Zynga Poker
I joined Zynga Poker during its transition from native iOS to Unity. During this time, I learned a great deal about workflow optimization and took on various features, both large and small, from conception to completion. Some features were primarily driven by Product Managers, while others were led by Designers. Here are a few highlights.
Social Center Impact
The overall retention rate increased and remained stable over several months, indicating that the improvement was not simply due to the holiday season.
One surprising insight was that players expressed a desire to use the in-game chat feature because their spouse or partner did not have access to the chat history. This behavior was unexpected and highlighted a unique way that users were engaging with our product.
POKER LEAGUES
Competition drives engagement and excitement. Scarcity, Exclusivity and Prestigious creates competition.
A League system was introduced to Poker to promote higher user engagement. We measured user engagement by the number of hands played and that usually painted an accurate picture of how well player engages with the game. Naturally, competitive players are driven to climb to the top because of exclusivity and the prestige status one could get by reaching the top. The higher the league, the more fierce the competition becomes and players who are highly engaged are much more likely to spend to remain in the competition.
Usually features begin with a simple question: As a user, what would I like to experience?
The product owner of Leagues used this approach to shape the parameters of the feature. Designers, product, PM and engineers gathered in a room and brainstormed on the stories and the corresponding design requirements.
I then study the design requirements and map out the keywords into columns, in attempt to group similar things together. By doing so, we effectively organized the feature into categories and framework that the user will interface with. These categories eventually became screens with elements derived from the columns.
Poker Leagues Impact
Poker Leagues was a successful addition to the game. It massively drove every KPI we are measuring.
- Retention increased
- Session play increased
- Number of hands played increased
- ARPDAU increased
To build on our success, we will continue to enhance competitions by adding an exclusive top tier, offering more appealing prizes, and introducing more limited-time events.
POKER CHALLENGES
Activate User Retentions through Goals & Rewards
Every game needs an objective. Without objectives, players will not be motivated to progress. Poker Challenges are designed to retain users by providing precisely tuned objectives (Challenges) for players to complete. Upon completion, players are rewarded for their efforts and are provided with a next set of Challenges.
Poker Challenges Impact
Poker Challenges are designed for players who seek the thrill of completing micro-objectives, and the results have been positive.
There has been a noticeable increase in retention across all timeframes: 1 day, 3 days, 7 days, and 30 days. Additionally, the number of hands played has also increased.
However, there has been little movement in the Average Revenue Per Daily Active User (ARPDAU). The theory is that we may be giving out too many prizes, which leads players to feel less inclined to spend. Fortunately, these issues are easily adjustable; we can increase the effort required to earn rewards or reduce the amount offered.
VIP CENTER REFRESH
Exclusive Status for the top payers!
Every casino has an exclusive VIP club. It’s an essential experience to be invited into the VIP club because of the contribution you made. The VIP Program in Zynga Poker provides additional purchasing perks and personalized customer support for Poker VIPs.
The feature refresh stems from the need to:
- introduce new VIP tiers
- improve UI so the perks are more spelled out for our VIPs
REWARD CENTER
As the final step of the core loop, players can redeem their tickets they earned from Challenges into these “Gacha” machines – Bronze, Silver or Gold vaults. Each tier of vaults gives you chances of winning varying amount of chips or gold coins and other special items.
MESSAGE CENTER
This feature is an peripheral feature to communicate with the players on our current events. The goal is to drive players to where the new things are and act as an information center.
TOURNAMENTS
A new brand partnership with WPT got us thinking to create this Tournament space as a destination. This destination houses WPT tournament game modes such as Spin & Win and Sit & Go. This feature provides variety for players who are looking for gameplay different than Hold’em.
PURCHASE STORE
The portal to our paycheck! The buypage demanded a much needed refresh to modern day. There were several complains that the images were too small to differentiate between packages. The buypage is a very sensitive screen to overhaul and many experiments were set up to test every aspect of the UI to drive conversion.
STYLE GUIDE
Without visual guides, Zynga Poker would be visually inconsistent. Our team had made many efforts in unifying our visual language.
SOCIAL CENTER
The Challenge
Zynga Poker has always been a social game. As part of a company-wide initiative to integrate social features into every game in our portfolio, our team was tasked with enhancing Poker’s current social aspects.
Through user insights, we discovered that players primarily communicate through the temporary table chat. Many users expressed a desire to continue their conversations outside of the game. In response, we developed the concept of the “Social Hub”—a dedicated space where players can connect with each other.