It is a very common trend in the industry to offer some sort of starter pack within your app to entice new users to purchase premium currency. Throughout this post we want to discuss what a starter sale package is and the benefits of offering such a feature.
What is a Starter Sale Package?
A starter sale package is a special offer that targets users who have never paid before, or users who haven't paid in a very long time. This package is usually provided at a discounted rate compared to normal packages for purchase within the app or game.
The primary purpose of offering starter package at a discounted rate is to make it easier to convert free users into paid users. You want to provide a premium experience to your free users so that they can see the benefits of being in the VIP or Paid user club.
There are several other ancillary benefits of offering a starter sale package. For example, it helps boost your revenue stream as you are converting more free users into paid users. It can help to boost your long term player retention as these users who purchase should get more engaged in your game and stick around for longer.
When to offer a Starter Sale Package?
In order for a starter sale package to be successful, you need to present it to the user at the most opportune time. For example, you would not want to necessarily offer it to users as the first thing they see in the game. If the user has not had a chance to play the game and enjoy it's basic mechanics, they will have no interest in paying for a premium experience. You also don't want to provide the discounted package too early as some users will convert into payers on their own, without the aid of an incentivized offer.
During your new player journey, your game will/should introduce several gates to the gameplay that make certain levels, rooms or experiences more and more challenging. A game that is too easy looses users too quickly. During these early gates is one potentially great location to introduce a player to a starter sale package. You are providing the discounted offer at a time when the user needs the benefits the most and thus you increase your odds of converting users.
Another strategy is to target the offer when you begin seeing player drop off. Maybe you start to loose players after they have been playing for about 45 days. If you begin offering the starter sale discounts and packages around day 30, then players will get more value out of the game at that point. Their interest/engagement in your app will increase and potentially push out that drop off point beyond 45 days.
Whatever strategy you employ, just be sure not to provide it too early in the gameplay. When evaluating whether or not it is too early in the gameplay, consider these two criteria:
- Has enough time elapsed in game for users to see the value of the premium currency offered.
- Has enough time elapsed in game to account for players who will naturally convert to payers.
Both of these items can be answered by plotting on a graph the days that elapse since installing the game and a purchase is first made. You can call this "Days to First Purchase". The first item above can be answered by determining when the "Days to First Purchase" graph sees a general upswing. The second item above can be answered by determining when the "Days to First Purchase" graph sees a trailing off. An example is below.
This graph and data are a hypothetical example, but it helps to illustrate a key point. There is distinct amount of time that a user needs to play before being convinced to make their first purchase. This is the upward trend. Most users wait until approx. week 2 of their game play to make their first purchase. By contrast, if a user hasn't converted to a payer by week 3, then they are not as likely to ever convert.
It would be a bad move on our part to offer an aggressive starter pack during weeks 1 or 2. During the first week, the user has not had enough time to really get engaged in the game and might not see the value of the purchase - even if it is heavily discounted. During the second week, an enticing offer might actually hurt your normal revenue trends as you will capture a lot of players who were going to convert anyhow. It might look like your start pack is a success, but what you are really doing is canabalizing on higher revenues you could have earned.
The optional time to start offering a discount sale package would be anytime after week 2 has ended. This is when your payer conversion begins to drop and the addition of a purchase sweetener or special deal may have greater impact.
Of course keep in mind that this is example data and you should analyze the conversion trends that your specific app or game is seeing.
What kind of discount should be offered?
The type of discount should be enticing. These are players who already have had the opportunity to pay and choose not to. That means that they don't see the value of paying at the current prices. You can approach this by either adding more value to a purchase, known as a purchase sweetener or by changing the price point so that the existing package is more appealing.
Many apps and games take the approach of offering special content or bigger than normal amounts of content to make that first purchase seen very special. This is a good approach. Offering samplings of different premium currencies and items can help the newly converted user progress in different features across the game. If you do take this approach, just make sure that offering is not spread so widely that the individual items offered don't carry much value. If your app has a substantial quantity of unique types of premium currency, it will be more effective to focus in on 2-3 premium item types and give the user good value, versus giving the 6-7 different currency types but each has a lower value.
Other apps take the approach of trying to offer the lowest price point possible, say $0.99 or something to that extent. Keep in mind that at this low of a price point it can often be difficult to offer the right value to convert the user. An offer at $5 may actually look more enticing / valuable to the user than the offer at $1. From a user perspective it is often just as hard to break out their wallet to pay for $1 as it is to pay for $2, $3 or $5. Sometimes giving more value in a $5 package will convert more users.
In the end, experiment with different starter package offerings and pay attention to which provides the highest conversion of free users to paid users.
