Fotostrana: how we doubled the revenue from match-3
With the help of events, the Photostrana social network was able to significantly raise the earnings of the internal development – the “Caramel” project. Anna Vyugina, product manager of the social network, shares her experience working on the game.
Anna Vyugina
Lately I often see articles about match-3. In this regard, I also decided to share our best practices.
One of our products on Photostrane is the game “Caramels”. This is a three-in-a-row in a candy setting with a classic promotion on the map.
The game is our own development. For several years we have conducted many experiments, in particular, with events. About the most successful – just below.
The first experiment: Super game
We decided to hold the event for the first time in 2014. By that time, the game’s revenue had reached stable indicators, but we were still looking for a way to significantly increase the increase in conditions of a minimal influx of newcomers and an already formed active core.
Our first experiment is the “super game” mode. It was a separate screen with 12 levels, a prize for passing and a time limit.
The entrance to the super-game was carried out by clicking on the icon that was on the main screen. To get the prize, the player had to complete all the levels in the specified time.
To test this solution, we did not make new levels, we just took ready-made ones from the main map. Judging by the lack of comments in the community, users did not notice this.
As a result of the launch, we received a 70% increase in daily income during the event due to an increase in the ARPPU active audience.
We held such events once a month. Thanks to this, we got a 15% increase in monthly income compared to the initial income of the game (without events).
Super game of several stages
The next step we tested the hypothesis is whether the income will increase if we hold super games more than once a month, but more often.
As a New Year’s event, we launched a super game consisting of not one, but four stages with a total duration of one month.
We liked the result so much that we still use this format.
The “super game with stages” is 3-4 locations (maps with their own sets of levels), following each other and connected by one story and setting. The stages are separated from each other by gates. They differ in color and background content.
You can’t go through the entire event at once. Each stage opens at a certain time. For example, if a player has passed the first location, and the second one opens only the next day, he will have to wait.
We made sure that the players passed the event synchronously. Thanks to this, we got extra time to finish drawing the event. Without restrictions, we would have to draw all the content for the event at once, and this is a difficult task with its volumes.
The super game has both a global goal, which can only be completed by reaching the end, and intermediate ones at each stage.
We set completely different tasks.
For example, in the first version of the “super game with stages”, the player released a character from the ice cube at each location. The global goal was to save all the animals.
In one of the last events, the task was already different. Players collected keys on the stages to unlock the cage and release the princess.
Initially, we were afraid that the players would switch from the main card to the event card and we would not receive an increase in payments, but a redistribution. The fears were in vain. Monthly income has more than doubled.
At the same time, the income of the main branch did not sink, since the event stimulated spending in the main mode.
For completing the stages of the super game, the user receives boosters. While the next stage is closed, the player spends them on the main map. Players get used to boosters quickly, so, not wanting to get stuck at one level or another, they start spending real money on them.
Of course, we got a doubling of indicators not only due to the introduction of such an event, but also the season (let me remind you, we launched it in December). Before the New Year holidays, there is always an increase in purchases in gaming products.
The following super-games brought less compared to the New Year’s Eve launch, but the total monthly income of the game still remained twice as high compared to the income without events.
By the way, not all users play the event. The DAU of the event is 30% of the DAU of the game. But these are the most active players from the well-paying segment.
Experiments on income retention
Any event due to the novelty can lead to an increase in income. The most difficult thing is to maintain this level of income.
By launching a “super-game of several stages”, we received a strong monetary gain. At the same time, we understood from the very beginning that over time the metrics obtained could fall. To prevent this from happening, we regularly make changes to the game, try to diversify the gameplay. Our goal is to use this to keep the commercial performance at the maximum.
I will give you successful examples. You might want to try some of them in your games.
Bosses
“Boss Game” is a mode in which the user confronts the bot. The player and the virtual opponent take turns and collect candy until the moves run out.
We put the boss at the end of the branch. The event is considered completed only after defeating the opponent.
We didn’t create this mode specifically for events. Before that, we had the experience of introducing PvP into the game, the game of two real players on the same field in turn. But the format from the point of view of monetization turned out to be unsuccessful. Judging by the number of sessions and games inside these sessions, people played and got involved, but did not use boosters.
Surveys have shown that players are embarrassed to win with boosters, as this demonstrates that they win not at the expense of skills, but at the expense of money. We have not figured out how to fix the situation, but we have implemented a bot for events based on mechanics.
Players understand that they are not fighting with a real person, and therefore do not hesitate to buy and use boosters.
We also made it possible to skip the boss fight for the minimum cost, but users prefer to fight with him and spend more boosters than the cost of the pass.
The addition of bosses gave plus 5% to the income from the stage due to spending regular boosters and additional purchases of special ones that can only be used in this mode.
Now we are working on a variant of the event, the levels of which will consist only of battles with different bosses, perhaps we will even try a variant of a team attack on the boss.
Collect the stars
In match-3, the following condition for passing the stage is often used: “collect N stars to pass on.” We also tried adding it to the event.
