作者：Jay Aird

社交游戏的巨大成功导致市场上的竞争日趋激烈。尽管市场准入门槛仍然很低，但是获取成功的障碍却不是如此了。

今天的Facebook游戏开发商会发现，自己正身处一个竞争极端激烈的环境中，仅由少数巨头控制着这一市场。不管是制作价值还是平台和用户获取成本都在不断提升着。这是一种基于点击率的业务，开发商不仅需要创造一款优秀的游戏，同时还必须掌握如何使用社交图谱。

基于这些挑战，是否对于小型开发商来说现在进军Facebook已经太晚了？并不是如此。我们认为那些瞄准了Facebook的开发商们应该投入更多时间去思考游戏业务，并制定更多竞争策略。

详细分析Facebook市场便是一个好的开始。所以我们将在此分析这一市场，并探索一些开发者能够使用的技巧，从而帮助他们快速且有效地制定竞争决策。

市场中发生了什么？

在整个Facebook环境中到底发生了什么？尽管许多报告都表示，社交游戏已经到达了最高点，但是从玩家基础的数值来看，情况并不是这样。综合所有Facebook游戏，其当前的日活跃用户为1.53亿，比起过去12个月提升了28%。

增长类型vs.下降类型

开发者能够用于提升成功机遇的有价值的策略便是，专注于那些能够快速获取用户的游戏类型，或用户数仍较低的游戏类型。从总体来看，在过去一年里Facebook游戏已经吸引了无数用户的注意，但是不同游戏类型所赚取的利益却各不相同。

像之前能够调动大量Facebook玩家的模拟游戏（游戏邦注：如《FarmVille》之类）便丢失了大量的市场份额。模拟游戏于2011年1月份到达发展的最顶峰，即获得了4亿多月活跃用户，并在此之后开始滑落，到2012年10月整整下降了34%，即剩下2.63亿。

所以，在模拟类游戏急剧下滑的同时，整个生态系统是如何发展的？答案便是，市场正趋于多样化，并因此推动着新的发展。特别是受到益智游戏，博彩游戏等推动。这些游戏的日活跃用户已经超过了5000万，比去年整整提升了86%。显然，这一数值已经超越了曾经处于主导地位的模拟类游戏（3900万日活跃用户）。

我们可以发现，如今的市场正从由模拟游戏主导的生态系统转变成类型多样化的游戏市场。而这种趋势正是建立在Facebook用户对于更多游戏体验需求的基础上，这便为小型且专门化的开发商门提供了更大的机遇。

子类型分析

让我们进一步去探索相关机遇，例如博彩类游戏。我们的目标是找到能够让自己成功赢得竞争的领域。现在我们需要明确目标类型的潜在结构，并从中掌握哪种游戏类型最受欢迎，我们的竞争对象在哪里，以及Facebook上哪种游戏类型的用户数较少。

博彩类游戏是由各种子类型所构成，包括了像老虎机，娱乐场，扑克以及bingo等类型。

而“其它”类别则包括源自多人博彩类别的混合游戏类型，如Slingo（老虎机和Bingo的混合）。

我们可以发现，扑克是博彩主题游戏中最大的子类型。如此我们便能够预见一些可能吸引更多玩家注意的游戏（尽管现在的用户基础仍较少）。

一种方法便是将博彩类游戏转变成具有社交性的投注游戏。尽管在离线和传统在线渠道下，像体育博投注戏便具有极大的吸引力，但是这类型游戏却还未真正在Facebook上拓展开来。

根据数据显示，社交博彩应用的秘密武器还未在Facebook上发挥真正的作用。所以明确如何才能创造真正成功的社交投注应用便能够为开发者带来真正的利益。

我们知道，这类型游戏在有些领域非常受欢迎，如2011年，全球在线互动投注市场的股价便高达106.7亿欧元。根据H2 Gambling Capital，这一数值是互动博彩游戏市场的2倍。

市场集中率

在dystillr.com，我们则是通过观察特定类型的竞争去明确Facebook生态系统中哪块领域最具饱和度，更重要的是哪里存在探索机遇。

我们在衡量竞争格局时可以使用的一种分析技巧便是，评估市场集中程度。市场集中能够反应特定市场的饱和程度。下图便是关于6种受欢迎的游戏类型的市场集中率的分析，条块越高意味着市场越饱和。所以我们可以看出，模拟游戏市场的饱和度最高，所以这里拥有“极高的”市场集中程度。相反的，冒险和策略游戏则拥有“较低的”市场集中程度。益智游戏位列第四，拥有“适度的”市场集中程度。

