But before we get started, what is a beta version of a software? Any software goes through an alpha-testing phase, that is usually carried out internally, to make sure that all major bugs and glitches are identified and corrected. However, in many cases, the number of possibilities and use cases for a software is too high for a small team to cover it all by itself. Releasing a second version of the software, free of the major bugs identified at first, to a larger group of users, will allow developers to collect more feedback both on possible remaining bugs, but more importantly on the overall user experience.

Beta – work in progress

What do you want to do with your beta?

Launching a beta version of a software has now become quite common, but before you do it too, take some time to think about what you will want your testers to actually test. By the time you launch the beta, the software will be running pretty smoothly globally, but you might have in mind some features for which you need real customer feedback, or want to check if everything keeps on working okay when an important number of users connect simultaneously to an online service.

Identifying your main objectives for your beta testing will help you planify the differents steps of your testing period, but most importantly, it will make the testers’ job easier as they will know precisely what they should focus on during their time with your product.

Choosing your group of testers

You would probably want your beta testing to be short and easy, but unfortunately, it will probably take a few months, since you will need to have each new beta version you put out tested again to make sure all the adjustments and improvements are working the way users wanted them to, and the way you tried to implement them.

You will be spending a lot of time with your beta testers, and, hopefully, hearing a lot from them, so getting the right group of beta testers is the first thing you should be working on. Here a few things to keep in mind:

• Public or private? Having a public beta (available to anyone) might seem like a good idea to collect more data, but too much data will probably prevent the most important issues from emerging clearly. It will also be harder to stay connected in a personal way with your beta testers to keep them involved in the process, so you might feel like the number of feedbacks is the declining as you move forward.
• If you decide to go with a private beta, you might get a lot of applications (hey, who doesn’t like getting early access to a cool new software?) from which you will need to extract those that will actually help you gather useful feedback.
• Target the people you want: they might be those you think will be your core users, or a new segment whose reaction to your software you want to test, but keep in mind that the data, and feedback, you will get will depend on who is testing your product.
• Remember to let people know what’s expected of them as beta testers. They should feel enticed to providing some feedback, and not only using your software before other people. You can try to quantify objectives (time spent on the software, number of feedbacks…) or simply incentive feedbacks, but if you’ve built your pool of testers carefully, that might not be necessary.

Note on NDAs: if your beta is private, and  you have not launched your product yet, you might want to look into Non-Disclosure Agreements (NDAs). The NDA will reinforce the importance of secrecy among your testers, and give you legal protection should anything leak.

Collecting data

People like to provide feedback in very different ways. Think about yourself: maybe you have never sent a bug report when your app or software crashed, maybe you have. Maybe you prefer writing emails once in a while to cover a long period of testing, or you’d rather send tiny pieces of feedback every time you get the chance. Chances are the same thing will happen for your beta testers, so letting them use whichever way they want will increase your chances of getting feedback.

Can your testers contact you? Email, Skype, Facebook, Twitter… They should be able to reach out to you in any way that is more convenient for them. Any effort you don’t put in making their lives simpler is an additional effort they will not make to send you the feedback you’re looking for. Whether they want to send a weekly recap of all the glitches they have encountered, and all the improvements they think would be useful, or just notify you instantly of what is going through their mind, your beta testers should not have to wonder if they can contact you through this or that way, as the answer should always be YES.

Want to get feedback on something more specific? A particular level in your game, or a question to which you would like to get an answer from all or part of your testers? An in-app prompt to answer a question is the surest way to find out what users are thinking. They have just finished a level you still have doubts about? Ask them what they think about! They have not been using a feature, or have been overusing an other? Ask them why, and find out what your users are really thinking. With polljoy, you can ask your testers anything you want, and customize your questions to match your software’s look and feel. Whether you ask multiple choice questions or open ones, you will have instant access to all the data to identify immediately the most important issues your users are facing.

Remember how you always skip those automatic bug reports (I know I do…)? Well, it turns out that some people don’t! Implementing those in your beta version comes at no (or little) extra cost, and it’s one effort people will not have to make if they want to report a crash. Just hit send, and voilà.

All this data, and now what?

Keep your testers involved! They are (hopefully) providing a ton of feedback that will make your product better in the end, so the least you can do is to let them know how their efforts have benefited you. Here a few ways you can keep your testers involved:

• Updates. Let your testers know how it’s going. They might feel like things are not changing that much even though they’re actively providing feedback. So while you’re working on making your product better, inform your testers you’re doing so. Let them know which changes you are making, and how their work has led you to making these adjustments. A weekly update, whether it’s an email, or in a closed group on any social platform you like (I hear Facebook is still pretty useful for that) is a simple gesture that should be well received. Share your successes, but also your failures or disappointments. Keeping the relationship between you and your testers human is a great way for them to stay motivated.
• New builds. In the end, the goal of the beta test is to release new builds that take into account the feedbacks you have been getting from your users, correcting what they did not like or adding the most requested features. Every new build is proof to your testers that their feedbacks are implemented as the development goes along, and that their efforts actually have an impact. And, if you ask me, that’s a pretty cool reward!
• Rewards. Speaking of rewards, some of your testers might be expecting a little gesture from you at some point in the process, and most probably at the end. Promising a reward before the beta test begins will get you more applications beforehand, but remember that you will have to hold on to that promise. If you’re not too sure what you’ll be able to offer in the end, better not to make any hazardous promise, and surprise your users with an unforeseen reward. It could be a free version of the software they have been testing, or a reward inside that software if it is free, or anything you can come up with that sounds cool enough to you (a visit to your office? Dinner with the development team? Really, anything!).

Angry people.

Unfortunately, and despite your best efforts to put up a great testing team, some people will subscribe to the beta as a way to get early access to a software they are interested in, with no or little intention to provide feedback.

