In the past few years, Facebook had became the part of our life. When the first I invited into Facebook by my friend, Facebook is not yet popular and my friends is only a few. So, when i check my Facebook I'm easily to get bored because there's nothing to do. Then suddenly, there was a game created by Zynga which called Mafia Wars and then I tried to play it (until now by the way). Then, when I logged in into Facebook, I always played the game. The game is simple but it became very addictive to me.
Zynga as the leader of the social network gaming that based on application widgets on Facebook. Some of the gam
e that Zynga already launched like FrontierVille, YoVille, CityVille and many others. When the first they launched, they only launched only a few games, but now they already made many games and create a big fortune. They make a fortune from two ways: direct payment via credit cards and partner business. Generally speaking, the player in Zynga needs some energy to play the games and if those energy are drained out, the player can buy some energy from Zynga itself or purchase any game cards. This is the picture of the game cards:
In 2010, Zynga announced that their revenue is above $500 million. This is a huge growth for a game based on Facebook. This means that everything can be made and promoted via Facebook. Zynga is one of many examples of successful developer that had made an agreement with Facebook and gaining a lot of revenue. The question is, is this still gonna be popular in a few more years? Because people are tend to be bored by these game. Do you think it's growth will be increased or decreased? As one of the people that still playing the game, I predicted it will decreased in the growth of games based on Facebook. What do you think?
As if facebook isn't 'sticky' enough without the games! It's amazing to know that Zynga is raising that kind of revenue. They seem very much a fad to me, but got to admit I don't play them. 'The Social Media Bible' (Safko, 2010) categorizes Gaming as one of 15 social media marketing tactics.
ReplyDeletewow really.. i need to read the social media bible.. do u know where i can find it? lol
ReplyDeleteHaha - Hubba lives by the SM Bible!
ReplyDeleteGaming is a fascinating aspect of SM. Should it be reserved purely for organisations in the entertainment industry, or can mainstream marketers use games to engage their customers and build stronger brand equity?
I think if the developer of the game can use their brand image to create a stronger brand equity as well because gaming is becoming a part of our life
ReplyDeleteWhy don't you (@Hubba) record a video like this one (http://vimeo.com/19151214) of you talking about the benefits of reading that fantastic and complete book? I heard that you can post that in the author's website (www.thesocialmediabible.com)
ReplyDeleteMany people become addictive to Zynga games. I know some people dropped out from uni just because they were addict to play online games and skip classes. Just be careful not to become too addictive yah chris ;)
ReplyDeleteI'm not a big gamer, but have on the odd occasion played some Zynga poker. As Hubba, I had no idea that you would be looking at that kind of revenue. As more and more social media platforms start up, I would imagine that if Zynga sticks to purely facebook, they may find themselves in a bit of trouble, unless off course they expand to other SM platforms.
ReplyDeleteRoss
@ farissa: I'm trying not to feel addicted to Zynga games. Thx for the advice Farissa!
ReplyDelete@ ross: actually they already expand to other platform but i think the other one isn't profitable as Facebook