Interview

How Voxel's interactive adverts are reinventing UA's core loop

CEO David Zhao on better users and higher install rates

How Voxel's interactive adverts are reinventing UA's core loop

Given the rising price of installs and rising concern about the efficacy of user acquisition, the search is on for a new way to attract new high quality users.

One such approach are the interactive ads offered by US vendor Voxel.

Using a proprietary server-side virtualisation system, it enables game and app developers to directly run their content within an interstitial ad that loads an interactive stream.

"For the majority of games, you can just drop the players into the action without the developer changing anything," says Voxel's CEO David Zhao.

Examples on the company's website include King's Candy Crush Saga and Doug Nguyen's Flappy Bird.

Clearly the technology works best for simple arcade-style games but any vertical slice of gameplay could be applicable.

Publishers such as King, Storm8, Electronic Arts and GSN are already using the platform.

Zhao says players will typically engage with these interactive ads for around 60 seconds.

Playing in real-time

Compared to banners, interstitials or video ads, the immediacy of Voxel's interactive ad is what provides its appeal.

The immediacy of Voxel's interactive ad provides its appeal.

Zhao says that compared to more traditional ads, the install rate for an advertised product doubles from around 3-5 percent to up to 10 percent.

Yet, he argues that the flow it enables is equally significant.

"Tapping on an advert takes you out of the game and into the app store. The experience breaks down there," he points out.

"You might even lose the player at this point if they don't come back to your game.

"But with our demo, you get a full sense of the experience real-time from within the app."

This means people who do go through the install process are much more informed and engaged about the game. In that sense, Voxel is generating a high quality user.

Play Candy Crush Saga  within an interstitial ad

As for how Voxel is making its technology available, Zhao says it's working with ad networks, who will support the option as an element within their range of ad formats.

The first to be publicly announced is InMobi, which offers Voxel as part of its new native-first approach.

You can find out more and see how the technology works via the Voxel website.

Contributing Editor

A Pocket Gamer co-founder, Jon is Contributing Editor at PG.biz which means he acts like a slightly confused uncle who's forgotten where he's left his glasses. As well as letters and cameras, he likes imaginary numbers and legumes.