The Challenge and how to solve it

The Challenge of making revenue

  • Monetisation is more than just pricing – it should be viewed as a holistic approach in game design and how it should be benefitting making of money.
  • The elements are much more deeper in the game development than just setting IAP prices or advertisement layers: you need to consider what are players motivation, ability and willingness to spend and on what kind of tools you have to bespoke them.
  • Monetisations planning starts when you start developing the game and fitting the idea to your core audience needs and values.
  • Pricing is only one part of it – it is the understanding of what value you are creating and how much of it you release to your customers and how they see the value of it.
  • Remember – pricing is not guessing – it`s always should based on data and information that you have gathered from the testing and soft launch phase.

Is App Store pricing going to change ?

Is Apple and Google surrendering the 30/70 split?

Since the dawn of the App Store, Apple and Google have adopted the 70/30 revenue share, with 70 per cent of sales going to developers and the rest going into the platform holders’ coffers.

More recently, Facebook Instant Games on Android adopts the same revenue share after Google Play’s, leaving developers with a minority share in revenue (49 per cent). Google and Apple have meanwhile already cut their revenue share for subscriptions after one year to 85/15.

Epic recently adopted an 88/12 revenue split on the Unreal Marketplace (though that deals with assets rather than apps and games).

But with mobile marketplaces making billions of dollars a year, and Apple now worth $1 trillion, is it time for a change to the terms?

Apple and Google have been ruling the air space of mobile apps since the beginning and I guess the time for a change has come. The shift towards the change in the revenue share model has already started and we will see the outcome of it in the near future. There is also vast number of competing platforms emerging: Amazon, Epic, Huawei… just to name few that are actively looking for new markets and developers to integrate with them.

Do you wonder what are Apprien and dynamic pricing?

First we need to define what we are talking about:

Games in general divides in three categories

  1. PC games (VR included)
  2. Console games (VR included)
  3. Mobile Games (VR / AR included)

Apprien operates in the segment of MOBILE GAMING which is also divided in three categories

  1. Freemium (F2P, Free to Play)
  2. Premium (pay to install)
  3. Subscription (i.e Hatch, the Netflix of games model)

Apprien operates in the segment of Freemium / F2P category.

Freemium games are usually monetized by IAP`s , advertisement and promoted content and Apprien operates with the IAP`s pricing.

Let´s face it – games are business and game makers and publishers needs to make money to make the ends meet. Monetization of freemium games is a constant challenge for both the developers and publishers and the situation is not getting easier… Apprien helps developers and publishers to boost the revenue of in app purchases (IAP) by applying dynamic pricing model to the games. By finding the optimal price point of all IAP`s we create at least 20-40% more revenue. This boost is considerable at the current market situation.

What is Dynamic Pricing?

Broad economics theory based definition of dynamic pricing is the practice of altering prices for goods or services in real-time without altering the goods or services (e.g. “just changing the price”). Different users, or possibly even the same user at different times, will see different prices for the same good or service. Consumers are more familiar with the terms like Airline pricing, Surge pricing, Auctions or real time bidding (RTB). So you see that prices change all the time, for a wide variety of reasons and business models. The concept of a “fixed price” that is stable and available to all buyers is currently exception, not the standard in e-commerce. These service has not been available for medium or small developers before, now things are changing and we at, Apprien are offering it to everybody in an automated and cost effective way – pricing as a service PAAS!