At Casual Connect USA, Bryan Bennett, Vice President of Marketing at AGS Interactive, was part of a panel that addressed the essential question in the game industry: how to realize a profit with your game. And while the question sounds simple, navigating the answers to it is considerably more complex. How, for example, do you find and acquire the highest value users, how do you succeed on Instagram or make the best use of Facebook ad products. Should you expand your business into other geographic markets and how do you decide which ones.
Fortunately Bryan, along with Owen O’Donoghue, Fantasy Sports and Gaming Lead for Facebook, Jeet Niyogi, Marketing Director at Playtika, Matt Widdoes, Senior User Acquisition Manager at Zynga, and Ian Wang, Co-Founder and CEO of Fox Club, discussed these and other aspects of succeeding with casino in the game industry.
Recently Bryan described to Gamesauce his work with AGSi, a wholly owned subsidiary of American Gaming Systems, leading developer of real-money slot machines, table games and mobile social casino games. Bryan also revealed insights into what it takes to make a game a financial success in the social casino space, gained through extensive marketing experience in the game industry.
Gamesauce: Tell us about the work you do at AGS Interactive. How did you come to work there?
Bryan Bennett: I lead all market initiatives at AGS Interactive. That includes user acquisition, product marketing, and monetization. I’ve been here since June 2015, which is when my previous company, RocketPlay, was acquired by AGS. We became AGS Interactive and here we are a year later.
Gamesauce: What is your favorite thing about your job?
Bryan: I like the immediacy of what I do. By that I mean that things are different every day and I can make changes or decide to test something and see almost immediate feedback on how it impacted CPIs, marketing spend, retentions, monetizations, etc. This allows us to have a massive impact on the core metrics on the business on a daily basis.
Gamesauce: How has your experience consulting with mobile and social game companies been helpful to you in your current position?
Bryan: My consulting was a limited time thing as I took a break for several months back in 2012. In fact, one of my consulting gigs was with RocketPlay, which turned into a full-time position and ended with us getting acquired three years later. So that was certainly a wild and unexpected ride when I started working with them.
Playing With Numbers
Gamesauce: How has your knowledge of deep strategic planning been used to advance the interests of your current company?
Bryan: Well, deep strategic planning wasn’t a luxury we had when we were RocketPlay. We were a very small social casino game developer trying to compete with the behemoths in the space – IGT, Zynga, Playtika, etc. So we were more in hustle mode to move as fast as possible to launch new content and features to drive revenue. Now that we’re part of a larger company, I’ve moved a little bit away from execution and more into strategy. But we’re still small and need to be nimble to compete. So thinking more than 3 – 6 months in advance is still not really a luxury that we have.
Gamesauce: What inspired you to pursue this career?
Bryan: I’m not sure I ever really pursued a career in gaming. I started working for Kabam when it was called Watercooler and we were building sports apps. We morphed into a game company and I got a crash course in what that means. From there, I’ve worked for several other game companies and like the nature of creating entertaining experiences for players. Running a mobile games business also appeals to my analytical side. I like playing with numbers and the social casino business is very reliant on that aspect.
Gamesauce: Do you have any advice for someone interested in pursuing the same career?
Bryan: If you’re going to work for a gaming startup, make sure they are fully funded and have a plan. So much of the mobile games business is reliant on user acquisition that even the best games are destined for failure if the company can’t do UA properly.
Gamesauce: In your younger years was there anything that hinted at your future career path in gaming? Did you expect to end up where you are today?
Bryan: No, I sort of fell into the gaming business. I enjoy games and come from a game-playing family, but I never really thought about working in this business until Watercooler morphed into Kabam. So I’m not really one of those guys that always dreamed of working in the game industry.
Real-Life Casino Experience on Mobile
Gamesauce: What has been your proudest moment during your career so far? What led to this moment happening?
