As part of our ongoing initiative to provide 100% coverage of currency and payments support everywhere in the world, we’re proud to announce that the Social Gold platform now enables customers to purchase virtual goods in their local currencies. Currencies already live include Euros, Pounds, Swiss Francs, Danish and Norwegian Krone, Swedish Krona, Canadian Dollars and Australian Dollars. We will be expanding our offering to support additional currencies over the course of this year.

Users can switch the default currency if they want

In addition to enabling customers to purchase in their local currencies, we will soon be revealing our partners for support of local payment methods in global regions. Audiences in different markets prefer diverse payment methods, so we’re building direct integrations with regional payment providers so that customers can purchase goods online by whichever method they prefer – whether that’s using credit and debit cards, mobile payments, cash or bank transfers. Additionally, we will ensure that exchange rates, regulations and local fees don’t get in the way of profits and market penetration for publishers.

Along with this, we have also optimized the customer purchasing experience: customers who enter the Social Gold payments platform locally from a specific region are automatically provided the choice of their local payment methods and the local currency. By listing the local payment methods at the onset of the purchasing interface, this ensures a seamless user experience and that the customer is never neglected from a monetization standpoint based on their local region. Unlike payment platforms where a customer must review countless payment options on a single page, through the Social Gold platform, customers only see the payment methods most relevant to them. Additionally, the default payment methods are further personalized based on most common usage. Customers can also override the default currency, and bring up non-local payment methods if they choose, and this does not disrupt the user experience.

Stay tuned for upcoming details on our partnerships with regional payment providers!

This year we’re participating in full force at the 2nd Annual Flash Gaming Summit (www.flashgamingsummit.com). Hosted by Mochi Media, the Flash Gaming Summit brings together leaders in the industry to share insights and strategies for monetization, distribution and analytics. 

Our co-founder and CEO, Vikas Gupta, will be speaking on a panel called “Money in Flash: Next Gen Monetization of Flash Games” with Mochi Media CEO Jameson Hsu, Kongregate CEO Jim Greer, and FlashGameLicense.com co-founder Chris Hughes (moderated by Atul Bagga of ThinkEquity). This elite group of panelists will discuss the current state of the flash gaming market as well as the opportunities and potential challenges of monetizing flash games. We invite you to come listen in on the panel at 10:00am on March 8 at the Mission Bay Conference Center at UCSF. 

Additionally, we are proud to be Gold Sponsors for the Flash Gaming Summit the year, and will have a booth setup at the conference. Please feel free to swing by and say hello, or email us at business@jambool.com to coordinate a time to meet. We hope to see you there!

To learn more about the event and register to attend, please visit: http://fgsummit2010.eventbrite.com/. Feel free to use our discount code to receive 15% off your registration: jambool15

Social Gold, the leading virtual currency and payments solution for thousands of online games and virtual worlds, recently announced a new workshop series focused on virtual currencies called “Cha-Ching” along with the launch of the Social Gold panel of virtual goods economists. Panelists include John Zdanowski, CFO of Avatar Reality, makers of Blue Mars (formerly of Linden Lab, makers of Second Life) and Prakash Ramamurthy, CTO of LifeLock (formerly of Gaia Online), who will also be providing keynotes at the first workshop. Both Zdanowski and Ramamurthy bring extensive experience in virtual currencies, product strategy and financial modeling for Internet businesses. The Cha-Ching Workshop series will feature panels and discussions with thought leaders in the virtual goods industry to discuss casual games, social games and virtual worlds. The first workshop focused on “The Virtual Economy” will be held on March 11, 2010 from 10:00am until 2:00pm PST in San Francisco at The Box SF just two blocks from the Moscone Center.

“As the virtual goods market continues to grow, virtual currencies will play a larger role in the core monetization strategy for publishers,” said Vikas Gupta, host of the Cha-Ching Workshop. “As such, it has become increasingly important for thought leaders in this industry to collaborate together, and we’ve created the Cha-Ching Workshop to facilitate this discussion.”

The Cha-Ching Workshop will offer a half-day of panels and talks dedicated to the key fundamental drivers of virtual currencies. It will bring together the luminaries from casual games, social games and virtual worlds in a collaborative environment with the goal to encourage cross-vertical learning. A group of experts will cover topics ranging from effective virtual goods strategies and monetization of virtual goods to building a virtual currency business online. Following the keynote discussion, a variety of hot-button topics will be circulated throughout the room so that teams can discuss, brainstorm and conduct mini-presentations based on their expertise and interests. Through these interactive events, the Cha-Ching workshop series will be a significant driver in encouraging leaders in the virtual goods space to collaborate.