拥有较低市场集中率，较高的平均用户粘性，广阔的增长率以及在Facebook上较高的关注度的类型便是在向开发者诏示着，这里存在广阔的发展机遇。如果能够意识到社交游戏玩家和博彩游戏发展的新趋势，开发商门便能够体会到像DoubleDown Interactive等公司所获取的巨大成功。

网络效应

比起小型开发商，Zynga等巨头所拥有的一大竞争优势便是他们的网络效应；他们能够无需花费任何成本而利用现有的玩家基础去交叉推广新游戏。他们的市场定位能够提供一个不均衡的领域向玩家推广自己的新游戏——这是其它开发商很难复制的。

从以下图表中我们便能够看出Zynga拥有多强大的网络效应。尽管Zynga的游戏在发展最高点时很难维护用户基础，但是他们却能够在游戏发行的前30天内有效吸引广大用户的注意，从而争取到强大的竞争优势。

用户粘性是基于日活跃用户指数除以月活跃用户指数再乘以30而得到一个估算的月平均值。

Zynga所拥有的大量用户基础便为他们带来了巨大的网络效应，并为他们的每一款游戏创造了有利的开端优势。

所以，基于Facebook游戏盈利所要求的广大用户基础以及大型开发者所持有的竞争优势，小型开发者该如何做才能赢得竞争？引用哈佛商学院教授，同时也是策略专家Michael Porter的话来说：“最糟糕的策略便是与同样水平的对手相竞争。”

为了避免这一点，小型工作室的核心任务便是分析竞争对手，并有效划分区域，为自己找到一个有利的特殊位置。如此，我们便能够察觉到对手的市场策略，目标用户，以及怎样的产品最成功，并最能吸引用户的注意。

在这一过程中，我们不仅能够观察最成功的开发者的动向，同时也能察觉到那些充满潜力的开发者们的发展。

掌握用户规模标准

免费游戏是Facebook中最主要的业务模式，即要求开发者必须吸引广大用户的注意才有可能获取巨大收益。尽管我们很容易获得前10大游戏列表以及表现最优游戏的用户规模，但是实际上，这些信息对于小型开发商或市场新手来说并不重要。下面的表格便是2012年10月，不同游戏标准所要求的月活跃用户指数：

从表格中我们可以发现，标准越低，月活跃用户指数也就越底。而大多数游戏都想获得巨大的收益。所以要想进入排行榜的前10位，游戏便需要获得1570万月活跃用户，这便说明了成为Facebook的顶级游戏是件非常困难的任务。这一信息能够帮助我们更好地明确盈利模式，并让我们能够制定更现实的目标。同时这样也能帮助开发者更有效地设定发展标准。

结论

毫无疑问，Facebook是个充满竞争的平台。所以在此突显自己的游戏并不是件易事。而该平台游戏更加多样化的趋势也带给小型游戏开发商更大的机遇，同时也导致更多大型开发商们更加难以维持自己的优势。

当提到在Facebook上获取成功的关键因素，即用户获取时，大型游戏开发商的优势（比起小型开发商而言）便清晰地突显出来。就拿Zynga来说吧，他们总是能在游戏发行后的几天内凭借现有的百万用户赚取巨大利益，而小型开发商们拼尽全力却只能获取少部分的收益（比较看来）。所以为了取得更大的成功，小型开发商门需要关注于三大核心内容：

紧盯市场，把握趋势

如果小型开发商想要利用不断变化的市场条件，他们就必须随时观察着市场的变化；并非不断创造出“最优秀的”游戏便足够了。他们还必须投入更多精力进行市场分析，从而找到哪种类型的游戏还未能满足玩家的需求。如此，小型开发商便能够把握住其它巨头们所遗漏的优势：更加快速地对趋势做出反应。

专注于用户留存

小型开发商们可以通过专注于用户留存而获取优势——比起获取新用户，留住现有的用户更加轻松。要想留住用户，他们便需要提供更多高质量的游戏体验，并且这也涉及到游戏的用户粘性，即游戏机制是否能够吸引玩家反复回到游戏中，以及游戏的特定内容中存在着多少替代选择。

瞄准能够带来更高盈利的类型

小型开发商更应该专注于利用自己的用户。有效定位便是一大关键因素：并非所有游戏类型都能够带来同等的收益。例如，比起其它社交游戏类型，博彩类社交游戏能够带来更高的每用户平均收益（ARPU）。根据Morgan Stanley最新的报告，博彩游戏拥有9美元的ARPU，而其它社交游戏则只拥有5美元的ARPU。

（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，拒绝任何不保留版权的转载，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）

Is It Too Late for Smaller Developers on Facebook?

by Jay Aird

It’s no secret that the success of social gaming has led to a major influx of competition. While barriers to entry remain relatively low, the barriers to achieving success are a different story.

