How mobile gaming has stepped into the franchising world

The mobile-gaming market is booming. Fortunately, there are plenty of opportunities for savvy franchisors and franchisees to benefit from this budding industry

How mobile gaming has stepped into the franchising world

Technology has changed everything. Over the past two decades tech giants like Apple and Google have fundamentally changed the way we enjoy entertainment. Just take video games for instance. While players of the 1990s had to plug in their Sega Mega Drive into their stationary TVs, modern players can play everywhere on their smartphones. Fortunately, this presents tech-savvy franchisees with a great opportunity.

And you just have to look at the figures to see how franchisees with some entrepreneurial flair can benefit from stepping into the market. For starters, there were an estimated 2.3 billion users global smartphone in 2017. As this number is expected to keep rising, so does the opportunities within the mobile market. Most notably, the biggest growth within the mobile arena has been the surge of mobile gaming. As the UK gaming market rose to a value of £4.3bn in 2016, the mobile game revenue of the sector jumped by a breathtaking 16.9% to £995m, according to research from The UK Association of Interactive Entertainment. Furthermore, the global mobile gaming revenue is anticipated to account for a whopping 42% of the expected $107bn gaming revenue in 2017, according to Newzoo, the game and esport market-intelligence firm.

Given how much the mobile game market is set to grow, it’s easy to see how it can also revolutionalise the traditional franchise industry. In fact, the franchisors in the market are bullish about their ability to completely tear up the traditional franchise rule book.

Rather than being a man in a van or a store covering a specific physical area, these game franchises cover virtual space. More to the point, the franchisees are expected to help the game go viral and boost awareness of games. For instance, at Project M Global, the sale and marketing agent for a London-based mobile gaming studio, franchisees are invited to purchase a piece of virtual real estate, which is essentially a ‘level’ within the game. The franchisee is then expected to help raise awareness around the game via sharing of ‘links’ and content around the game. The mobile-game franchisees will make money in two ways: in-app purchases and advertisement. However, it’s important to recognise that each mobile-gaming franchise might differ depending on each studio’s requirements.

But just like in traditional franchising, budding franchisees are expected to do their due diligence. No matter what gaming studio you are interested in joining, make sure to thoroughly research the franchisor to find out who their marketing and industry partners are. Moreover, ensure that you understand what your responsibilities are, how the studio works with the mobile providers like Apple and Android, what the studio’s business model looks like and how the game is actually like to play.

Once you’ve done that and if you’re still excited about joining this new franchising sector, there is only one thing to do: let the games begin.  /></p>
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<p><em>This article comes courtesy of <a href=Project M Global, the sale and marketing agent for a London-based mobile gaming studio

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