If you’re a mobile games developer and you’re not using rewarded video game ads, you could be losing out! To generate considerable revenue and live respectively off your apps it is vital that you keep up with the latest industry trends. Today, this means including rewarded video in your apps.
You might be wondering why developers should consider it. Simply put: both you and the users of your app benefit from this form of advertising. You earn money and they earn extra benefits/rewards in your game.
The power of rewarded video ads
If you’re unfamiliar with this form of advertising, here is a short definition. Rewarded video advertising is a type of video ad unit designed to boost engagement and revenue by providing users with credits, in-app currency or premium content in exchange for watching a short video (often 30 seconds or longer) that the user cannot skip. Essentially, users are given the chance to interact with the ad in order to receive something they want, while developers receive video completions and potentially more installs.
When your players are happy everyone wins
When gamers enjoy your app, you win. Superior game engagement is how you can obtain higher revenues by retaining users and obtaining more by giving them more of what they want. Remember, while rewarded video ads can help keep players around and encourage more downloads of your app, users will only stick around if they like what you have to offer. Therefore, don’t just expect these ads to save your game. Your app needs to be enjoyable enough that they want to keep playing!
Give players what they want
Getting rewarded for watching an ad is what people want. While the majority of consumers will choose to watch ads to obtain premium content for free rather than pay for the content, there are some (a far smaller percentage) who would rather pay for the premium content. This is why it’s not a bad idea to make both options available. Give users the option of being able to pay for premium content if this is what they want, but for the vast majority who would rather obtain premium content through a value-exchange offer (e.g. rewarded video ads), make sure this option is available, too. Most users are quite happy to watch ads knowing that this is the cost of obtaining what they want.
Make rewards continually relevant
According to the managing director for EMEA at mobile marketing platform AppLovin, Johannes Heinze, not implementing rewarded video ads is one of the biggest missed opportunities of a lot of developers. However, Heinze stresses that it’s not just including the ad that’s important.
“Game developers should try not to link the reward to currency but rather some sort of one-time consumable like boosts, speed-ups, and revives,”Heinze says.
This is particularly important if there is any progression in the game. While there is nothing wrong with awarding currency, there may be times during gameplay when something other than currency will be more valuable to the player. This is the optimal way to make the most of rewarded ads because they don’t just offer players rewards, but relevant rewards.
Beyond reward video ads
While reward video ads remain the prominent in-app gaming trend, an upcoming trend that is gaining ground is Playable ads. These are essentially micro mini games that are similar to interactive banners and are less disruptive than video ads. Essentially, playable ads give the user a firsthand glimpse on what the product is all about and smoothly links from one game to another. The result is often more downloads for both games.
