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The report which questioned 2,500 mobile users was carried out in five countries: USA, UK, Italy, Spain and Germany. The most astonishing finding is that only 5 percent of those surveyed had downloaded a game onto their handset. I-play believes that the potential for mobile gaming will only be possible if the industry works together.
“As a collective industry, we can put the corrective action in place to ensure downloading becomes a simple, straightforward process,” said David Gosen, COO of I-play. “The mobile games market is essentially only five percent penetrated. The good news is that we now know what’s limiting market growth – the industry must improve accessibility to mobile games and more importantly, educate consumers on how and where to obtain mobile games.“
“The research findings are one example of how we put the consumer at the centre of what we do as a business. Firstly, through understanding that ‘virgin downloaders’ need more education about the process and more information about the game before they feel comfortable making that first purchase is critical. We know we have to de-risk that first download for the end user.“
Several reasons why mobile games are reaching such a minority of users were discovered in the report. 33 percent of those questioned said they were unsure if their handset could play games, and 17.5 percent said they did not know how to download games. Other reasons such as complex download methods and confusing error messages were also given as causes for the lack of mobile game downloads.
“We are looking to introduce more initiatives such as ‘try before you buy’ and purchase enabled demos,” said Gosen. “To demystify mobile gaming we are providing more information on our website, such as independent reviews and videos, so that the consumer has a clear expectation of what they are getting for their money.“
“We are increasing our media spends and marketing support programmes to alert non downloaders to the latent entertainment available through their mobile. But this is an industry challenge and we will be working with carriers and handset manufacturers to accelerate the growth potential in this market,” Gosen concluded.
So the market is there, but mobile phone users currently don’t want to go to the party.
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