Gaming Moves From Casual to Social

The audience for casual games appears to have bought, well, the farm.

Traditional gaming sites are bleeding users, as millions of Web gamers shift their time to social games, such as the massively popular FarmVille. That, coupled with an increasing desire among advertisers to move beyond old-school banner ads, has put the advertising market for online gaming very much in play, said analysts and buyers.

According to Nielsen Online, Yahoo Games has seen its audience plummet by 30 percent to 9.9 million unique users in January, versus 14 million users a year ago. Similarly, long-standing gaming destinations Pogo and AOL Games have each experienced 16 percent audience drops over the same time period. MSN Games is down to 5.3 million unique users; four years ago it exceeded 8.4 million uniques.

This slippage is being driven by Facebook users' devotion to FarmVille, Mafia Wars, Dragon Wars -- all from social gaming pioneer Zynga -- and others such as RockYou's Zoo World. Per research firm AppData, over 80 million alone have played FarmVille.

"For many people, Facebook is their home base," said comScore analyst Andrew Lipsman. "It makes sense that other online utilities and functions move there."

Plus, games are more fun when you play with your friends. "We are seeing a seismic shift happening in the quality of game play, the competitive nature that comes through the social graph," said Chris Cunningham, CEO of Appssavvy, which sells for Zynga. Zynga declined to comment for this story.

Competing for high scores on gaming sites in relative isolation suddenly seems bland, added David Madden, evp, sales, marketing and business development for the gaming distributor and seller WildTangent. "Portals don't evolve very quickly and what they are offering gamers is stale," he said. "Gamers are a communicative bunch and they go where the excitement is."

That viral nature also provides a major business advantage. "Customer acquisition costs are so low for social games," explained Bart Barden, director of online marketing for game developer PopCap. "Yahoo has to buy ads to acquire users."


Traditional gaming sites "have to figure out how to compete by getting more social," said Dana Jongewaard, IGN's executive editor of expanded audiences, who noted that some have incorporated Facebook Connect to facilitate more viral game play. Yahoo is not about to start building its own social games, but is looking to partner with developers as it tries to stem audience declines, said Yahoo Media head Jimmy Pitaro: "We're actively engaged in socializing our sites."

Starting last fall, Games.com -- then AOL Games -- started producing more editorial on social games, rather than simply hosting games. "Instead of being afraid, we've really embraced them," said editor Libe Goad, who acknowledged that advertising had taken a hit over the past year.

Casual gaming sites have been a fit for packaged-goods and auto clients. They reach a large female audience and offer natural game breaks that suit banner and video ads. Zynga's games, however, don't have standard ad units. That's appealing in today's market. "We are treating social games in a different way," said Shana Kohen, account group supervisor at Horizon Media. "Overall we're trying as much as possible to get out of banner advertising. And through social there is more ... we can achieve."

Heidi Browning, evp, global digital officer at UM, agreed. But her team isn't yanking all of its dollars off casual gaming sites yet. "Casual games are still a huge audience," she said. "But we are trying to create new and unusual programs, and you can't really get that on those sites."

See also:

"Game on for Brands" [1]

"Multiplayer Marketing" [2]

"Women Clicking for Virtual Dollars" [3]