[ad_1]
Nowadays, it is easy to be cynical about the video game industry, advertising and the general state of the mainstream technology. Google has decided magnanimously to help Android game developers to increase monetization opportunities by offering ways to win back lost gamblers and continue to pay those who are happy in ad-free happiness. How, you could ask? Two methods: use advertisements to attract gamers to a game and use machine learning to only serve ads to those who are deemed less likely to buy in-app purchases.
Since there are actually two parts here, I will start with the first one. Google wants to introduce methods that allow game developers to re-acquire players who have left their games, because those who do not play will obviously not spend money. The proposed solution is to serve ads to those who, at one time or another, have installed and dropped a particular title. This could be used to inform people about new features or encourage them to come back to them. Google even mentions the use of these advertisements to convince netizens to try the game for the first time with the blog post, which involves doing so via Instant Apps.
Along with that, Google also suggests a machine-learning based way to separate players who may be buying IAPs and those who are not. With this information, the developer can run ads in the latter group while leaving it alone (so as not to piss them off).
"Ads are a way to increase overall revenue, but some developers are concerned that ads may hurt revenue from in-app purchases by disrupting the game for spenders.
"Smart segmentation ad units will only show ads to users who are not supposed to spend on in-app purchases, and spenders will not see ads and will continue to play."
This leaves me uncomfortable, especially since I see what Google is trying to do. In the end, this brings in the most money when game developers earn money continuously, without appeasing the sensitivity of the players. Certainly, the players in the "less likely" segment would not necessarily know that they are seeing ads while their IAP buying friends are not, but that does not make it any less manipulative.
This is not as serious as the insidious patent of Activision dating from a few months ago, but it does not seem too far in some respects. However, Google is already offering developers the opportunity to try this, so it's not a simple concept or a patent, and I would not be surprised if we start seeing it as soon as possible.
[ad_2]
Source link