Specialist
VP at Tripledot Studios Ltd
Agenda
- Operating environment for Zynga (NASDAQ: ZNGA), Applovin (NASDAQ: APP) and others – IDFA (Identifier For Advertisers) impact on user growth, CAC (customer acquisition cost) and revenue growth trajectories
- Value propositions of key marketing channels pre- and post-IDFA changes
- Mitigation efforts – Zynga's Adjust and Chartboost acquisitions and contextual advertising efforts
- Outlook for Q4 2021 and beyond – industry winners, losers and potential wildcards
Questions
1.
Can you outline the changes that came with iOS 14 and 15 and how they impacted the data that advertisers such as yourself have access to? What data has been lost and what still remains?
2.
For those that opt in to tracking, is it basically just a free-for-all as it has been historically where the ability as an advertiser to follow all the way through the funnel is exactly the same or are there restrictions now even if you do opt in?
3.
It seems that some workarounds that have been discussed are statistically oriented around lookalike audiences in the form of fingerprinting, or now being called probabilistic attribution. Is there any nuance between the two methods? Is probabilistic attribution different from fingerprinting? Do you think they both still go against Apple’s new terms and conditions?
4.
Is there much difference in the lifetime value of the typical gamer pre-IDFA [Identifier For Advertisers] vs 2020 vs 2021 or is the lifetime value not being impacted given that there’s a lot of parity as to what probabilistic attribution brings you in terms of capabilities to monetise those users?
5.
What do you think about iOS 14 impacting the ability to acquire new users into an app in the first place? How significantly are CPIs [costs per install] increasing? What does that do to the CAC [customer acquisition cost] equation per gamer for new customers?
6.
You mentioned there might be some lifetime value inflation aside from iOS 14. Can you elaborate on factors such as internal A/B testing and subsequent liveops efforts that may offset some headwinds by driving a better payer conversion, driving longer lifetime value and converting more DAUs to MAUs? What live service elements can allow you to monetise gamers better than average despite the headwinds with IDFA?
7.
Is it all that frequent that overlap of gamers across game portfolio actually exists for an operator or studio? Is there much efficacy in cross-promoting to probabilistic attribution across just one app when we think about being more of a niche and a one-trick-pony mobile gamer where presumably the overlap’s actually 100% vs a company where genres it has are very disparate and so it’s a different type of gamer that plays each game within the overall portfolio? Which portfolio setup has the best opportunity to take advantage of cross-promotion?
8.
When you think of a Playtika-style one-trick-pony type of company where there is a meaningful overlap across the game portfolio, what potential does cross-promotion have for improving the 30-day retention curve? Are you talking about north of half the users retaining on a monthly basis given some success there or is it still going to be fairly muted given the inherent churn profiles of mobile gamers?
9.
It seems that pre-IDFA the top three marketing channels external ad network-wise were Facebook, Google and Unity. Do you resonate with that or are there any other platforms to call out as the top players that mobile gamers are spending their ad dollars on? How might that shift post-IDFA, if at all? Do these three still remain on top in your opinion?
10.
Are there any negative impacts for Unity, Chartboost and Vungle in instances where they’re not really charging on a CPM basis but are compensated based on customer acquisition and downloads? How do instances where ad placements go dark and CAC goes up impact revenues for these companies? Are a lot of those headwinds passed on to marketers and publishers?
11.
Chartboost was used by third-party developers. Now that it’s owned by Zynga, how does that impact the data assets? Is there a lot of client and thus data leakage churn now that it’s under the Zynga umbrella? How does that impact how great a move it was by Zynga to acquire the ad network vs use more an independent option such as Unity?
12.
What about smaller mobile programmatic DSPs [demand-side platforms] such as Liftoff Mobile, AdThrive and Mediavine? How would you compare the impact on them from an ad platform standpoint vs the players you’ve talked about so far?
13.
Liftoff acquired Vungle. Does that bolster its position vs the rest of its category in terms of insulating itself from the headwinds to come?
14.
What are your thoughts on Digital Turbine’s positioning and on catering to mobile gamers from a network standpoint?
15.
Can we circle back to genre types? You mentioned hyper-casual was quite worried about this. There’s one story where they rely on ultra-low CPIs and the ability to make ARPDAU back over the life cycle will be more difficult given how short a time spent in a game is. The one-day, seven-day and 30-day retention curves are brutally low. I’ve also heard the flip side where you consider Rollic games for Zynga where it’s just not relying on IDFA to achieve those ARPDAUs because there’s not much focus on the profile vs blasting them with ad load. Where does hyper-casual sit in terms of the genres most impacted by the iOS 14 changes?
16.
You mentioned the shift to Android user focus from iOS focus, is that something that’s possible for hyper-casual that might be over-indexed to iOS 14 in the immediate term? How big a shift do you expect the priority to be towards those that Android ID has not yet impacted?
17.
Can we touch on social casino? It seems to be a sector that’s been less impactful. You hit on some of the benefits for a player such as Playtika but would you be worried longer term around the eventual need to target net new whales?
18.
When do you expect the environment to begin to normalise? When it does, will it be a new industry with structurally higher user acquisition costs for the same lifetime value?
19.
Is there anything different to say around how quickly Facebook has been able to rework its algorithm to get close to parity with how it was working prior? Is it negatively impacted long term by the changes or is this somewhere it is trying to reach a new normal similar to how it was operating pre-IDFA?
20.
You mentioned Liftoff, AdThrive, Mediavine and Vungle and a performance miss there. Was that because they are smaller scale than the other networks or because they are disadvantaged from the changes and more prone to a crackdown?
21.
What are your thoughts about the trial that played out with Epic Games and Apple? In the context of IDFA, was there any ability to build a direct contact with players solving some sort of a problem there? What impact would off-platform payment systems have on the on-platform user acquisition market?
22.
If third-party payment processes become much more open, do you expect a lot of uptake to avoid payment fees?
23.
What is your opinion of ASA SKAdNetwork? Do you expect it to meaningfully improve over the next few years and be a more serious contender from an advertising standpoint?
24.
We talked a lot through Chartboost, Adjust, Vungle, AdColony and Fyber. Do you think that whether for vertical integration purposes or ad tech scale there has been a lot of M&A velocity as a function of IDFA? Is there a lot left to be had? Do you expect any themes to drive future M&A responding to IDFA?
25.
Is there anything else you would like to discuss? Is there anything we should monitor over the next few months and quarters?