You probably wish the only angry things in your surroundings were those birds in your smartphone, but being surrounded with beta testers, the truth might be a little different. Some of your testers might not exactly understand that a beta version of a software is, by essence, imperfect and get pretty, um, harsh to you whenever something goes wrong. If you’ve picked your testers carefully, and let them know precisely what the situation was in the beginning, there shouldn’t be too many of those, but if they are, you can do either two things. If the feedback is valuable, you might want to smooth things out and remind the tester that bugs and glitches are inherent to beta testing. If harsh feedbacks keep on coming, remember you can always choose to exclude a tester from the process. However irritating it might be, keep cool – you do not want your software to come into market with detractors already waiting for you around the corner.

Being responsive both to positive and negative feedbacks will keep your testers participating, while censorship, even to overtly negative feedbacks, might not be very well received and insert a bias in the testing process.

Have you been beta testing recently? Share your experience with us at hi@polljoy.com or on Twitter, @polljoy!

The post Making the best out of beta testing appeared first on polljoy.

Ratings popups are important to your iOS game

It is very hard to get your users to rate your app. Developers rely on ratings while users tend to be annoyed. The average review has a certain impact on downloads and rankings. Used correctly, rating requests can be of great help to your iOS game. They can benefit both app developers and users.

Set up your iOS rating prompt with polljoy

The iOS integration is fast. You will be up and running in 5 minutes.

1. Download the SDK and extract Dist folder to your local drive
2. Drag the Polljoy.framework & Polljoy.bundle to your project in Xcode
3. Add the following iOS frameworks to link
   • UIKit
   • Foundation
   • CoreGraphics

You can access the complete integration guide here.

A smart rating prompt SDK

polljoy’s smart rating system enables you to identify your big fans and motivate them to rate and improve your ratings. Meanwhile, it gathers critical feedback from all users, so you can make your app even better.

We have a ready to use poll. You just have to create an account and integrate. You can deploy rating prompts instantly. And you can also fully customise your polls!

polljoy also offers an advanced target filtering. Decide who you want to show the poll to, and monitor the live results in our interactive web console.

In-app rating request best practices and tips

• Embed your app store link into the rating prompt so users are redirected to the app store when asked to rate the app.
• Make your prompt look native to your app by uploading custom graphics or customising the layout.
• Keep questions short and simple. Create personal questions using a wording that fits your app.
• Show the request at a moment of accomplishment.
• Reward users for their input with in-app currencies by using our reward feature.
• Use the dynamic console to analyse your results at a glance. Learn and act fast.
• Do not interrupt the user in the middle of the app play

If you are looking for an easy to integrate “rate my app” plugin that supports iOS, get started with our free SDK. It will take only minutes and help boost your 5 star ratings quickly. It also gives you the feedback you need to improve your product to an even higher standard. If you want to know more about app store ratings, check out our tips on how to improve your app store ratings.

We also support Android, Unity and Web. If you’re also developing on Android, check out our dedicated article here.

Any questions, just ask me at caroline@polljoy.com. Follow us on Twitter for more mobile love and polljoy news!

The post iOS rating prompt SDK – Free appeared first on polljoy.

Where polljoy comes in

polljoy is a free rate my app plugin that supports Android, iOS, Unity and Web. It enables you to set up your own rating prompts in minutes, deploy and change polls instantly from polljoy’s web console.

Set up your rating prompts in 5 minutes

1. Copy the polljoy SDK Archived File to your project workspace folder and unzip. You’ll see two projects: PolljoySDK and PolljoyTestApp.
2. In Eclipse, import the PolljoySDK project into your workspace.
3. Add the PolljoySDK project as a reference project in your project settings.
4. Add INTERNET permission to your project’s AndroidManifest.xml
5. Again in AndroidManifest.xml, declare PJPollViewActivity by adding the following lines between <application>and </application>

It’s that simple. For the detailed integration guide check here.

If you’re using Android Studio, check out the 4 minutes video tutorial that walks you through the integration process for our Android SDK.

The smartest way to get better ratings : a unique SDK

polljoy offers a unique rating SDK for your Android app. Its technology identifies your true fans and motivate them to leave a review on the Play Store. This approach improves your ratings and boosts your app’s ranking. Meanwhile, it gathers critical feedback from all users, so you can make your app even better.

What you need to do? Just log in to your account, integrate and get started with our template polls or create your own.

Powerful rating prompts

• Advanced user targeting (paying, non paying, app version, time since installed, platform, and more).
• Embed the link to your app on the Google Play so your poll redirects users straight to that page. Easier for them to rate.
• Use a design for your prompts that appeals to users, upload your own graphics or customise the default layout.
• Reward users with in-app purchases.
• Deploy and create polls from our web console. No app-updates needed.

If you are looking for an easy to integrate “rate my app” plugin that supports Android, get started with our free SDK. It will take only minutes and helps boost your 5 star ratings quickly. It also gives you the feedback you need to improve your product to an even higher standard. If you want to know more about app ratings, check out our article on how to get better ratings for your app.

Also developing on iOS? Check out our dedicated article here.

Got a questions? Just send me an email caroline@polljoy.com :) and keep up with polljoy on Twitter.

The post Android rating prompt SDK – Free appeared first on polljoy.

By now, you have probably heard of SEO – Search Engine Optimization. With about 50% of all websites traffic coming naturally from search engines, it is critical for your website to be optimized to stand out among the billions of web pages on the Internet.

Now, think about this: more than 60% (63% actually, according to Forrester) of app downloads come from people casually browsing their app stores. So, how do you get your app to all those people that might not be actively searching for it? How do you make sure that you are not missing out on what is probably the biggest pool of potential users for your app? Enter ASO, App Store Optimization.