Keynote speaker John Zdanowski was the CFO of Linden Lab from 2003 to 2006 as the Second Life economy grew from $10 million to a half a billion dollars annually. “I’m excited about the Cha-Ching Workshop as a place for industry participants to discuss the unique challenges associated with managing virtual economies, currencies, fraud and payment systems. I will be sharing insights learned from growing Second Life’s successful virtual economy and how we’re approaching building a new one in Blue Mars,” said Zdanowski. 

Having recently joined LifeLock as CTO this year, keynote speaker Prakash Ramamurthy was most recently the Senior VP of Product Management and Engineering for Gaia Online, and formerly the VP of Identity Management and Security Products for Oracle. “While the virtual goods market is expected to exceed $1.6 billion this year there is still much opportunity to grow, and the Cha-Ching Workshop series serves to address the challenges of operating virtual economies as well as identify the solutions to help foster the growth of this industry,” said Ramamurthy.

For more information on the Cha-Ching Workshop, please contact Social Gold at chaching@jambool.com

Social Gold and Women in Games International (WIGI) will be hosting its 3^rd annual mixer at GDC 2010 on Wednesday, March 10 from 6:00pm – 9:00pm. This year’s industry exclusive VIP party will be will be held at one of the most unique venues in San Francisco — the California Historical Society Museum located a few blocks away from Moscone Center. The reception will bring together innovative developers, publishers, and top leaders from the industry along with great food, drinks, and plenty of excitement. 

The Social Gold team visited New York City last week as part of the Virtual Goods Conference at the Engage! Expo, held at theJacob K. Javits Center.  Sharing the spotlight with the 107th International Toy Fair, the Virtual Goods Conference gave us an opportunity not only to provide shelter to blizzard victims seeking warmth in the Social Gold V.I.P. Lounge, but to connect with other leading members of the virtual goods industry. Opening up dialogue on the current and future state of the virtual goods industry is something we constantly seek out and encourage among our industry peers.

The two-day event was highlighted with our very own Mike Haswell speaking on the “Getting Paid: Payment Systems That Power Virtual Goods” panel. The panel focused on the necessary steps in building and implementing a payment solution for virtual worlds and social games. As Mike pointed out during the session, the keys to maximizing revenue in the virtual goods market are having a proper currency in place, analytics to assess virtual ecosystems, and delivering the best payments method to enable purchases. Specifically, in regards to payments, targeting and matching the right payment method for the right users is essential, and platforms such as Social Gold that remove all friction from the user experience help convert visitors into purchasers of virtual goods. Mike also shared that publishers have noticed an increased conversion rate of 30-50% after having implemented the Social Gold platform into their virtual economy.

The juxtaposition of the Engage! Expo with Toy Fair was an interesting combination of two separate, yet somewhat similar worlds. Both the virtual good and the retail toy deliver a level of entertainment to the average consumer. However, while the retail toymaker must navigate the current troubled economy with only a partial understanding of their consumer base, the virtual goods provider has an amazing advantage in today’s world of digital consumption. As Mike pointed out on the panel, virtual goods providers can carefully use analytics to identify and connect with consumers. Having the ability to key in on the right payment methods, price points, and overall spending behavior within a virtual economy allows publishers of virtual worlds and games the ability to react in real-time. Unlike their retail counterparts, virtual goods providers can adjust to and fit the exact needs of consumers within their own ecosystems immediately.  

Additionally, judging by the New York City weather, obtaining a virtual good through digital distribution is likely more desirable than hitting the streets in a desperate search for a product sitting on a shelf at a local retailer not so near you. 

Here’s a quick intro to getting set up with payments within your flash games. Sign up and start making money today in your flash games!

Monetizing your international user base is not an easy task. Having a global user base inherently means that a very diverse user base is involved. When you game is playable on social networks that reach players in multiple countries around the world, you are dealing with hundreds of countries, even more languages, a wide variety of preferred payment methods and a large number of local currencies. Therefore, it is imperative that your payments solution is comprehensive to provide full coverage across international markets.

Money from around the world

http://www.flickr.com/photos/nicmcphee/ / CC BY-SA 2.0

The idea of successfully catering to local needs in a global market can be daunting. When monetizing an online game, there is the added complexity that users in different parts of the world prefer to pay with different means. Specifically, credit cards are popular in the U.S., but not as much in other parts of the world. In order to accommodate varying needs, you need to work with payment methods that are appropriate for each region or country. Furthermore, handling local currency is problematic because it requires operational complexity and exposes you to currency risk. In addition to these factors, you need to be aware of and work with local fees and regulations in each country.

Although international monetization is not intuitive and involves countless details, it is essential not to neglect such a valuable user base. On one hand, you want to enable users from anywhere in the world to be able to purchase virtual goods and make microtransactions, but the complexity in collecting money from them can be prohibitively high.