Today, Facebook game developers find themselves in an increasingly competitive environment dominated by a few major players. Production values have gone up, as have platform and acquisition costs. It’s a hits-based business where you need not just a great game to win, but also a deep understanding of how to use the Social Graph.

Given these challenges, is it too late for smaller developers to find success on Facebook? We don’t believe so. What we believe is developers targeting Facebook need to spend more time thinking about the business of games and be more strategic in how they choose to compete.

A good starting point is with a thorough analysis of the Facebook market. In this feature, we’ll provide a high level analysis of that market and explore techniques developers can use to quickly and efficiently determine where and how they can compete and come up winners.

What is happening in the market overall?

What’s happening within the overall Facebook environment? While many reports suggest social gaming has peaked, the absolute figures in terms of the player base indicate otherwise. Across all games on Facebook, there are currently 153 million daily active users (DAUs), a 28 percent increase over the past 12 months.

Growth genres versus declining genres

A valuable strategy developers can use to increase their opportunity for success is to focus on games in genres that are experiencing rapid consumer uptake or, alternatively, in genres that are under-represented. While Facebook games on the whole have gained users over the past year, the fortunes of different types of games have varied widely.

Simulation-type games (FarmVille-style), which once commanded an overwhelming majority of Facebook game players, have lost significant market share. The simulation game genre peaked in January 2011 with an aggregate 400,520,000 monthly active users (MAUs) and has fallen 34 percent since that peak to an aggregate 262,944,143 MAUs as of October 2012.

While still the largest genre in terms of monthly active users, simulation-type games peaked in January 2011 and are currently in decline. Growth on Facebook is now being led by genres such as gambling & casino, puzzle, and card & traditional. Click for larger version.

So how has the overall ecosystem grown in size while simulation genre games have fallen so sharply? The answer is the market is becoming more diverse, which is driving new growth. In particular, growth has been driven by puzzle-type games and gambling and casino-themed games. Together, these game genres reach over 50 million daily active users, an 86 percent increase over the past year. Notably, this figure now exceeds the 39 million daily active users across the once dominant simulation genre.

We can see the market is evolving from a simulation genre-dominated ecosystem to an increasingly diverse games market. This trend is being driven by the consumer’s demand for more diverse game experiences on Facebook, a positive for smaller, specialized developers looking for opportunities.

Analysis of sub-genres

Let’s dig deeper to further explore opportunities, for example, the gambling & casino genre. Our goal is to uncover opportunities where we believe we can compete and be successful. We now need to examine the underlying composition of our targeted genre to learn what types of games are most popular, where our competition is concentrated, and what game types are under-represented on the Facebook platform.

The gambling & casino genre is comprised of multiple sub-genres, including popular categories such as slots, casino, poker and bingo.

The category ‘Other’ includes hybrid game styles that draw inspiration from multiple gambling categories such as Slingo (Slots and Bingo).

We can see that poker is the largest sub-genre within gambling-themed games overall. With this understanding, we could look toward popular forms of gaming that might be currently under-represented on Facebook.

One example in the gambling & casino genre could be social betting apps. While gambling games like sports-betting are immensely popular in offline channels and traditional online gambling channels, this category has yet to truly take off on Facebook.

Data suggests the secret sauce for social betting apps has not yet been successfully cracked on Facebook. Cracking the code for how to make a successful social betting app could pay big dividends.

We know it’s massively popular elsewhere in the world, as the global online interactive betting market was valued at 10.67 billion euros in 2011. This figure is over twice that of interactive casino according to H2 Gambling Capital.

Market Concentration Ratios

At dystillr.com we look at competition within specific genres to gain insight into which areas of the Facebook ecosystem are most saturated and, more importantly, where exploitable opportunities may exist.

