metrics for social games
david king siqi chen
green patch serious business

metrics are a force multiplier
but you need to have something to multiply!
can’t replace a good product
can’t replace creativity, art, design
can’t replace qualitative metrics
(user sentiment, net promoter score, etc)

the business of social games

(life time value - user acquisition cost) X scale = profit*
* these variables are not independent

user acquisition costs
virality, retention, cross promotion, marketing etc
life time value
retention, quality, flow, mechanics, theme, payments, etc

3 ‘A’s of metrics
actionable, accessible, auditable

actionable
build a framework for experimentation, not vanity
emphasis on split testing and actionable insights

accessible
on demand experimentation capabilities
timely, transparent and accessible reporting
separate metrics infrastructure as much as possible

auditable
sanity check against other data sources:
db, google analytics, facebook

why companies are metrics focused
simple math: linear improvements yield non-linear results

k = (infection rate) * (conversion rate)
[summed across all channels]

Visit
Product quality
New user experience Activation Revenue
Social proof (friends)
Key Metric: activation rate
the “viral loop”
Infection
Invite flows Conversion
Retention Copy writing
Call to actions Persuasion psychology
Game mechanics Demographic targeting
Self expresssion
Allocation tuning Key Metric: click through rate
Key Metric: infection rate

virality discounts user acquisition costs
(potentially, down to $0)

user acquisition:
user acquisition cost:
user acquisition cost discount:

infection rate
viral flows, calls to action, product quality, game mechanics, allocation tuning
conversion rate
copy writing, persuasion mechanics/psychology, demographic targeting
viral channels
requests, notifications, feed forms, email, profile box, share link, email, app tab, etc.

brief overview of facebook rpgs

metrics can help with game flow
this affects retention, virality, and everything else

metrics can help with revenue
gain actionable insights on virtual goods behavior

that’s it. questions?