In the first version of the “super-event with stages”, it was possible to pass to the next stage only if the required number of stars was set. But this had a bad effect on the funnel of progress through the stages. We got big dumps at the first stage and few players got to the last one. And their spending did not compensate for the lack of users.
We refused this condition and tied the task “collect N stars” not to the passage to the next location, but to the opening of the bonus level within the event.
For the first time, the mechanics worked well, warming up the curiosity of the players and adding 30% to the income from the stage. The increase was due to an increase in the number of levels to get stars and spending on the bonus level.
In subsequent times, the effect of the bonus level became lower, the players realized that the bonus level is no different from the rest, and they do not give gifts for its passage.
Adding additional branches
Over time, after the introduction of events, income, as predicted, began to fall. The paying ones quickly passed the event and most of the time we received income from the “tail” of the low-paying ones.
Working on the complexity of the levels did not give the desired effect. Easing the levels of the super game led to a drop in income, as players passed the event even faster. The complication affected the loyalty of non-paying and low-paying segments.
In order to increase the income from whales, but not to spoil the gameplay for the rest of the players, we have introduced additional branches into the super game with more difficult levels and additional prizes for completing them. Unlike the main stage, additional branches do not have to be passed to get to the next location. The introduction of additional branches leveled the revenue dynamics due to the interest of whales in it and did not affect the loyalty to the game from the low-paying audience.
“Burning levels”
“Burning Levels” is a mini—event mode in which the player is invited to complete several levels in a row without ever losing. The “burning levels” differ from the usual ones visually.
Having implemented this event for the first time, we received a 30% increase in revenue due to additional purchases of additional moves. But the number of players who passed the event was small, and a large number of negative reviews appeared in the game community.
Then we found another use for this mechanic — we added several “burning levels” to the end of an additional branch of the super game. The player plays most of the branch as usual, and the last 3-4 levels on the branch must be completed without losing.
Only the most active and loyal players who are ready to play in this mode reach the last levels of additional branches. In our case, “Burning levels” increased the income of the entire branch by 20-30%.
Important: by adding burning levels to the end of the event branch, we have simplified the mode: in case of loss, the player does not throw back to the beginning of the burning branch, but only one level back.
Pass among the first 100 and get a prize
From the name of the mode, I think everything is clear. We reward the most active users for passing events.
This type of task shows a strong increase in income in the first day and a half after the launch of the event, when there is competition among the whales. After recruiting hundreds, the income drops.
In total (for the entire project), the mode gives a slight increase — 3-5%. We add this task irregularly, for a change.
Additional task “go through all the branches”
To reduce the amount of art and make the super game longer, we have increased the number of branches and days. This increased revenue by 15%. But the number of players who passed both the main and additional branches did not suit us.
To increase the conversion rate, we have introduced an additional prize for completing all the branches of the stage. This increased the number of players who completed the stage completely from 14% to 28%.
In addition to the prize, we also tried a variant in which, after passing an additional branch, the player receives a piece of the puzzle. After completing all the additional branches, the player collected a whole puzzle and received a prize for it.
Despite the colorful presentation, both options bring the same income, so we left the option just with a progress bar, since it does not need to be redrawn.
Debiting game currency for the game
Some time ago we introduced a soft currency into our game. A player can get it, for example, for completing quests or completing certain levels on the main map. There were also a lot of experiments with the currency – this is a separate topic. But in one of the super games, we decided to try not to charge it for passing, which is common in such games, but to write it off. Regardless of whether the player has completed the level with a victory or not, the game currency (in our case, crystals) is debited from him as payment for the fact of playing at this level.
The player does not want to waste crystals and tries to pass the levels without losing, so he spends boosters more actively and buys additional moves.
This technique increased the income of the additional branch by 20% and washed out some of the accumulated currency from the players.
But I’ll make a reservation — players get crystals for their activities in our game, and they can spend them in another application. Therefore, this currency is more valuable for them.
Tops
We experimented a lot with the mechanics of tops, adding them to events. The most difficult thing was to get the players to actively compete with each other.
First, they lined up the top on points. Players received points for each completed level. They could also increase the result by going through the levels. Under this system, the leaders were determined in the first couple of days and did not shift until the results were summed up.
We were not satisfied with this state of affairs and we decided to build a top not by points, but by the sparks that users collected during the game.
Sparkle appears on the playing field and hangs for three moves. If the player does not have time to collapse the candy with a sparkle, it disappears. Collected sparks are counted in the top if the level is passed.
The number of sparks depends on the difficulty of the level: the simpler the level, the fewer sparks it brings.
This mechanic has increased the passage of levels by 3 times, and payments from whales by 35%.
Based on this mechanics, we made a separate event that we periodically launch to stir up the players. Now we are thinking about the introduction of a daily top, which involves the levels of the main branch and super-games.
Conclusion
We continue to launch super games, but each such event requires a lot of effort from the team, despite the maximum optimization of the process. For this reason, we are currently testing several variants of events that can be restarted without changes at once in order to reduce the cost of the schedule. I will definitely share the results later.
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