in indicating that the US market is now worth around $17.5 billion but that this will probably more than double by 2017; now that’s some growth. So you can quickly see why this is such a big deal – and that’s just in the US. It’s in Asia where he really big bucks are these days!