Today, no single company provides a seamless experience, easy integration and access to local audiences. Companies, who claim to, work with other intermediate aggregators to present payment options to users. Unfortunately, this is less than ideal for developers and leads to a poor end user experience, higher fees and eventually loss in revenue—the exact opposite goal of monetization. We see a great opportunity to improve international monetization and cater to a huge global market while providing a quicker, smoother and more tailored local user experience that international audiences deserve.

Please stay tuned for more exciting news at Social Gold that will tighten the gap between international payments and a frictionless end user experience!

At Social Gold we sit at the helm of the extremely fun space of virtual goods. It is a very new world, and publishers and platforms are all only beginning to see the revenue potential here.

Today we want to share some interesting statistics we have observed on virtual goods. Traditional wisdom would say that people spend very little amounts on virtual goods — but we’ve found that your engaged users can spend several thousand dollars through their lifetime use of the games.

We also find that of all the users who pay through Social Gold, 56% come back and make a repeat purchase. Part of the reason this number is high is that Social Gold enables a frictionless, single click in-app experience for repeat purchases. We’ve found such users to be more than twice as likely to make repeat purchases than other users.

Even more interesting is the fact that 25% of paying users make more than two purchases. This is quite huge — and confirms the value users see in the purchases they make.

Social Gold: Users' Spending Behavior in Social Games

We’re excited to share with you that today we’ve launched a partnership with the leading online gaming website, Miniclip. This marks the beginning of Miniclip’s foray into virtual goods and microtransactions, powered by our roboust virtual economy platform. Miniclip currently hosts 550 online games in its catalog, reaching 57 million players, who will now be able to purchase virtual goods through a seamless payments experience. As Miniclip is the portal leader in providing Flash-based games, their platform is a perfect match for our in-Flash payments experience, which enables players to purchase currency and goods entirely within the game, resulting in increased conversion.

What is particularly significant about Miniclip’s launch of virtual economies is that it’s indicative of the confidence businesses have in the virtual goods market as a viable, sustainable business model. Social games, virtual worlds and free-to-play MMOs have been the early adopters of this model, while more traditional retail and advertising-supported game publishers have been evaluating the risks and rewards.

Often we’re asked about the question of cannibalization – will virtual goods sales cut into existing revenue streams? As we’ve seen from developers experimenting with different business models, such as iPhone developers, virtual goods and microtransactions have proven to be a source of supplemental revenue. Additionally, considering the continuing decline of retail sales as well as advertising spending, it’s likely we’ll see a rise in virtual goods sales supplementing these revenue streams over the next year, perhaps even replacing them at some point as the primary source of revenue for publishers.

We’re dedicated to helping foster the growth of the rapidly expanding virtual goods market through innovation in payments and user experience. Leading up to Miniclip’s virtual economies launch today, we’ve been working closely with their team to ensure the most seamless integration of Social Gold into their platform, and we look forward to hearing feedback from their community.

Unlike a physical store out in the real world that is positioned in a specific neighborhood or city, online applications are readily accessible to a global audience. Although an app may be targeted to a specific demographic with different expectations and needs, (i.e. tween girls, 18 to 35-year-old males, or working mothers) the great expanse of the Internet means that your reach is always global. It is essential that your company consider the currency and payment preferences and requirements of an audience that spans far and wide. Overlooking these aspects can be a missed opportunity to monetize willfully paying audiences.

It’s clear as online gaming has increased globally over the last several years that games are enjoyed universally among people everywhere who seek entertainment and engaging, interactive experiences. While cultural norms may differ from country to country, social experiences are part of daily human experience and are necessary for people to thrive. It’s not surprising that the relatively new genre of social gaming is rapidly expanding and attracting audiences everywhere. If you have an entertaining and engaging online game, it is very likely that users in more than one country are already playing it. If you are building apps on social networks, then there is no question: your user base is already global.

It is important to remember your international audience not only when it comes to language and content preferences, but also when it comes to currency and payment methods. Users are looking to purchase virtual goods with the payment method most comfortable and accessible for them – whether that is with a credit card, bank transfer, mobile phone or cash. Currency exchanges and regulations must also be taken into account when providing a fluid payments experience for the end user. We recommend looking for comprehensive payments solutions that provide full coverage across international markets without corrupting the user experience. We here at Social Gold focus on providing a comprehensive payments solution to ensure the most seamless payments experience for local and international users.

Additionally, just as games and social experiences are universal, so is the desire to have a frictionless payments experience. When playing a game online, users enjoy being engaged in gameplay—why disrupt this enjoyable experience? Remember, engagement is the key behind monetization. That’s why Social Gold offers seamless in-app and in-Flash payments. Players remain in the game while they complete their purchase, which results in greater retention and repeat purchases.

Remember your valuable international user base when it comes to payments and make sure they are provided the best possible payments experience no matter where they live.