What are the elements that can affect my ASO?

You will want to start with the factors over which you have complete control, most notably keywords and title. This is where your impact can be most significant, so spending some time searching for the right keywords and title, or working on your app description is a step you will hardly be able to skip.

The rest of your ASO depends on your total number of downloads and your ratings. You might feel like it’s harder to influence those, and it is, but knowing how the mechanisms work should help you guide your efforts in the direction.

1. Keywords are key

Keywords do not work the same way on Apple’s App Store and Google Play.

Apple lets you pick actual keywords, but the number of characters you have for your keywords is limited to 100, so you will want to make each character count. That means getting rid of all the words that will be ignored in a search on the app store (think “a”, “and”, “the”…) and focusing on the keywords that will make you stand out. Generic keywords might get more searches, but it will be harder to make a difference using only those because competition will be fierce. Try being present on more niche keywords, that are more specific to your offer, as it will increase your chances to reach your core target.

Not too sure what a relevant keyword could be? Answering these 4 basic questions will help you get started.

• What would a smartphone user type in his search bar if he knew your app and wanted to find it on his app store?
• What would he type in if he wanted to get a service provided by your app?
• What are competitors using? If they’re aiming for the same audience, you should find enough material to give your brainstorming a boost.
• What are people saying in their reviews of your app? If the same word is recurrent in an important number of positive reviews, it might be something other users will be searching for.

Apple won’t let you update your keywords list unless you have a new release, so each update is the perfect occasion to check how your keywords compare to the market, and make the necessary adjustments.

Google’s Play Store search algorithm works differently, without a keyword list. What is taken into account for your app’s ASO is its description. If you want your app to rank high in search results, your app description needs to be carefully crafted with the right amount of relevant keywords (no more than 5 repetitions of the same keywords). The keywords you found for your iOS release are probably a good starting point, but you will still need to find the right balance between using those and, um, well – having a description that makes sense.

Remember though, your app description will also help your SEO for Apple’s iTunes webpages, so any effort you put into optimizing your description for the Play Store will also benefit your Apple App Store ASO.

2. Make your title stand out

Not only is your title the first thing users will see from your app, but it is also a great way to get your app high in a search result. Including your best performing keywords in your app title is something that will boost your rankings (apps with keywords in their title rank in average 10% higher than those who don’t in app store searches).

Once again, think about competition. Having a trendy word in your app name (think “Candy”, “Insta” or “Flappy”) might seem like the easiest way to get easy downloads, but remember that more often than not your app will be drowned in thousands of apps with near identical names. Aim for something creative and unique, that will be easily remembered should someone try to search directly for it.

The battle for trendy keywords rages on!

When it comes to apps, users tend to judge the book by its cover. You only have one shot to make the right impression and get that click through to your app page. Your app’s title and icon are your best allies in that battle, so make sure you give them the love and attention they deserve.

3. Localize your ASO

With specific app stores in more than 155 countries, and almost 30 languages to choose from, localizing your ASO is key if you want to reach users worldwide in the most efficient way. Before committing to a full translation of your app, localizing your ASO will help you evaluate the potential for the various markets you are considering for entrance. Translating your title and keywords is mandatory (unless your brand is strong enough), as it is more than likely that users will browse the app store using their native language. Remember that competition on keywords will vary from one language to one another so you might need to spend a little time making sure your keywords are still relevant in the new language and finding new ones if they’re not.

Because of market specificities, all ASO localization efforts might not show direct, or even long-term, results, but it will help you evaluate the opportunity to release a translated version of your app in a specific app store before you actually start looking into the time and resource-consuming process of translation.

4. High ratings bring high rankings

Ratings are key for your ASO. Not only will apps with high ratings rank higher in the search results, but they will also critically increase the chances of a user getting to your app page and eventually download your app. We could say A LOT about app ratings, but we recommend you check out this article we wrote on that specific topic if you want to know more!

In-app polls are a great way to get users to rate your app, but timing, message and targeting are essential to increase your chances of having positive reviews. polljoy lets you target your most engaged users and push the rating prompt to that specific group, making 5* ratings more likely.

5. More downloads bring more downloads

The total number of downloads for your app is the final element that will push it up in the search rankings, as it is seen by most app stores as a relevant indicator for popularity. Unfortunately, this is also where you will the hardest time having a direct impact. However, improving your ASO should bring you more downloads from your core users, and more downloads will bring more downloads (simple enough, right?).

Think of it this way: your first ASO improvements, keywords and title, will help you make sure that the people searching for your app, or for a service provided by your app, will have your app featured in their search results, and be able to download it. Those extra downloads will grant you a higher visibility and a chance to broaden your audience.

6. Be patient

Remember, you will need to keep on working on your ASO as you progress. You might not hit the best keywords right away, or you might need to adapt to competitors. Your ratings and number of downloads will influence your rankings and you will have to adjust to get maximum exposure at any given time.

What are your thoughts and past experiences with ASO? We’ll be bringing more ASO-related content to the blog in the upcoming weeks, so let us know at hi@polljoy.com or on Twitter, @polljoy!

The post App Store Optimization: how it works and how you can improve it appeared first on polljoy.

1) Let’s start with the usual. Could you tell us about yourself and how you discovered Unity?

I’m a programmer. I’ve been in the games industry professionally since the end of 2010, so not long. But it’s been a pretty jam-packed few years. I went straight from graduating from QANTM college into a position with the company I did my internship at. They wanted me to make a mobile game and I was a c++ programmer at the time. At least, that’s what had been taught in my degree, I’d never coded anything professionally before that. I did some research and that led me to Unity. Taught myself Unity and while at Bifrost studios released 4 mobile titles with it.

