October 31, 2013 at 10:05Business lunch at Tanki Online, or a few words about bundles
There was a lunch break. You go to the nearest restaurant and order yourself a business lunch: salad, soup, hot and necessarily compote. You return to work, finish the working day and go to the gym, of course, you have an annual subscription, because it is more profitable than a monthly one. Wholesale is always cheaper. In this article we want to talk about how we use the mechanics of sets (bundles) in the game “Tanks Online”: which KPI we focus on, what principles we follow and with what difficulties we encountered.
Bundles are a very good thing from any point of view. I remember, in my first place of work, I preferred to always take lunch with me. It’s more profitable, and my mother’s cuisine is the most delicious and healthy in the world. The situation changed when my colleagues suggested that I go for a business lunch. For two hundred rubles I ate plenty of small portions of different dishes. Soon he abandoned his mother’s kitchen and began to eat only business lunches. “It’s more profitable,” I concluded again. In the language of the game dev, I turned into a donor. The first advantage of bundles is increased conversion to a paying user. A few years later, my bundle also became my first purchase on Steam.
Speaking of Steam. Have you ever bought bundles on Steam? But were all the games from these sets then played? That's it! For example, I never listened to the soundtracks from the games that Steam shoves into their bundles with stubborn frequency. And the addition I install only one of the three purchased. The bundle is good for the seller in that it allows you to increase sales of goods with low demand. The second advantage of bundles is the discharge of illiquid assets. And the effect here is both one-time - in fact, increased sales, and constant - demand creates demand. Often, after the bundle expires, a product that was previously illiquid is untwisted and begins to be in demand, primarily due to virality. I think the creators of the Humble Bundle pursue these goals as well.
I can’t say for catering, but everyone knows that the elasticity of demand for prices in game devs just rolls over, and even a well-presented ten percent discount can increase sales by at least double. The third advantage of bundles is an increase in revenue. Steam with its discount policy here looks like a king - new attractive offers appear weekly. It is very important to show the whole kitchen. Look: the bundle consists of five games, and if you bought them separately, you would spend X rubles, but in the bundle they cost X / 2, and we will give you a soundtrack from the game and a card. And you’re running to buy, even though you already have two of these five games - after all, it’s still profitable for you.
A bundle is a new item in a store, new content. Players really love the new content. Do not believe it - try adding one new trinket to the store of your game, for example, Malevich’s Black Square, which raises hp by exactly 0 points. Demand for it will pleasantly surprise. At the same time, the bundle is not a new gun, which must be balanced for a long time and painfully. This is only welding from existing parts. Bundles are very easy to implement and always justify their already low production costs.
Plus think about users. Having made one purchase, no matter how much it costs, they get a bunch of different and colorful toys, which makes their life brighter and more diverse. Ultimately, the main thing is that the players were fun. After all, we make our games so that the player is happy, right?Bundles are user friendly.
A few captain principles of bundle formation:
And now about how we made bundles (in our case, sets) in Tanki Online.
We decided that the kit should be primarily user-friendly. Having bought it, the user receives a finished tank, while with a regular purchase, the hull, gun and paint are purchased separately. The kit contains everything you need: a gun, a body, paints with resistes, as well as several dozen sets of consumables. When sorting objects, we were not guided by any strict algorithms; instead, we manually selected the details one to one, trying to keep a balance between the price of goods, their popularity and just playability. For example, several paints with low demand were added to super-popular cannons and hulls, while choosing those paints that will work well and look good on the tank.
The first time we released bundles in April 2013. The goal was only to increase the conversion to donat, and therefore the kits were designed only for the initial ranks. The kits justified themselves, but only gave a temporary effect, raising the DAPU by about 3% for one month. Then the euphoria subsided, and the effect of entering the sets “spread out” throughout the game content.
The experiment was considered successful, and we decided to repeat the success. At the end of September 2013, new sets appeared in the game, this time for all ranks. The effect worked very well - the daily number of payers increased by 20%, without losing the average income per payer.
A little over a month has passed since the release of the sets, and the effect does not think to decline. Therefore, we decided to go further and arrange the release of new sets on a regular basis.
