Digital Talent Agency

Top 25 Facebook Games for May, 2009

While the world looks to tweets, companies on Facebook are quietly becoming the future EA's of the internet.  
 

from Celebrity Cafe:

"When Mark Pincus, Michael Luxton, Eric Shiermeyer, Justin Waldron, Andrew Trader, and Steve Schoettler started the development company, Zynga, in 2007, it's doubtful that any expected this type of success in such a brief amount of time. Zynga's games are featured on the popular social networking sites Facebook and Myspace. The company expects to earn $100 million in sales this year . . . proof that all those game credits add up.

According to Silicon Alley Insider, most of that money comes from "the 2% to 10% of users who pay $1 an hour to play premium games or buy virtual goods." Their games, which include "Dope Wars," "Texas Hold 'Em," and "Gang Wars," have an estimated 71 million registered users, with 46 million monthly active users.

BusinessWeek reported that in April, Zynga passed widget maker RockYou to become Facebook's most popular application maker. Their customers make up one-fifth of Facebook's 200 million users.

The San Francisco-based startup company has shaken off the disdain from "real" video game developers, reveling in the success of their simple but addictive games. Said Pincus, "A lot of people come to the game industry who aren't typical developers and they can unleash their creativity on these
massive platforms without the constraints of cost and time to market."

The highlights from the Chart above:

• Zynga and Playfish’s battle for the #1 spot continues between Texas HoldEm Poker and Pet Society, with the latter closing the gap with a gain of 1,348,759 to Zynga’s 1,054,775.
• However, that same growth did not hold true for spots 4 - 6 with Bumper Sticker, Pass A Drink, and Lil Green Patch losing about a million active users each.
• Playfish title Geo Challenge kept it’s #8 spot with 3.97 million active users this past month with Word Challenge coming in behind, but surprisingly enough the other Playfish titles were ousted by MindJolt Games who jumped all the way from #17 to #10.
• Zynga RPGs Vampire Wars and Street Racing increased in popularity with the former coming out on top at #12.
• Behind the major players, new comer Know-It-All-Triva appeared on the scene at #15 with 2,543,557 users, followed by another fresh face, 101 Eggs & More with 2,464,247 users.
• The past month also played host to two other new games for the Top 25 with Bejeweled Blitz from PopCap Games at #21 and Playfish’s newest title Restaurant City at #23.

iPhone Application Insights

"Now that there are some 10,000 applications available at the App Store, it makes it much harder for new apps to be discovered, some developers say. Brandon Bogle, an engineer and a co-founder of the Blimp Pilots — an ad hoc group of iPhone-app creators, who are otherwise employed as game developers — said its hit app Koi Pond, which sold 600,000 copies, was simply in the right place at the right time. "We were lucky enough to get in on day one, when people could find us. There are so many good apps for the iPhone, the problem is that now it's so hard for them to rise to the surface." Bogle said he and his partners had no desire to quit their day jobs."

Insights on iPhone Apps, Pricing, Marketing, Adoption, and related here.

Here are to top downloaded paid and free applications on iPhone for 2008.  See the complete
list here.

Virtual Currencies 411

by Anu Shukla for Mashable

The word on the street is that social networks, as popular as they are, can’t make any real money. After all, who’s going to click on an ad while they’re in the midst of socializing with their friends?

While there’s a grain of truth to this rumor, it’s fast becoming an out-of-date perception. What’s changed? A new economy based on social web properties that use virtual currency to capture users’ imaginations.

By creating a demand for premium content such as virtual gifts or upgraded features, savvy social publishers are finding that at least a portion of their users will gladly fork over real cash in order to pay for, say, a pretend peony on (Lil) Green Patch or to buy the latest toys for their virtual babies on Make A Baby. Even better, plenty are willing to wade into the world of online surveys and advertising offers in exchange for these “must have” items in their games.

Though no one knows yet the exact size or potential of the market for virtual goods and services, conservative estimates put it at over $2 billion for this year alone. Not bad for a marketplace that barely existed a couple years ago. Even better, all signs indicate that the growth is just beginning.

As more and more social web publishers catch on to virtual currency as an incredibly effective way to not only monetize their traffic but also engage and motivate their users, the trend will only pick up steam. And as advertisers understand the channel better and realize that it is ideal for both performance-based campaigns as well as branding efforts, don’t be surprised if virtual currency becomes the most sought-after ad channel on the web.

 

Ever noticed the little gift icons on Facebook lately that urge you to send a present to a friend? Virtual gifting is a reportedly $50 - $60 million a year business for the company, and that doesn’t include any of the gifting that takes place on third party applications. But beyond Facebook’s own virtual gifting, it’s also built into a number of applications, offering revenue opportunities for the developers of these games.

irtual worlds and avatar-based communities have been charging people for decorative types of goods like fancy upgrades for their avatars or special backgrounds for their profile pages for some time now. AtWeeWorld, for example, where you can create your own personalized WeeMee and take it with you around the web, you can spend WeePoints to pimp out your avatar with just the right hair, right clothes and right accessories.

Virtual goods can also be more functional than decorative, such as the case when virtual currency is redeemed to unlock hidden features or advance within a gaming scenario. This type of virtual good is especially prevalent in MMOGs or other types of social games. For example, at Mobsters, the number one app on MySpace, users can redeem virtual currency to help them grow their mob and level up faster towards the top of this underground world.

By tapping into the user’s social activities and motivations—in this case, sending a virtual gift—advertisers’ offers essentially provide the fuel that enables consumers to interact with each other within an application. The key to success, from the advertiser’s point of view, is using all of the juicy demographic and behavioral data on hand in order to target their audience strategically. Do that, and they will generate new customers far more effectively than through any other channel

Here's the link.

The Cybercafe Lives

by Virginia Heffernan for the NY Times

"Participants in social networks and any kind of massive-multiplayer-online existence often feel suspended between total isolation at their screens and howling online crowds. The next incarnation of the cybercafe should take into account that people will pay not only for coffee and online minutes but also for the reassurance that in their cyberjourneys they might find traveling companions whose faces — in line for a Red Bull or a margarita? — they might even see. Finding a way out of isolation and into productive fantasy and social connection, without being eaten up by virtual swarms, may be the video game we’re all playing."

The full article here.