In-game Advertising: Helping Enterprises to Reach their Audiences with Entertainment

Home quarantine during the COvid-19 pandemic period would not have been the same without numerous mobile games, such as Fruit Ninja, Candy Crush, or Rummy Pride. People have started spending most of their leisure period during the pandemic on their smartphones, tablets, or computers, regardless of age, gender, nationality, or education. This has uplifted the massive growth of the app economy for the older as well as the new gamers. The rate of installing mobile games has been tremendously increasing among individuals over the past few years. Not only provides the biggest form of entertainment, but mobile gaming also allows users to earn some exciting rewards. This rising popularity of mobile gaming provides enormous opportunities for advertisers and game developers to increase revenue growth through the in-game advertising (IGA) model.

In-game advertising (IGA) is a monetization strategy that game developers mostly use to boost their game’s revenue. The most popular types of in-game advertising are dynamic ads, static ads, and advergames. These advertisements are implemented in console games or mobile games in different formats including pop-up messages, billboards, cut-scenes, background displays, rewarded video ads, and many more. Game developers use this model of in-game advertising to increase their revenue. Nowadays, many large-scale global brands and advertisers are working together with video game companies to focus on advergaming. This concept of promoting ads includes advertising products within a given game. It has already existed in LEGO-produced games such as Harry Potter, Lord of Rings, marvel, and many more.

What are the Popular Formats of In-game Advertising?

Generally, advertisers choose formats that will bring great value to their target audience as well as boost their engagement. Some of the commonly used formats of in-game advertising are listed below:

• Display banners
• Playable ads
• Interstitial ads
• Offerwall
• Rewarded ads and rewarded video ads
• Cross promotional ads
• Coupon ads

What are the Exclusive Benefits of In-game Advertising?

Presently, the in-game advertising market is rapidly growing at a breakneck pace. Many industries have already started experiencing growth in their revenues by implementing in-game advertising effectively. In-game advertising helps businesses to make better communication and innovatively engage their target audience. Out of a wide spectrum of benefits of in-game advertising, some are listed below:

• Increase in App-Purchases: In-game advertising allures players by rewarding in-game currency. This enhances the interaction of users with ads and increases the value of in-app purchases. The rewarding technique is the small step that develops the likelihood among players to spend money to get in-game benefits.
   
• Increased Revenue: By signing contracts with an ad agency to promote high-quality ads in the latest video games, help organizations to increase their revenue base significantly. With in-game advertising, the companies or enterprises managed to keep the gaming platforms to be used freely and extract additional profit.
   
• Engage Players to Play More: In-game advertising models provide a better user experience to players with an effective rewarding system. By offering high-value rewards to the players, in-game advertising keeps them engaged for a longer time and fascinates them to come back and continue playing the game more often.
   
• Help to Reach New Audience: Nowadays, game developers use in-game advertising as an effective and diversified channel for adopting mobile games among individuals which attract every age group. Previously, mostly boys used to play video games, however, in this era of the internet, user-friendly gaming interfaces, and most importantly the rewarding system attracts people of all age groups to play mobile games. According to recent studies, nowadays, educational games, many simple yet interesting mobile-based games like Ludo King, and Candy Crush, attracts a young audience, and two-thirds of all internet users cover people aged more than 50.

The Future Landscape of the In-game Advertising Market

With the increasing number of smartphone users and gamers, the global in-game advertising market is expected to witness prominent growth in the forthcoming years. The market is anticipated to generate a revenue of $17,591.6 million and grow at a noteworthy CAGR of 11.0% during the 2022-2030 timeframe. However, the inability of devices to support some games may impede the growth of the market in the upcoming years.

Key Message Take Away

Currently, with the growing usage of the internet, where almost every individual holds a smartphone, the in-game advertising market is expected to thrive in the near future, by reaching a diverse audience that they were unable to reach through traditional advertising channels. Moreover, the emerging trend of online gaming is one of the vital factors that is expected to drive the growth of the market in the approaching years.

About the Author(s)

Princy A. J

Princy holds a bachelor’s degree in Civil Engineering from the prestigious Tamil Nadu Dr. M.G.R. University at Chennai, India. After a successful academic record, she pursued her passion for writing. A thorough professional and enthusiastic writer, she enjoys writing on various categories and advancements in the global industries. She plays an instrumental role in writing about current updates, news, blogs, and trends.