2020 & Beyond: A Review of Tapjoy iOS Offerwall

For over a decade, mobile offerwalls played a key role in app monetization, particularly for gaming apps that rely on free-to-play economics to drive revenue. It’s one of the few mobile ad placements that is truly opt-in, allowing users to reap the rewards of the value exchange model. Mobile offers invite app users to test out new games, watch videos, make purchases, and take surveys in exchange for in-game currency.

In April 2019, Apple began to enforce a policy against incentivized installs on the iOS platform. As a result, Tapjoy and other offerwall providers were obliged to remove Cost Per Engagement offers from the iOS Offerwall. These offers invite users to complete fun challenges in a new game or app in return for currency in the publisher app. This popular and profitable ad format remains available on Android devices.

A year later, what’s changed? That’s what our Director of Developer Relations, Dan McAdams, set out to discover. He recently shared the findings with PocketGamer.biz. Here are the highlights:

The changes in policy had no impact on traffic to the Tapjoy Offerwall. Users continued to visit the offerwall, despite the lack of CPE offers. In fact, the number of active offerwall users grew throughout 2019. With no CPI or CPE offers available, users began to complete more surveys and Cost Per Action (CPA) offers. These offers target conversion events on mobile web, rather than within an app.

We’ve also seen a marked growth in CPA ad spend as advertisers embrace the opportunity. The average daily number of active offers was over 700 for 2019, reflecting an uptick in interest from advertisers in these three categories:

• Performance marketers: Brands are increasingly embracing performance-based marketing. This shift to performance is reflected in the diverse range of brands on the Tapjoy platform.
• Direct-to-consumer brands: On the Tapjoy iOS Offerwall, we’re seeing an influx of DTC traffic. Between January 2019 and January 2020, publisher earnings from subscription offers — typically associated with DTC brands — grew by 117%.
• Market researchers: Our global audience of over a billion monthly active users is an ideal fit for market research. Today, survey conversions make up nearly 40% of all those on the iOS Offerwall.

As a result of this growth, CPA ads began to contribute more to total ARPDAU. Moving forward, we’re focused on optimizing CPA and creating new opportunities for advertisers.

Between COVID-19 and global stay-at-home orders, and the amazing traction of the Black Lives Matter protests, 2020 has been an eventful year. Unsurprisingly, these massive cultural shifts also affected brand advertisers’ ad spend. But throughout the year, users have stayed active on the offerwall.

We saw many brands pause ad spend for various reasons, during COVID-19. For example, some subscription services had to put production on hold, therefore necessitating a pause on ad spend. Meanwhile, meal delivery services saw a huge increase in organic demand, so they paused ad spend as they scaled their fulfillment infrastructure. Then, in June, a lot of brands paused in support of BLM. The graphs below illustrate the trends in CPA ad spend and conversions on the Tapjoy iOS offerwall.

We’ve taken a bullish stance towards the iOS offerwall and have an ambitious product roadmap for the years ahead. That said, there are a few optimizations publishers can implement to maximize earnings today:

• Use custom creative assets to make your offerwall feel like a native part of the in-app experience. Talk to your Tapjoy rep if you’d like our designers to create a custom theme and header graphic for your offerwall.
• Run currency sales. During currency sales, publishers multiply rewards for a short period to increase offerwall traffic and drive revenue. This tactic is particularly effective on iOS. On average, our partners see a 20-80% increase in revenue and engagement that extends beyond the sale period.
• Optimize currency exchange rates per country to make rewards more appealing. One US-based fighter game increased its daily revenue by 135% in Russia with this feature.

These are just a few examples, but we’re always working on new revenue-driving features. Stay tuned for future product updates and please reach out to our team if you would like to talk further about any of the updates above.

While the offerwall on iOS has yet to bounce back to its original state across all providers, we are optimistic about the future. It’s clear that users value offerwalls and view them as a crucial part of their gaming experience. The influx of performance-focused brand also bodes well for the years ahead.

Want to get the full low-down on iOS? Check out Dan McAdams’ full post on PocketGamer.biz!