Using The Freemium Model To Sell an Enhanced Experience is Key

Wednesday, May 7, 2014

Is the app industry better or worse off with the dominance of the freemium model? It probably depends on who you ask the question. Regardless, the freemium model is here to stay, at least until someone figures out a better system.

So maybe the better question is: What is the best way to provide an excellent experience for both app users and app developers/publishers utilizing the freemium model? In the most basic terms, it is a situation where app users get a positive experience while using the app and developers get rewarded for providing an app that people enjoy.

As Niklas Herriger of Gondola recently pointed out in a blog post, “if a game’s virtual economy is almost exclusively used to make money (as opposed to generate depth and fun), chances are high that this will be noticed by its players fairly quickly.” Of course this means that users will quit playing the game and move on, a negative situation for everyone involved.

So with the freemium model, how do you balance the need for users to enjoy an app and for developers to monetize their efforts? Herriger provides a number of tips in the gaming realm of “examples of carefully crafted freemium games that enrich all of our lives with awesome playing experiences that are truly free to play.”

He points to key elements that game developers can utilize to optimize the fermium model including “selling an enhanced experience.” To learn more check out the blog post here.

Herriger is the Founder & CEO of Gondola, which specializes in analytics for game economies. The company helps developers analyze the relationship between pricing, gameplay, and revenue, allowing developers to modify games in real time.