Consumer Segmentation and Attribution (Top of the Funnel)

Analytics is a term used to describe many different things from reporting to predictive marketing, but the foundation of analytics, as one would expect, is data.  Without data, one cannot do any reporting or any predictive modeling.

Whenever I join a new group, they always say they have lots of data, but in reality, they have lots of random information that is not usable.  One of the keys to having usable data is to have a strong data base or business information team.  In the gaming industry, this is sometimes overlooked.  It is also important to work with the database team and the development teams to understand what key data is important to track. 

In this write-up, I am going to focus on the top of the funnel and what data is important to track and why.

One of the most important things to track for any game, specifically online games, is the top of the funnel.  Zynga's analytics primarly focus on this.  The general steps of the funnel that need to be tracked is as follows:

1. Consumer Attribution (What drove the consumer to your game?)
2. Registration Process (Web Funnel)
3. Installation Process (Downloading / Installing Game)
4. Game Execution Process (Playing the Game)

Consumer Segmentation and Attribution
One of the key things that needs to be done to verify the success of your marketing is consumer attribution and segmentation.  You need to be able to track or attribute where your consumers came from.  For example, what google search terms did they use, what banner ads did they click, what store did they purchase that package from, what TV ad drove them to purchase, etc?   There are many tricks to doing this but it is very important to find an advertising partner who can track this for you or implement tags that allows you to do this.  TV is very different because you will need to exclude organic acquisition versus ones driven by TV.  Normally, you need to first find a baseline then see the lift due to TV.   Every account will need to be tagged.  
Once you know what drove a consumer to your site, you should also try to find out the segment this consumer is.  Segmentation takes many forms, but the most basic segmentation is gender, location, income, race, and game experience.  You can get this information from either the registration process or surveys, but one must balance the possibility of losing a consumer for every question you ask in the registration process.  The more advanced from of segmentation is game usage, play patterns, social networks, and others based on in-game behavior.
Once you can track consumer segmentation and attribution, you can now maximize your advertising mix by now what marketing channels are the most effective in getting the type of consumers you want.  For example, maybe players who are pvpers are the best consumers and based on your attribution data you can see that a specific banner add is the most effective in attracting these users.  You can now try to search for more ways to find that consumer segment and use marketing material similar to the banner ad that was effective in drawing these consumers.

Registration Process
The registration funnel needs to be tracked click by click to see where there are any large drop offs.  Any large drop offs need to be addressed.  For games that have millions of players signing up, a 1% drop-off can be very significant especially if it is a game that has a short life such as a facebook game.
Please keep in mind proper web development protocols such as testing the webpage on all browers and operating systems, having a very linear registration process, showing a type of progress bar, and ensure that every link works before going live.  Ironically, there are many examples of webpages where one or more of these steps are overlooked.

Installation Process
One of the key drop off points that companies sometimes have a problem tracking or forget to track, is the installation process.
The installation process needs to include the following steps:

1. Link to Download App/Client
2. Download Starts
3. Download Completes
4. App/Client Installation Starts
5. App/Client Installation Steps (if applicable)
6. App/Client Installation Completes
7. App/Client Executes

Unless you track each one, you will not know if or where your issues may come from.

Game Execution Process
Once the game is installed and working, you still need to track the player experience step by step. Please keep in mind the following steps (remember it is different based on the game):

1. Opening Cinematic
2. Character Creation Steps (each step must be tracked)
3. Start Tutorial
4. Each Step of Tutorial
5. Complete Tutorial
6. Enter Game World
7. Achieve First Level

Once a player is able to complete those initial steps and reach the first level that means the game should be functioning fine.  Any drop-off before this needs to be examined to see if there are any technical issues, usability issues, or just design issues.

Once you are able to track the consumer from its source to being able to play the game, you can now maximize the effectiveness of the top of your funnel.  Make sure you are getting the right consumers and that players are not dropping off because of issues that can be easily fixed.  Consumers should be able to easily access your game. 

If you blend this with the bottom of the funnel, you can now see how well each consumer monetizes and estimate their lifetime value.  Combing both you can now calculate a correct ROI for each marketing channel and each consumer segment.  If the top of the funnel is clean and easily tracked, you can then maximize the ROI of your game.  Even if the game will not cover the development costs, you can learn from the data you collect and hopefully make the run rate of the game profitable.