Café LifeDeveloping a social game for Facebook

Gemili@Tencent.com

July 21th 2012

Coffee Break !

Tired? Let’s take a coffee break! I will share some

stories about how we created Café life.

Coffee Break

About the speaker

• Currently - The producer of ZingPlay.– A pioneer of Tencent Game international.

• Previously - The producer of Tencent QQGame oversea . – Design and run games in Facebook.

– Used to be project manager and programmer.

• Always - Addicted to playing games

Gemili

Introductions

• A restaurant-management game where you can bake cakes , make drinks, and decorate the shop.

Introductions

Introductions

• Launched on May 2010.

• MAU 2.5M+，Facebook rank reached #62.

• iPhone version , a simplified Chinese version ,a Vietnam version and a Thailand version.

• First game developed by Tencent that was successful overseas

Accelerated the internationalization of Tencent'sin-house development capabilities

Established a strong overseas user base

Introductions

• SNS game is burning hot in China. Because the heat of SNS, QQGame suffered .

• Facebook continue to grow, some Chinese companies were making good profit from Facebook games.

• So we decide to attempt entering this new market…

Background – why?

• Theme– Hotel（0） , Pet shop（0）, Restaurant（at least 2）

• Why restaurant?– Low risk, as we know nothing about Facebook, it suitable for the

first game developed

• What kind of Restaurant?– Different from Restaurant City and Café world, we can get users..– More liked by women.

• Why baking?– Target audience -> 35- 65 housewife.– Make something different and more accurate marketing position .

Theme

• Three competitors

• Grandma's secret recipe -> Special emotion of baking.

Competitor & Inspiration

• Art research starting point on how to understand the housewives in Facebook.

– How much girl-appeal do we need?

– How to make the game more appealing to girls ?

Art

• Avatars: Make women like it at first glance!

Avatars

• Goal: “OMG! This is soooo cute… Check out this cupcake!”– Each cupcake tells a story…

– Each cupcake has a personality…

– Each cake you can buy from the store in your neighborhood.

– Make the cake with the actual steps you do in real life.

Cake & Drinks

• Decoration: In a set! Cute! Real item in life.

Decoration

• Two Mistakes.

– Failed to make a very strong structure.

– Spend too much time in fine tuning.

Develop

• First rule: You Don’t talk during User Testing

– Let them make mistakes. It’s YOUR fault, not theirs.

– Get the whole team involved .

• Goal: No one gets stuck, everyone makes progress, knows what they are supposed to do… and has fun!

• When there is only one right thing players should be doing…

Users testing

• Acquisition marketing – Revenue and Reach– Five Country Tiers (based on ARPU percentiles)– Separate expenditure associated with Gender, Age buckets– Internal vs. External Advertisers – Tried everything– Revenue focused spend: Acquire users where we earn

back the CPA in <3 Months.• In first month after launch, earn-back was 2 weeks

– Reach focused spend: Most users, least money

• Cross-promotion – Acquisition and Retention• Above all else – People need to love your game

– Organic/Viral critical to social gaming growth– Refine the top of the funnel – Conversion matters

Growth & Acquiring traffic

HELP!!!

• Make something users can not refuse !

• Make something players can get reward for!

Virality

• Fine tuning, lot of fine tuning.

– UI , game play, Art , Data system.

• Season/holiday version.

Operation

• Great Game +

• Large Potential Audience +

• Originality (improves virality) +

• Aggressive Marketing and Promotion +

• Constant Data Informed Iteration =

• A chance at success =)

Formula for a successful social game

THANK YOU!

Any Question?

Gemili@Tencent.com