I left Bifrost to do become a contract developer and did some work for Disney Japan, I was the programmer on the first Digital Writing Residency in Australia for which we made Robot University for a huge, multi-touch screen public display at Queensland University of Technology’s state-of-the-art interactive learning and display space called The Cube. I am also the programmer for the indie bitpop band 7Bit Hero that combine video games and live musical performance. All of those projects were done in Unity.

2) As an experienced Unity developer, what benefits does Unity offer over other development tools?

There are many benefits offered by Unity over other development tools. Firstly, traditionally working with an engine, especially for a coder, is quite abstract. You’re dealing with code and only see things happening when you run a build. The 3D editor that made Unity so accessible when it first came out is a huge leap forward from that.

Secondly, using small scripts to control game object, and being able to visual place things within a scene make prototyping ideas extremely fast. Thirdly, the number of platforms that Unity can build to from a single code base is something that was unheard of, at least by me, before it came along. To be able to create a game for android, iOS, Mac and PC all with c# code, is amazing.

And lastly, the asset store. It’s a huge, vibrant marketplace that provides numerous free resources, again speeding up prototyping of ideas, and so many high quality assets that can be purchased for a fraction of the price it would cost you to make it yourself (your time is always worth something, even if it’s you “paying” yourself).

3) What inspired you to start your own Indie Game Studio?

I love working on other people’s ideas. Games programmers are luckier, in my opinion, than the other disciplines of game development. We get to see the faces of our players light up, as does the rest of the team, but we also get to see the faces of the designers and artists light up as we start to bring their ideas to life. But having said that, I consider myself part designer as well. Like most developers, my mind is buzzing with game ideas that I believe people would want to play. These ideas are usually a little left of field, often being inspired by AI concepts, and they may well not be “commercially viable”. I obviously believe otherwise, but generally speaking they’re would be considered risky. I knew if I was ever going to be able to make those sorts of games, I’d have to do it for myself. I’ve been lucky enough to find an amazing little team of talented individuals who think I might just know what I’m talking about.

4) How are you going to finance your studio? In other words, what are the great ways for indie game developers to finance their games?

Financing your own studio is always the first big hurdle. At least, figuring out a plan is. For me, that plan is to fit it into the cracks in my life, and bootstrap it. Let me explain those two things. I have a full-time job, I’m a programmer for a Serious Games company in Brisbane called Real Serious Games. It’s around a 40 minute commute. I have 2 children, my son is almost 4 and my daughter is a little over 6 months and about to start daycare as my wife returns to work. As you can imagine, that’s the hours of 5:30am till around 9pm (after dinner, nightly bath and bed routine and tidying up) accounted for. My weekends are for spending time with family and friends and of course the jobs and chores that didn’t get done during the weeknights. On an evening I work on 7Bit Hero or my studio. That might mean working on the actual game, which in itself could be design work, prototyping, game code etc., or it could be social media interaction, dev blog content.

That’s what I mean by the cracks. I haven’t given up my day job for Sly Budgie. I have to provide a steady income for my family’s sake. But it would be nice for the company to make some money while we work on our games. So this is where bootstrapping comes in. If you aren’t familiar with the term, it basically means doing whatever work pays money to cover the cost of doing your own thing. Like I said, for us, that’s not really anything. The work we do is considered sweat equity, it’s time we’re willing to put into the company. But any contract work we might pick up, will earn the company a little profit. And we are about to look into creating assets and selling them on the Unity Asset store. Bootstrapping is an excellent way for an indie studio to finance their games, and I’d recommend checking out the Well Placed Cactus guys’ website. They have written some great pieces on how they keep their little studio going with contract work.

5) From your experience as a developer for several successful gaming companies, what makes a great game developer?

What makes a great game developer is so hard to answer. A strong work ethic definitely. Making a game is way harder than anyone thinks it is before they do it. You don’t have to play games all day, every day. In fact, you won’t get far doing that. I saw a lot of people drop out of my game development college because they couldn’t stop doing that. Personally I’m too busy to play many games. But I do follow what’s being made. I read about them, I get to know as many people as I can that make them. I watch videos of them being played during lunch breaks sometimes. I talk about them, a lot. You need to be able to hold a discussion on a game. Not just state that you think it’s awesome and then have nothing else to add. And make games. A good developer is making games. Finishing games. If you’re working on something big, that is going to take you a year or two, take a break once in a while and do a game jam. So many important lessons can be learned from a game jam in a fraction of the time it will take you otherwise. And it might be pretty obvious, but being able to work in a team is pretty crucial as far as I’m concerned. There’s rarely any room for ego in a development team. And let the players decide any disagreement. No matter what you believe, if putting the game in the hands of players points to a different conclusion, listen to the players.

6) There has been a significant rise in the number of high quality mobile games. So, what makes one game stand out?

What makes a mobile game stand out? Man, that’s another hard question. On the app store, getting featured makes you stand out. And that’s a mix of making a quality product (visually, preformance-wise, content-wise, gameplay-wise), that showcases the features of the device, and a spot of luck. All you can really do there is polish your game. Don’t release anything half hearted. Get people to play it as early as possible and listen to what they have to say about it.

7) What is your favourite game right now, and why should we play it?

My favourite game right now is Crawl by Powerhoof. It’s fast and fun. Has a unique spin on the classic dungeon crawler. A stunningly nostalgic art style with a modern level of detail, especially animation-wise. And best of all it is played by a group of people sitting around a TV. Not enough games put you in a room with your mates anymore.

Thanks to Adam for answering our questions! Check out the Sly Budgie website and keep up with him on Twitter. Let us know what your experiences with Unity are, or what you’re playing at the moment at hi@polljoy.com or on Twitter, @polljoy!

