7 Tips To Increase Mobile Game’s User Retention

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7 Tips To Increase Mobile Game’s User Retention

October 11, 2021

You need people to interact with your app, and you need them to keep doing it. Increasing and maintaining retention rates isn’t an exact science, but you can do several things to keep your app on people’s screens. Here are a few tips that can help you with user retention.

Craft a Great First-Time User Experience

To keep new people coming back, you need to give them a memorable first-time user experience (FTUE). Show users what they’re in for immediately with a good, interactive tutorial. For example, you can throw them straight into the game while guiding them on how to proceed.

Use Options to Keep Your Game on User’s Screens

Allow users to opt into methods that will keep your game on their radar. For example, send out email notifications of updates, changes, and events. Also, include these notifications and options on the platform that users play your game on. Consider things like push notifications, alerts, and unobtrusive reminders. Don’t overburden users, but do make sure your game makes its presence known.

Keep Your Interface Clean and Uncluttered

Your game may feature a ton of awesome options, modes, choices, and information. You can easily overwhelm a user and keep them from picking your game back up. Keep your interface simple and navigable. A good practice is to only show a user what they need. For example, if your game features a gameplay mode newer users can’t use yet, then keep it off the interface until they can access it.

Give Users a Steady Amount of Things to Do

Retention requires interaction. A user should always have something they can do when they open your app. Engagement is the key to retention. Set up daily, weekly, or even monthly goals for them to pursue. Let users unlock new modes of play and content as they progress. You want your users to feel like they’re progressing, not just doing the same old thing to no end. Give your users a sense of achievement and accomplishment as they play through your game. Those feelings of moving forward and earning better rewards will keep them coming back to take up the challenges your game gives them.

Create Incentives and Offers That Add Value to Your Game

You can incentivize just about any aspect of your game, but those incentives and offers should further the enjoyment of the game. Offer discounts and promotions for users that will help them achieve more in the game. These incentives will depend entirely on the nature of your game and how you monetize it. Nevertheless, always think of ways of rewarding users, especially continuing users.

Get to Know Your Users

Your users want to play your game, and they want you to know what your game needs to keep them coming back. Don’t ignore the comments, complaints, or frustrations of your users. Instead, invite your users to voice their opinions and report on things concerning your game. Set up a website, forum, or another place where your users can gather and speak on the game. Collect user data by allowing people to send you their information. You can solicit feedback, send out questionnaires, and create surveys. Your game may even have a social community you didn’t create. Seek those communities out and see what people are saying. The more you know your users, the better the experience you can create to keep them coming back.

Pay Attention to Metrics and Analytics

Today’s analytics solutions can help you measure every nuance of a user’s experience. You don’t have to jump straight into the complicated world of data analysis; start with something as simple as your retention rates. Tracking your retention rates will help you figure out what other metrics you should pay close attention to. Tracking retention rates can let you know:

When people installed your app
How often people open your app
How often people fully uninstall your app
How many people use your app on a given day or month

You can learn a lot by paying attention to retention metrics. With that information, start to drill down to find the reasons behind the user behaviors. Also, pay attention to your churn rate, which is basically the opposite of your retention rate. As you implement more things to keep your retention rate up, you’ll likely come across even more methods for doing it. The more you know your user base and their behaviors, the more you can do to facilitate their continued use of your game. Before you can keep users entertained and engaged, you must develop a polished app. Xsolla exists to help give your game the best chance at attracting and retaining users through our suite of professional tools and services. If you want to keep users coming back for more, check out what we have to offer. ‍