Well, now, lunch break. Bon Appetit everyone!
Bundles are a very good thing from any point of view. I remember, in my first place of work, I preferred to always take lunch with me. It’s more profitable, and my mother’s cuisine is the most delicious and healthy in the world. The situation changed when my colleagues suggested that I go for a business lunch. For two hundred rubles I ate plenty of small portions of different dishes. Soon he abandoned his mother’s kitchen and began to eat only business lunches. “It’s more profitable,” I concluded again. In the language of the game dev, I turned into a donor. The first advantage of bundles is increased conversion to a paying user. A few years later, my bundle also became my first purchase on Steam.
Speaking of Steam. Have you ever bought bundles on Steam? But were all the games from these sets then played? That's it! For example, I never listened to the soundtracks from the games that Steam shoves into their bundles with stubborn frequency. And the addition I install only one of the three purchased. The bundle is good for the seller in that it allows you to increase sales of goods with low demand. The second advantage of bundles is the discharge of illiquid assets. And the effect here is both one-time - in fact, increased sales, and constant - demand creates demand. Often, after the bundle expires, a product that was previously illiquid is untwisted and begins to be in demand, primarily due to virality. I think the creators of the Humble Bundle pursue these goals as well.
I can’t say for catering, but everyone knows that the elasticity of demand for prices in game devs just rolls over, and even a well-presented ten percent discount can increase sales by at least double. The third advantage of bundles is an increase in revenue. Steam with its discount policy here looks like a king - new attractive offers appear weekly. It is very important to show the whole kitchen. Look: the bundle consists of five games, and if you bought them separately, you would spend X rubles, but in the bundle they cost X / 2, and we will give you a soundtrack from the game and a card. And you’re running to buy, even though you already have two of these five games - after all, it’s still profitable for you.
A bundle is a new item in a store, new content. Players really love the new content. Do not believe it - try adding one new trinket to the store of your game, for example, Malevich’s Black Square, which raises hp by exactly 0 points. Demand for it will pleasantly surprise. At the same time, the bundle is not a new gun, which must be balanced for a long time and painfully. This is only welding from existing parts. Bundles are very easy to implement and always justify their already low production costs.
Plus think about users. Having made one purchase, no matter how much it costs, they get a bunch of different and colorful toys, which makes their life brighter and more diverse. Ultimately, the main thing is that the players were fun. After all, we make our games so that the player is happy, right?Bundles are user friendly.
A few captain principles of bundle formation:
- a bundle should be cheaper than all its components separately;
- a bundle should not be cheaper than its most expensive item;
- the bundle must be evenly assembled, it should not contain objects that differ greatly in price in one direction or another;
- the bundle should be useful to the user, its components should not contradict each other (no substitute goods, but complementary goods);
- bundle pricing principles should be shown to the user as transparently as possible;
- do not be greedy - the bundle should be cool, and everything else - idle reasoning.
And now about how we made bundles (in our case, sets) in Tanki Online.
We decided that the kit should be primarily user-friendly. Having bought it, the user receives a finished tank, while with a regular purchase, the hull, gun and paint are purchased separately. The kit contains everything you need: a gun, a body, paints with resistes, as well as several dozen sets of consumables. When sorting objects, we were not guided by any strict algorithms; instead, we manually selected the details one to one, trying to keep a balance between the price of goods, their popularity and just playability. For example, several paints with low demand were added to super-popular cannons and hulls, while choosing those paints that will work well and look good on the tank.
The first time we released bundles in April 2013. The goal was only to increase the conversion to donat, and therefore the kits were designed only for the initial ranks. The kits justified themselves, but only gave a temporary effect, raising the DAPU by about 3% for one month. Then the euphoria subsided, and the effect of entering the sets “spread out” throughout the game content.
The experiment was considered successful, and we decided to repeat the success. At the end of September 2013, new sets appeared in the game, this time for all ranks. The effect worked very well - the daily number of payers increased by 20%, without losing the average income per payer.
A little over a month has passed since the release of the sets, and the effect does not think to decline. Therefore, we decided to go further and arrange the release of new sets on a regular basis.
Well, now, lunch break. Bon Appetit everyone!