The post Using Unity 3D and running an indie game studio with Adam Single appeared first on polljoy.

As he explained it, “every time I increase the difficulty of the levels my ARPU goes up but my retention goes down – it’s like I can’t win”.  He’s not alone feeling that way.  At polljoy we consult often with game designers and game balancing in a freemium world ranks right up there as one of the top challenges.

On one hand you have to recognize that 95% of your players aren’t ever going to pay, but they still need to have a great experience or else they won’t stick around to give you great ratings, and downloads will drop – resulting in less chance to attract payers.

And then on the other hand, if it’s too easy for payers there is little motivation to start and keep spending. And spend they need to – given paid acquisition costs well above $US 1, each paying user needs to at least contribute $20-50 on average just to try to break even. How do you achieve a good balance then?

Here are 8 tips to help guide you through the process:

1/ Define your pinch points

Every freemium game needs their pinch points, the places where users run out of something of value.  Points where they feel they need to spend if they want to keep making progress at that particular moment in time.

• For games with levels (eg- Candy Crush), it could be running out of lives after failing a blocker level with high difficulty
• For a competitive PvP game (eg- Clash of Clans) it could be running out of troops to be able to adequately defend their base, leaving it vulnerable to attack (and risking the loss of much prior progress)
• For a casino game (eg- Hit It Rich) it’s simply running out of virtual currency and not being able to keep playing and enjoying the experience
• For a city building or farming games (eg- Megapolis) it could be running out of production capability to produce a needed part or structure, or lacking money to buy electricity to support a growing town
• Etc…

No matter what genre of game your freemium title is in, it’s important to identify what your pinch points are, and make sure they are easily understood by players in the UI and art. In general, the more direct a pinch point is, the more compelling it is. Running out of lives is a simple yet effective concept. A vague feeling that someone should invest in something for potential benefit somewhere else is often less compelling.

2/ Decide how non payers will overcome pinch points

At the pinch points, you want to encourage your paying users to buy to bypass it and keep on playing further – smooth links to IAP are crucial. For competitive games where players are fighting each other you want to not directly appear to be unfair (pay to win) but design systems where paying achieves what could be also gained for free through skill or grinding (ie- indirect benefit)

Next for the other 95% of players (the free users), there needs to be ways to overcome these pinch points. The simplest recovery method in most freemium games is time – energy replenishes in 4 hours, or new crops can be harvested in 8 hours providing new raw materials in a farm game etc. Other related options are grinding – doing actions over and over to recover that resource.

If it is grind related, the process should be interesting and diverse enough to keep their attention up while recovering. No matter the recovery option, it’s important that the player thinks it’s fun, fair and consistent.

3/ Decide sessions & lifecycle for payers and non-payers

Once you have your game design, pinch points and recoveries in place, it’s time to decide how long you want people to be playing and how many times a day.

For mobile games, players may be coming back 5-10 times a day or more, for sessions anywhere from 2-3 minutes up to 10-30 minutes and beyond.

You want to decide what you think is right for your game and audience, and then also decide how long it will take to complete your game for free (it’s good practice to make the game able to be finished with enough time and skill – complete pay blockers part way through the game don’t tend to work well), and conversely how much money it would take a paying user to finish playing the game in the shortest time possible (ideally 100′s if not thousands of dollars)

An alternative is to add extra (optional) branches of gameplay and content to encourage the paid “completionists” to spend more while providing a main branch for all players.

If you’re running a PvP game or one where new “content” is provided by the community themselves, then instead you should concentrate on how much payers could be spending per day or month and how many battles you expect them to participate in etc.

4/ Model your game and set your parameters

Using the targets above, dust off your spreadsheet skills and construct a model that will let you figure out how to set all the parameters in your game:

• XP / level progression
• Difficulty and fail rates
• Recovery and cooldown timers
• etc

You want to make sure the free users will hit pinch points at the right frequency and recover at given rates so they won’t finish the game too fast, but will still find it interesting and not too frustrating so as to keep them playing and moving forward.

And for the paying users you want to make sure there is enough for them to spend their money on through the game to hit your target revenue per paying user. People who are interested in your game can start investing (spending) right within the first session, so make sure there are opportunities to do so.   For example – in many top games there is a special new user paid offer that appears within the first day.

Getting this combination right is one of the most difficult aspects of balancing. In providing the pinch points, it’s important for users to have a feeling of “near miss” as often as possible, to encourage them to keep trying to get over the finish line and completing that particular part.

Real life note – It’s often very challenging or impossible to build a complete theoretical model for your game balancing – yet it’s still worthwhile. And you may lack the real life gameplay data to let you build it from actual results “in the field”. Yet a model still is very helpful, so don’t be afraid to build in tunable “fudge factors” (more about that later).

5/ Don’t let the time to make late game progress spiral out of control

Games are interactive systems with challenge and feedback – massive success, outright failure and everything in between. It’s important that the user keeps feeling a sense of progress in the game (new high score, or level up to a higher level etc) even at higher levels.

Ideally you want to give new users much initial progress, but not to slow this down exponentially at higher levels. Many game designers will go for a simple graph which means leveling up at higher levels get increasingly harder, and leads to frustration at the mid-end game: A better approach is to slow down the rate of increase in time between progress points, so that users still feel they are making progress at a steady pace.  eg- x axis is level and y axis could be days to get to the next level:

One way to achieve this is to have variety of mechanics (eg varied modes or different takes on standard goals) to effectively “multiply” the content and systems you have in your game. You don’t want to be the game where going from level 20 to 21 took only 2 hours but from level 40 to 41 takes 2 weeks – that gets boring, fast!

