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How to Supersize Your Hypercasual Game Retention

August 01, 2023

High demand and high download numbers (representing 30 percent of all gaming downloads in 2022). We’re still eyeing up hypercasual games as a genre to watch. But despite this considerable footprint in the market, many hypercasual publishers also have an eye on their analytics, as their titles fight with low retention and engagement metrics.

Poor hypercasual game retention doesn’t need to be a cause for concern – but a cause for creativity. Rewarded ad units, such as adjoe’s rewarded ad unit Advance, have ensured hypercasual advertisers can build depth and engagement into their titles. Here’s how.

How adjoe Advance Helps Hypercasual Game Retention

adjoe Advance is a level-based rewarded ad unit that creates a continuous engagement loop between instant gameplay and instant gratification. Unlike any other channel, the rewarded ad unit continuously rewards users in a publisher’s in-app currency based on the number of levels they complete in a hypercasual game. This inevitably drives users to play for longer and more often.

Product Lead Evgeny Bagaryakov at adjoe explains why the market needs Advance: “As we studied the gameplay of different verticals and the needs of advertisers, we became aware of the challenges hypercasual games pose. This vertical needed a custom rewards logic to match the rapid engagement of users. We launched Advance to solve this problem.”

adjoe’s Director of Growth, Carly Ostasiewski, broke down exactly what the new rewarded ad format means for advertisers at a Hyper Games Conference. And we’ll break it down for you even further.

1. Less Competition to Acquire Valuable Users

We know it’s a seriously saturated mobile gaming market out there. This is likely why this 2023 gaming report talks about fewer new releases on average in the hypercasual games segment.

More and more advertisers need a unique and effective UA solution designed specifically for this specific market. adjoe Advance caters especially to hypercasual game advertisers and only to adjoe’s demand partners in what we call an exclusive ecosystem. This means advertisers will not compete for inventory in any waterfalls.

Hypercasual advertisers benefit from adjoe’s very own wide-reaching SDK network by acquiring users without competition from typically high-CPI-bidding games, such as strategy or social casino games. UA experts at adjoe can tell advertisers which CPI will help them achieve what kind of scale to ensure they can market their hypercasual title extremely effectively. And with CPI bids lower in Advance than they would be in other channels, advertisers can put meatier UA budgets toward other campaigns.

2. More Sessions and Levels or Actions Completed

What’s more rewarding than receiving rewards after completing levels in a highly enjoyable game?

To combat low retention and engagement, adjoe Advance capitalizes on the popular and snappy mechanics of hypercasual games with its unparalleled rewards-based model adjoe Advance. When acquiring new premium-quality users at scale from Advance – a nonconventional traffic source – some advertisers have been able to keep their users hyperengaged for up to 25 percent longer on Day 1.

four phones showing user flow of adjoe Advance to improve hypercasual game retention

All of this means advertisers benefit from quantity and quality when using Advance: It drives users to the app more frequently and for longer. You have a UA solution that:

boosts your users’ session time
increases the number of levels users complete
increases ad consumption and ad revenue

3. Better Retention and LTV

Let’s come back to Advance’s reward loop and its ability to boost hypercasual game retention. With its instant gratification model, hypercasual players return to play more often and are driven further and further into the game.

Pairing up with various hypercasual advertisers, such as TapNation, Lion Studios, and Green Panda Games, Advance has demonstrated up to 15-to-20-percent higher lifetime value than with other channels. This is simply through connecting advertiser and publisher in a fun and frictionless way.

“adjoe has a better evolution than other partners; you start from a good quality, and the user can play as much as they want to earn currency. It’s more user-friendly because players always get rewards compared with other channels. It’s like a win–win.” – Thomas Létoublon, Green Panda Games

young couple sat down inside looking at phone with benefits of adjoe Advance placed in boxes around them talking about hypercasual game retention

Outperform with Better Hypercasual Game Retention

When engagement is falling, it’s time to reinvent the wheel, experiment, and diversify. We expect more hypercasual games to evolve by blending their mechanics to bring in higher engagement metrics from their users.

But the most successful hypercasual games also leverage the right marketing channels that supply them with engaged users. Whether it’s your new or legacy hypercasual titles that are stagnating, adjoe Advance offers a new channel. One that promises a market of untapped high-quality users and an exclusive network that’s already partnered with hundreds of global apps.