What we need to learn about our users
To start this topic, here, economy refers to the value generated within an application. I know this topic is much more widely discussed across various different aspects such as analytics to understand user behavior, then in-app purchases (IAP) for monetization, and also communication to keep the user engaged.
That being said, let’s bring together this information and understand how they work together to generate the economy of an application.
Economy in games
Mobile games, in general, work with this concept in a simple and playful way. If you haven’t been living under a rock, you’ve probably played some casual mobile game like Candy Crush, for example. In this type of game, there is its own economy, like the “currency” of the game.
Here’s how it works (random example): you complete some challenges and earn some tokens; with these tokens, you can acquire assets or even exchange them for gold coins, which are the strong currency in the game; the best items within the game are purchased with these gold coins, which are rare. But… you can buy these coins, just “swipe your card”.
In addition to being a way to keep the player eager to progress and acquire new coins, it is also an economy based on the real world that exploits the player’s emotions by giving a small reward after advancing or by instilling the desire for achievement by showing that there is a long path to explore.
Economy in an application
Now, let’s apply this concept to an application in the tools category (I chose examples that are more familiar to me).
What asset is the app delivering to the user, and how can you utilize the economy based on that?
In the example of a tool, the asset is the specific need to solve something, such as scanning a barcode, performing a calculation, or measuring an angle using the phone’s camera.
Deliver that to the user and, in return, obtain some time spent on your application. This exchange, if well planned, can generate revenue for the developer.
The four most well-known forms of revenue are:
- Advertisements
- In-app item sales
- Subscriptions
- Paid apps
However, there are many other ways, some stemming from these categories and others quite unexpected.
For this example, what might work is using advertisements as an incentive for premium usage.
A user who uses the tools of the application may not necessarily want to pay for the premium app with all its features, but you can give them a “taste” of the premium app through, for example, a rewarded video where the user watches a 15-30 second ad and gains premium access for 30 minutes. It’s a win-win situation.
This is a vast field that can be explored in nearly infinite ways.