6/ Check your difficulty curve (hint- exponential is bad)

If you play top casual games from companies like King and Wooga you’ll notice that difficulty doesn’t smoothly scale up from extremely easy at the start up to impossibly hard on the last level.

Instead they gradually increase the scattering of so called “blocker” levels – the hard ones you need to try many times before passing. These get more frequent as you get further in the game, and individually can be more harder, but they still maintain a large number of easy or “relief” levels all the way through the game.

That way the gamer doesn’t dread the next level as being even more harder ad-nausea but instead looks forward to the unknown of what’s next – for example it could be an easy level where they feel a sense of mastery or a level designed to get them to make use of a new skill gained or tactic learned.

7/ Build tools to let you playtest, adjust and A/B test

Whilst models and live data can take you a long way, they are no substitution from playing your game – a lot!

You yourself have to experience what your players do to get a sense of the fun and frustration they experience. But playing through hours of gameplay multiple times each day isn’t feasible either. So it’s important to build in the cheats and tools to let you easily speed up time, gain more of desired items or time & level shift – so you can jump right to the point you really want to get to. Also it’s helpful to have the ability to load the database of other players into your test builds, so you can play exactly what they are playing (you may be surprised – especially in games that foster different strategies or play styles)

When it comes time for beta or launch A/B testing can also help – by allowing you to test different assumptions – eg that giving the player more rubies will let them get into the game further and be more likely to spend more later (sometimes hard to know the result in advance). Note that this is only useful if you have a large enough scale of traffic – make sure you figure out if you have that before you spend energy on the implementation work.

8/ Measure the real data to keep improving your model

What if you did all the modelling in your game balance and playtested thoroughly, but then launched and found out that session frequency was more than doubled what you planned for?

Well the good news is that you know and checked it. Many game designers make the mistake of not validating their initial assumptions and hence the balance is always off. Check all of your assumptions and “fudge factors” from live data, and make the model more accurate over time. Remember that freemium games are – games as a service rather than release and forget. We’ve seen game designers tell us they have increased retention and monetization by 200% in a matter of weeks just through thoughtful analysis and game balancing tweaks.

BONUS tip – Listen to your players! (5 ways to do it)

At the end of the day it’s all about your players.

Stats and spreadsheets are great at telling you what’s happening, but really bad at telling you why. Quantitative data needs to be coupled with qualitative data – what the players feel and express about your game and the features in it.

A change to nurf the payout rate in a city building game may temporarily increase monetization through currency purchase but result in largespread player dissatisfaction that could be resulting in big drops in other systems or metrics. Staying close to users also helps pick up any loopholes or bugs that may be disrupting your game balance.

There are a five key ways to get player feedback – all of which are important and in use by the leading game companies:

1. Appstore reviews – tools like App Annie are good to summarise
2. Support emails – many game companies use tools like Zendesk to manage this
3. Player forums and social media – various options here including Helpshift
4. Instant in-game feedback using a game survey tool like polljoy
5. In person playtests and focus groups

Hopefully with these tips you are able to design and balance better freemium games – that both retain free users as well as entertain and monetize paying users for your creative effort.

Good luck! If you’d like any help or have feedback feel free to get in touch – caroline@polljoy.com

The post 8 tips to balance free-to-play mobile games appeared first on polljoy.

1) Tell us a bit about yourself and how you ended up where you are today.

Hello, my name is Andrew Huff. Currently the Founder / Chief Editor over at DroidGamers.com. I’m 37 and I’ve been playing video games since I learned how to walk, which means I’ve played on just about every console that’s come out, more than I care to admit, along with a plethora of PC gaming.

I have played online games competitively as well. 2008 rolled around and Google released Android. I was one of the first people designing custom homescreen themes back then but because finding gaming news for Android was a pain in the ass, I started DroidGamers as more of a hobby in 2010. Just so I could know all the gaming news going on in Android and anyone else who wanted to know could read up on it. 6 months after the launch of DroidGamers I had to quit everything to do DroidGamers full-time, haven’t looked back since.

2) According to you, what is the hottest trend right now in the mobile gaming industry?

I think the hottest trend going on right now in the mobile gaming industry is trying to prove that it can be just as good for developers as other platforms (console / PC). Probably not the answer you were expecting as I could have said a particular genre of gaming instead. However, in the mobile gaming industry we are seeing technological advances leaping ahead constantly. Each month that passes lately sees more and more games being released with console/PC quality visuals, deeper gameplay than say titles like Angry Birds, and things of that nature. You have game engines with specifically developed plug-ins and such strictly for mobile game development like Unity3D. Even Unreal Engine is in on it.

If you look at other aspects of the industry you have Nvidia bringing the Tegra K1 chipset, Qualcomm pushing the limits as well, and services like Nvidia’s GRID and GameStream available where you can actually play PC games on your Android tablet. So the hottest trend right now is mobile gaming trying to prove it is as good as any other platform. Once it reaches that point though, it’ll be interesting to see what starts trending next. Virtual Reality has certainly picked up steam these days as well which has a lot of mobile integration in it but I’m not sure we can call a pair of glassed that provides stereoscopic view as Virtual Reality. Oculus Rift had the right idea.

3) With Freemium becoming almost a standard for mobile games, what is the best monetization solution for mobile game developers?

As much as mobile gamers have come to hate freemium games, they have also come to accept it. With that said, developers need to be very careful how they plan out their monetization for their freemium games. Content locking (can’t go past a certain point without paying and this happens constantly throughout the game. This isn’t including DLCs though) or pay-to-win freemium games are very risky to do.

The best way to monetize your game, if you are planning to go freemium, is to at least make the entire game available to play through without paying for anything. Offer perks or DLC as IAPs instead. However with perks you also have to be careful that you aren’t making your game pay-to-win. Some developers have seen a lot of success offer up their initial game for free, but then releasing expansions for it, or episodes if you want to call them that, as in-app purchases. That is a good way to go. In the end though, just make sure your game is fair when it comes to IAPs.