One analysis technique we can use to assess the competitive landscape is an assessment of market concentration levels. Market concentration reflects the degree of saturation within a specific market. The chart below provides an analysis of the market concentration for six popular game genres as an example, with higher points corresponding to more saturated markets. Simulation is the most saturated game genre, with a “very high” market concentration level. At the other end of the spectrum, adventure and strategy has a “low” market concentration level. The puzzle genre ranks fourth, with a “moderate” rating.

A genre with a lower market concentration ratio paired with high average user engagement, promising growth rates and/or demonstrated popularity off of Facebook could present a strong early indicator for an opportunity. Recognizing the emerging trend that social gamers and gambling shared a similar DNA paid off in a big way for companies like DoubleDown Interactive.

Competing with the “800lb gorillas”

One of the largest competitive advantages top developers such as Zynga have over smaller developers is their network effects; their ability to cross-promote new games to their existing base of players without cost. Their market position provides an unlevel playing field to market new games to players, which cannot easily be replicated.

The following chart provides insights into just how powerful the network effects for Zynga really are. While Zynga’s games are showing challenges in sustaining audiences at the same peak levels over time as attained previously, their ability to launch a title and gain traction within the critical first 30 days remains a formidable competitive advantage.

Engagement is calculated as daily active users divided by monthly active users with the resulting figure multiplied by 30 to provide an estimated monthly average.

Zynga’s enormous pre-existing audience provides them with network effects that give each game they produce a significant head start over the competition.

Given Facebook gaming requires a critical mass audience for profitability and the competitive advantage held by larger developers, how can smaller developers compete? To quote Harvard Business Professor and strategy guru Michael Porter, “the worst error in strategy is to compete with rivals on the same dimensions.”

To that end, a core activity of smaller studios should be to analyze their competition and look for areas to differentiate and create a unique position. By doing this we can gain a sense for their market strategy, their target audiences, what products are most successful for them and which products are most engaging to users.

This process should involve monitoring not just the most successful developers but also the up-and-comers in the space.

Understanding audience size benchmarks

Freemium is the dominant business model for Facebook games, which requires a critical mass audience to become economically viable. While it is easy to look towards the Top 10 game lists and get caught up in the sheer scale for the top performing games, this information is less relevant to smaller developers and new entrants. The following table outlines the monthly active users required by a game to make it into a respective benchmark as of October 2012:

As we can see, the numbers fall off quickly at lower benchmarks. We can also see the majority of games struggle for profitability. To break into the top 10 in games overall requires an audience of 15,700,000 MAUs (at time of writing), which demonstrates the difficulty of becoming an elite game on Facebook. What this information does give us is more useful inputs for financial models and more realistic expectations. It also can serve as a way for developers to benchmark their own progress against the majority.

Conclusion

Without question, Facebook is a fiercely competitive environment. Standing out, or for that matter, even getting discovered is no easy task. However, the trend towards an increasingly diverse games market is ultimately good for smaller developers, as it becomes harder for the top developers to maintain their position across a growing variety of game niches.

Nonetheless, small developers are at a distinct disadvantage to the big game development studios when it comes to a critical component of success on Facebook: user acquisition. Whereas Zynga can count on millions of instant users within days of releasing a title, small-time developers need to fight just to get a fraction of a percent of that. So, to succeed, smaller developers should focus on three core activities.

Monitor the market to spot trends

In order for smaller developers to take advantage of these changing market conditions, they need to keep their finger on the pulse of the market at all times; just making the “best” games often isn’t enough anymore. Rather, there’s a need to augment development efforts with market analysis to uncover what types of games have unmet demand. By doing this, smaller developers can take advantage of a key competitive advantage they have over larger players: their ability to move and react quickly to trends.

Concentrate on retention

Smaller developers can give themselves a leg up by concentrating on user retention — it’s easier to keep an existing user than to acquire a new one. Retaining users obviously requires delivering quality gaming experiences but it’s also a factor of stickiness — how much the game’s mechanics keep players coming back for more — as well as how many alternatives there are in the game’s particular niche.

Target genres that monetize at higher rates

Smaller developers need to concentrate on making the most of their audience. Positioning is one critical component of this: not all genres of games are created equal. For instance, gambling and casino themed social games drive significantly higher average revenue per user (ARPU) than many other types of social games. According to a recent report by Morgan Stanley, gambling and casino type games have an ARPU of around $9 per user compared to $5 across all social games.(source:gamasutra)