While smart readers such as yourself learn about new Facebook games right here on Gamezebo, the vast majority of Facebook gamers rely on little more than advertising to inform them of what’s new. Companies like Zynga and Playfish can afford to spend millions on advertising, and can also rely on their already popular games to provide exposure for their latest releases. Sticking a banner for Treasure Isle in FarmVille, for example, let’s Zynga advertise its newest game to 80 million players already in their demographic. Smaller developers just can’t compete on that scale. Applifier, a new service created by a select group of developers, is looking to rectify that.
While smart readers such as yourself learn about new Facebook games right here on Gamezebo, the vast majority of Facebook gamers rely on little more than advertising to inform them of what’s new. Companies like Zynga and Playfish can afford to spend millions on advertising, and can also rely on their already popular games to provide exposure for their latest releases. Sticking a banner for Treasure Isle in FarmVille, for example, let’s Zynga advertise its newest game to 80 million players already in their demographic. Smaller developers just can’t compete on that scale. Applifier, a new service created by a select group of developers, is looking to rectify that.
Created by Nabeel Hyatt ofConduit Labsand Jussi Laakkonen ofEveryplay, Applifier provides cross-promotion between Facebook games of different developers. Company A, B, and C may have ads on a single banner, and that banner will appear in the games of all three companies, increasing exposure of their games to a new audience that otherwise might have never discovered it.
“It’s more difficult to grow organically or acquire traffic than it was 6 months ago,” Hyatt told Inside Social Games. “There are a lot more large players that are spending tens of millions of dollars to acquire traffic. But we feel like there’s a lot of innovation happening that’s not just around the big players.”
Despite promoting the games of smaller developers, the program isn’t offering the “everybody’s welcome” attitude that you might expect. “We’re doing business with the people that we want to do business with,” says Hyatt. As such, the service is invite-only. Founding participants in the program include Metaplace, BitMinion, Free Lunch Design, Wonderhill and Three Rings.
Unlike other services that exchange traffic, Hyatt says Applifier stands out from the pack because it offers it’s services free of charge. “The spirit of this is kind of a rebel alliance where we’re banding together to make the whole stronger.”
The Applifier network reaches approximately 5 million monthly active users. Hyatt expects that number to double shortly. Whether or not it can grow to the numbers that the big boys are putting out is anybody’s guess – but we do love a good underdog story.
[via Inside Social Games]