4) In a booming market with thousands of games, what makes a game stand out from the competition?

Tricky question because both Google Play and the Apple store have discoverability issues. This makes it extremely hard for good indie developers to get their game’s seen by the mobile gaming population. Originality, good quality, and fairness with pricing (whether it be a premium game or a freemium one) are some of the things that make a game shine on the mobile game stores. You could have top quality 3D visuals by Unreal Engine 4, an amazing storyline and the right pricing all there but if your game is lacking in controls, developer support, or other areas, it’ll fail.

Developers get excited when releasing a game. Don’t rush it though. Take the time to properly fix all the bugs and make sure it is as good as it can be before releasing it. Closed/open beta testing is an excellent way to ensure that your game is where it should be before you release it. This also helps with building hype around it and building a fan-base for your game before it is even officially released.

5) From your experience, what should a developer focus on in order to make his game rank higher on app stores and get more visibility?

As I mentioned above, take the extra time to ensure that ALL aspects of your game are as good as they can be before releasing it. I can’t tell you how many games I’ve played where 90% of the game is just amazing but because, for example, the controls were not as high as a focus as everything else, the game was so difficult to play that it wasn’t fun. This can lead to a lot of bad reviews which obviously hurts your ranking on Google Play and iTunes. Once you lose a gamer, chances are they won’t return to check your game out after you update it with better controls.

Your initial impression that you make on gamers when your games are released needs to be good, just like when you go for a job interview. Your first impression is everything. Also seriously take a look at how you are monetizing your game. Does it fit the game you have made? Is it fair? While freemium games can make a ridiculous amount of money, sometimes it is better to release a premium game instead, just on the sole reason that it fits the type of game you’re releasing better.

6) What is your favorite game right now and what makes it special?

Haha I play so many games right now it is hard to pick a favorite one. However the one I am playing right now the most is this game called Motor World Car Factory published by Chillingo. The monetization in it is completely unbalanced in a lot of ways and it is slightly repetitive but for some reason, aside for being a car enthusiast, I keep on playing it. I’m not even really sure why. It has issues like how it is monetized (technically this game has two currencies PLUS a stamina/energy bar and tons of IAPs) but how the game is played is perfect for mobile devices.

Thank you Andrew for that awesome interview. Remember to check out Droidgamers. By the way, you might be interested in their forum. It is literally a gold mine for Android devs and lovers.

The post Mobile gaming trends with Andrew Huff from DroidGamers appeared first on polljoy.

Asking users to rate your game or app is a basic requirement today for any developer serious about their app-store results.  More ratings and positive reviews attracts more people to download, and influences the position on the charts and search results, which in turns increases downloads.

When implemented well in a way that respects users, there are many benefits for a small amount of integration work – it’s great low hanging fruit.

There are a few open source options available, from traditional request to more modern options.  Following is a comparison of 3 popular options:

1/ Appirater

Appirater is an open source project originally started by Arash Payan in 2009.

A simple utility originally for iOS environments (others have modified it for other platforms including Android), it presents a basic rating request popup that can be configured as follows:

• How many days until the prompt is shown
• How many uses (ie- sessions) until the prompt is shown
• How many times a user does one type of event until prompt is shown
• The time period to wait until reminding about rating again

2/ iRate

Described by its author Nick Lockwood as similar to Appirater with a simpler interface, iRate is another simple open source plugin for iOS and also Mac appstore environments.

Similar to Appirater it supports basic control over the prompt appearance:

• How many days until the prompt is shown
• How many uses (ie- sessions) until the prompt is shown
• How many events until prompt shown
• Number of uses of prompt per week (maximum)
• Time util subsequent reminders

There have been a handful of derivation projects from iRate which branch in different directions – using star system for rating etc.

3/ polljoy

polljoy is newer option that supports style customization and virtual currency to feel more native to games and apps, and provide a better player / UX.  Geared in particular for Unity / game developers it’s also used by native app developers on Android and iOS.

It has a flexible system to determine who should receive requests and when – for example – people who have completed the tutorial quest, or those who have achieved level 5 and have played for at least 30 minutes.

Apart from smart ratings it also includes flexible survey and user engagement features.

Whilst direct prompts can be used, the rating request approach suggested is:

1. identify and motivate fans through a qualifying question or other criteria
2. request ratings from those fans through support for branching prompts
3. request feedback from those who don’t rate, to improve the game or app

This approach has the benefit of gathering negative feedback in a place where the developer can follow up, rather than on the appstore which also brings down the average rating value.

Comparison

The following table summarizes the different solutions:

The post iRate vs Appirater vs polljoy – open source rating prompts alternatives appeared first on polljoy.

In a world where people have more voice through app store reviews, it would seem like we are held hostage by our users, especially those that may falsely post negative reviews. This can severely impact your app store rating and discoverability in the Google Play Store and Itunes App Store.

Many game developers forget that reviews are not set in stone. There are things you can do to resolve and prevent bad reviews to improve your rating on app stores. Here is a list of things you can do to prevent and deal with bad reviews.

1. Check Daily

One of the best ways to make sure you reduce negative reviews is to constantly watch out for them. Negative reviews can pile on quick, especially after an update, or a newly discovered bug. By constantly being on watch, you can quickly take action on the issues and prevent even more bad app store reviews from popping up.

2. Get in Touch with your players

Getting in touch with your players can be a crucial step in reversing a bad app store review, especially if the bad review is due to a misunderstanding, a confusion, or a problem that can easily be mitigated with an explanation. A year ago, dealing with a bad review was rather tough since it is hard to get in touch with the reviewer. It’s a good thing that a Google Play Store update now allows the developer to actually reply to reviews. You can now easily deal with a couple of bad reviews that may just need a small explanation to fix.