Bryan: Two come to mind. First, working at Watercooler and helping to lead the series B round that got us into the position to become Kabam. I started at a company with 17 employees and almost no revenue and left 3.5 years later when the company was at 500 employees and well worth of $100M in annual revenue. Very satisfying to help a company grow like that. And second, navigating a very competitive space to help RocketPlay be successful and find a long-term home in AGS was extremely difficult but very rewarding. We had some lean times, but persevered and had a successful exit for the company, investors and employees.
Gamesauce: What do you think will be the next big trend in the industry in the next three to five years? How are you incorporating this trend into your future plans?
Bryan: For social casino, I think it will be more of the same, to be honest with you. Real-money content is becoming more and more popular in the social space. By that I mean that players like being able to play content on their phone that they can also play in the casino. We’ve been very successful with that, as have some of the larger guys. I think you’ll continue to see the industry move more and more to that model as it’s clear that’s what the players want.
Gamesauce: It has been over four years since the wire act was repealed and only a handful of states permit online gambling. Surprisingly, non-regulated social casino apps are predominant. Looking forward, do you think online gambling will ever catch up to social?
Bryan: No. Not in the near future anyway. The US has not shown any willingness to allow online gambling en masse, and trying to navigate things on a state-by-state basis can be a nightmare. Just look at the problems Daily Fantasy is having now in some very big states. So I think it’s an uphill battle to have any movement there.
Gamesauce: Do you see Apple Watch or Oculus as future platforms for social casino?
Bryan: Not really. Apple Watch is just too small, and, as mentioned, players want a casino-quality experience when they play slots. Oculus could be interesting, but I think it’s very new. I’ve heard there are some social casino devs looking into it, but I think it’s quite a distance away. We have a large number of players playing on devices well over two years old. Getting that kind of player to buy a VR device is way too big of a hurdle at the moment.
Gamesauce: A lot of attention is being paid to skill-based casino; do you see opportunities there?
Bryan: Maybe. We’re not looking into it on the social side, but I’ve heard of others that are. I think skill-based is probably more interesting on the real-money side because that side of the business is trying all sorts of things to get millennials into the casino. I saw a ton of interesting things at G2E last year, but in the end, I’m not sure how much of them have a great chance to succeed.
Gamesauce: For social casino, is there still such a thing as an emerging market?
Bryan: There are some geos where there’s room to grow, but they’ll always be a long way from what you can do in the US and other tier one markets. We’ve had some success in Mexico in social casino because AGS slot machines are very popular in casinos there. So we’ve been able to be successful by using ads that specifically call out machines that players already like to play.
Something To Promote Every Day
Gamesauce: What are some ways you’ve used your knowledge of tactical execution in marketing social casino games?
Bryan: Related to the above example with Mexico, we’ve been successful with going hyper local with our FB mobile campaigns. AGS content is very popular with tribal casinos, especially in certain parts of the US. So again, we’ve been able to be very user specific and creative to make sure we’re putting the right message and right slot machine in front of the right player. That strategy and execution has allowed us to create campaigns that have 5 – 10x the LTV as generic FB campaigns. And I think that’s a situation that’s very unique to AGS because a lot of their casino content is very regional in nature.
Gamesauce: Monetization is essential to a successful game. Are there any particularly successful ways of monetizing for social casino?
Bryan: Put offers and promotions in front of players early and often. We’ve AB-tested this ad nauseum, and you really cannot overdo promotions and live operations in social casino. Players expect it and want it, so we have something new to promote every day, be it a live event, chip sale, bonus multiplier, etc. We give the players what they want.
Gamesauce: Are there any aspects of user acquisition and growth that are unique to social casino?
Bryan: Pretty ads don’t always work. Some of the ugliest ads are the best performing ads. So take everything you know about what makes a good ad and throw it out the window for this market. You should test everything, and don’t be surprised when the ad you hate the most performs the best.
Gamesauce: Other than your own… what is your favorite social casino app.
Bryan: I like Quick Hit from Scientific Games, probably because there’s so much real casino content there. I also like Princess Bride slots because I’m a sucker for that movie. And surprisingly, I still can’t get enough of Coin Dozer and their new Coin Dozer Casino. That’s my way to check out for a half hour and just push coins around.
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