Web3 Games Can Onboard The Next 100M Users In 2 Simple Steps Right Now
Web3 Games Can Onboard The Next 100M Users In 2 Simple Steps Right Now
With a mix of great marketing and a seamless onboarding experience. The current technology built on top of Crypto is enough to onboard the next 100M users through blockchain gaming.
Recently, Reddit was the talk of NFT Twitter after people realised the crazy numbers they were bringing in.
TL;DR: In July 2022, Reddit announced they are selling seasonal collectible avatars (NFTs minted on Polygon) purchasable by creating a Reddit Vault (cryptocurrency wallet). Fast forward to October, 3M+ wallets were created with tens of thousands of avatars being sold.
An excellent example of:
smooth onboarding
current NFT tech being used
utilising an existing userbase
Web3 Games
Blockchain games or Web3 games, whatever you want to call them. I am defining it as: games that utilise the blockchain (cryptocurrency, nfts, sbts⌠etc). The road to tens of millions of users being onboarded through them is clear. This article is for people working on a blockchain game, you are the people that need to make this push to maximise your chance to succeed and help with the mission of onboarding traditional gamers.
And, it doesnât even require new technology to be created. We can use existing tech. All that awaits us now is fun games that people want to play! How? Letâs go through 2 key points.
Marketing
Problem: Misinformation around the word âNFTsâ
Effect: The average gamer hates NFTs.
Solution: Changing the terminology that is currently being used.
Reasoning: First impressions are important. You need to push them to try out your game. If they donât try it out, itâs much harder.
You are not hiding the technology or tricking users. The goal is to attract them to a product and let them experience it. NFTs are an add-on to the product and arenât the purpose of it. Itâs a trend to hate NFTs, the minority is usually the loudest and impacts the majority. It is why anything NFT-related is instantly disliked by the crowd. The hatred stems from a few places, but mostly because of misinformation and bad representation.
I am a firm believer that if you presented a good product, whether itâs a game or an application that people find useful and then add NFTs into the mix in a position that makes sense â people will view them differently.
Why? Because NFTs are just digital assets that can be traded. And, games are the best example of billions of dollars being spent on virtual items that you merely rent. And another recent example is Reddit avatars spoken about at the start of this article.
The point isnât to just change to another term, but to explain in familiar terms to users. Digital collectibles work for reddit. But, not everything is collectibles. Digital Art can work for artists and museums. Or, virtual items for your game.
Onboarding
Problem: Most Crypto applications have bad UI/UX (e.g. Wallet setup, purchasing an NFT, etc.)
Effect: A large % of users do not care to use the product/service because of it.
Solution: Make it seamless and smooth, it should be similar to purchasing a normal digital asset.
Reasoning: To attract users at scale, we need to make it as easy as possible to onboard them.
Alongside marketing, a smooth onboarding process is very important. Even now, it is possible to use the current technology and design it in a way where users canât tell the difference between a normal purchase of a game item.
If you nail the marketing and have attracted the users, your product should speak for itself. The way you design tokenomics plays a part in this (including NFTs). Game designers need to design the UI/UX around it to be seamless.
Forgetting NFTs for a second. If you had to continuously buy things or even enter your credit card details to interact with essential elements in a game you want to play, it wouldnât be a great experience. The same logic applies.
StepN is another project that did it extremely well and attracted millions. What did they do? They allowed you to generate a 12-word seed phrase inside the app which created a wallet for users. No directing users to their PC or another existing wallet app. Surprisingly, they were one of the first to do this simple but necessary step to make the pipeline easier for users.
There is no one formula for success and I am confident there will be many successful games in the future. But I am certain that the marketing and onboarding will be critical for that adoption needed. Letâs not forget that there are still people building on top of this technology making this process easier.
The road to 100M gamers being onboarded is not so far off!
Great content!