Since this doesn’t work on the iTunes App Store, you can try to get your explanation across by putting a few words in the general description portion of your app. If the review warrants an update, you could address the review by specifically mentioning that the problem has been fixed in the “app changes” portion of the description.

You can also use polljoy’s in app feedback prompts to engage with your users within the game and find out what their frustration is, what bugs they face. Then, you will be able to prevent some bad app store reviews and make your game even better.

3. Release an Update

Updates are a great way to reach out to those who may have given you a bad app store review in hopes of changing their minds. Make sure to release an update however small the changes are. This way, you are offering a way for your clients to reevaluate the app. Facebook does this a lot. They release a lot of new updates simply with “bug fixes and stability improvements”. Simply suggesting that something has been fixed will prompt negative reviewers to try it again. While you’re at it, consider putting in an in-app request for rating so they can remember to change their previous bad rating.

4. Get Better Reviews

While difficult to accept, we must understand that people can be very stubborn. When you can’t change a bad review no matter what you do, just focus on making your game better and work to drive 5 star reviews from your other fans. polljoy can help you find happy customers by using smart rating prompts before you send a popup a message to get their feedback.

Getting a bad review isn’t always bad. Sometimes, it can be a learning experience for the developer. Always look into a negative review so you know if there is something you can do to further improve your app. Who knows? Maybe that one bad app store review will help you improve your app so that you get 10 amazing reviews right after by improving the app based on the review.

As they say, “prevention is better than cure”. In this case, it would be better for you as a developer to maximize your positive reviews and minimize your bad app store reviews. Here are some preventive measures you can take to ensure a better review:

1. Find out what they Want

To drive 5 star reviews, it is best that you always seek to give them what they want. Truth be told, finding that out is a lengthy process indeed. polljoy can help you by creating surveys and even get suggestions from your customers, so you can push out an update that will help them focus on how awesome your app or game is. Make sure to put an in-app request for rating, so you can maximize the  effect of that update.

2. Divert Unsatisfied Customers

According to StudyBlue, “9 out of 10 unhappy customers never say a word, they just never come back” In this case, they simply uninstall and move on. Unfortunately, app developers sometimes invoke an unhappy customer’s wrath upon themselves by accidentally asking an unhappy customer to rate the app.

With polljoy, you can easily filter unhappy customers by presenting a way for them to send feedback without touching your ratings record in the app store. This prevents them from leaving any bad app store reviews while you use the polljoy feedback system to figure out why they dislike the app, and what you can do to make it better for them.

For more tips on how to improve your App Store rating, check this article.

The post How to deal with bad app store reviews appeared first on polljoy.

With poor ratings, you are likely to get ignored by the next person to stumble upon your game, while good ratings makes it easier to increase app downloads.

The problem is getting people to rate the game well. Communicating with your customers is hard, and getting them to rate the app is harder. Lots of developers think in-app rating prompts are simple and already handled. But with a new generation of rating prompts, developers finally have a direct way to reach their players and intelligently improve app ratings.

So far, it has been implemented poorly.

Have you ever had an experience that after playing the first level of the game, you are immediately given an in-app prompt to rate the game on the App Store? How did that make you feel, especially when you may not have done well? Well, depending on the game, people would have more likely ignored it, got annoyed, or rage rated the app for the early interruption with a measly 1 star when you hadn’t done well.

The bland and overly direct manner of seemingly “begging” for ratings through in-app rating prompts has also been seen negatively by the gaming community. More often than not, the ratings request is bland, and would most likely pass as an annoying ad.

It doesn’t have to be that way.

Sure enough, in-game rating prompts could be the game changer that we all need, but it needs to be done properly. We believe there is a solution to get that 5 star rating you have been craving for from your players.

With polljoy, each any every prompt can be as intuitively designed as your game. In fact, you can make the rating request blend in so well with your games that people won’t even see the in-app prompt as a strange request all of a sudden.

polljoy can transform the traditional in-game rating prompts into your own personal in-game customer service solution. You can determine whether a player is happy with the game or not by simply asking them how they feel about the game so far, without automatically pushing them to rate the app right away. Depending on the answer, you can either prompt them to go rate the app now (if they’re happy) or try to get the reason why they are unhappy.

Showing your customers that you care is likely to drive them to keep playing and increase game retention. This all works towards making sure they are happy with the game, and you can get them to send out those 5 hard earned stars to boost app downloads.

As you may have noticed from our previous examples, polljoy can change the usual in-app rating prompts into other types of prompts. This ties in with polljoy’s ability to deliver prompts to a targeted audience. For example:

• When players reach a specific level
• How many friends they have in the game
• When they have spent a certain amount of money
• When they have spent a certain amount of time in the game

There are some people out there that may never rate your game no matter how much they love it. These are the kinds of people you have to convince that something they do is beneficial for them in some way.

For example, polljoy helps you offer to users some in-game rewards for providing their feedback and rating your game. This way, they will feel that there is a reward for the action, making the prompt a part of the game as well. On another side, you could try to appeal to them that ratings are what makes you strive towards the next new update. That is sure to get them to rate, especially if they want more of a game they love.

Sure enough, in-game rating prompts are what will change the game of hunting for 5 star ratings. All you need is the right implementation, and the right partner to help you do it. With the right tool, the great targeting and timing, the right words, and the right incentives, reaching the top is not so impossible after all.

If you are a developer looking for more tips on how to boost your app’s ranking and get better reviews, check this article: Better Appstore Ratings.

The post In-game rating prompts are game changers appeared first on polljoy.