Since the 2019 pandemic, there has been such a big boom in online gaming that the industry is projected to be worth USD 321 billion by 2026. There is an increase in online gamers and the time people spend playing online.
Online games help people connect with others who have similar interests. Players have a sense of achievement and quality time spent focused on a task. Plus, gaming is excellent for mental health and unwinding. So, the tremendous growth of online gaming is hardly surprising.
However, this growth places a significant demand on gaming platforms and services in support and experience. Players often find customer support and personalized gameplay lacking.
You need to understand why and how players feel dissatisfied. It’s crucial to address solutions to enhance customer experience. With this information, you can pave the way for better game features and increased customer satisfaction.
Moreover, this ultimately impacts the bottom line with up to a 30% increase.
So, we will show you how to enhance customer experience to benefit your gaming community and your business.
The Starting Point: Understanding Player Dissatisfaction
Out of the 3.2 billion gamers globally, 1.17 billion are online gamers. The sheer volume of these online players makes it hard for gaming platforms to provide adequate and timely support.
While the average customer email response time is around 12 hours, gaming companies take around 39 hours. And that is if gamers can easily find ways to contact customer support. More often than not, even this primary facility can be confusing and convoluted.
Let’s say your customer satisfaction is around 70%. If the daily active users (DAU) are 5,000, there is a churn rate of 25%. Dissatisfied and disengaged players mean you have poor player retention, a negative reputation among online gaming communities, and lesser chances of monetization.
A wide gap exists between the current player experience and transforming into an engaging, community-driven platform. However, you can bridge this gap with some innovation.
Embracing Player Feedback: The Catalyst for Innovation
One of the first steps toward giving your online players the desired experience is being proactive to their needs.
Pay attention to user reviews and what customers are saying on social media. Want to make your users feel seen and heard while being committed to player needs? Address any queries or concerns promptly. This will help your customers and lead to higher engagement.
Another source of insight and innovation is collecting feedback. You can do this via in-app interactions, surveys, pop-up questions, and polls.
Implementing an in-game feedback system can help reduce response time to 24 hours or less, giving you the player insights needed for personalized game recommendations.
Addressing player complaints can produce new features and enhancements that boost your gaming platform and appeal. For example, in response to feedback on Monster Hunter, Capcom made changes to Monster Hunter World. They cut down on complexity and streamlined the gameplay, resulting in a sleek and polished game.
Here’s how to implement such changes to evolve and upgrade your gaming service.
Implementing Game-Changing Features
You can tweak and modify your in-game features and platform functions. However, focus on customer support, personalization, and community-building to create a lasting positive customer experience.
Innovative Customer Support
Waiting for a long time for resolutions to queries and bugs can demoralize any player. An innovative solution to this is including an AI-powered in-game support system. Players can find easy and quick solutions to frequently asked questions, and you can also reduce response time for specific custom queries.
Personalization at Its Best
Dedicated gamers invest ample time and effort in playing the games they love. So, create a dynamic recommendation engine that adapts to player behavior. This will reward players for their time and increase engagement and satisfaction.
Building a Community
Gaming improves social skills, brings different people together, and helps people express themselves and collaborate. So, building a community for your gamers is a core part of the gaming experience. Include community features like live tournaments and discussion forums based on player suggestions. This will foster a sense of belonging and loyalty.
If you’re wondering whether these measures work, keep reading to see how such changes can transform player experience.
The Transformation: A New Era of Player Experience
We can attest to the impact of enhancing customer experience based on the changes we implemented and the resulting growth.
Card games like Freecell, Solitaire, and Spider Solitaire are great for relaxation and quality time engaged in gaming. Our straightforward interface was always a great place for Solitaire enthusiasts.
However, we learned that there is always room for improvement. When we implemented game changes based on customer feedback, we saw several eye-opening results, almost like a ripple effect.
Our success metrics were impacted.
The biggest impact we noticed was how customer satisfaction rose to 90% post-enhancement.
Increased customer satisfaction drew in more players. From 10.000 DAU, we logged in 15.000 DAU post the enhancements. Correspondingly, the churn rate dropped to 15%.
The player community grew.
There is an active and eager card-game community out there. So, we weren’t surprised when we noticed a rise in positive testimonials. For example:
- “I like that I can change the speed and auto-play settings, and it stays put, so I don’t have to keep changing it to my preference.”
- “LOVE how the leaderboard shows country-specific stuff and how we can discuss moves and games on Facebook!”
- “Bookmarking is useful. And you can create an account for free to save your progress.”
More users were encouraged by the elevated customer experience. So, the number of email feedback and reviews we received increased. This meant we had more insights to make better changes and boost customer support.
We recorded bottom-line growth.
Our satisfied customers ultimately impacted our bottom line. With more players spending more time on the platform, we saw a boost in engagement and reduced churn.
Satisfied customers also speak glowingly of a product or service they’re happy with. So, we benefited from word-of-mouth publicity that drew in more players.
Thanks to all this, we saw a 30% increase in revenue.
Reflecting on the Journey: Lessons for the Future
Enhancing customer experience is a hands-on activity that requires attention and dedication to your users. There is considerable information on how to improve customer experience. But the best way you can impact your online players is to listen to their concerns and act on their feedback.
By implementing player-focused innovative solutions, you can make positive changes to your gameplay and platform, thus drawing in more engaged players.
Plus, continuously improving your game and features shows your players how committed you are. For example, you can enhance player experience by publishing blogs detailing plans for future features and community events targeted to address customer needs.
What does this mean for you?
Don’t shy away from feedback or reviews, even the seemingly negative ones. These are opportunities for you to improve your platform and game.
75% of organizations have drawn a direct connection between customer satisfaction and revenue growth. So, invite players to continue sharing feedback to improve your game, reinforce your dedication to players, and increase your revenue.