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31st January 2015

AOL Canada Set To Launch In-House Video Production Studio

AOL CanadaAOL Canada has announced an extensive investment in video with the plans to launch a full-service in-house video studio. Pivoting off of AOL Canada’s success in video, which saw 53% growth year-over-year in total video views*, AOL continues to dominate as the leading online destination for premium video content**. The studio is the most recent initiative of a long list of significant investments in video by the media company. Read the rest of this entry »

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29th January 2015

Victoria’s KANO/APPS Discusses User Acquisition

KANO/APPS  is a Victoria BC mobile and social game developer that has been very successful with game distribution on Facebook and is on the verge of launching a new game for iOS distribution. Go2mobi interviews KANO/APPS CEO Tim Teh for Village Gamer.

Tell Us about KANO/APPS

KANO/APPS focusing on mid-core to hardcore RPGers, KANO/APPs develops free-to-play strategy games. Mob Wars: La Cosa Nostra is one of our more popular games.

Our smaller, niche audience provides more focused opportunities for in-game monetization. Since we’re free-to-play, about 95% of monetization occurs through in-app purchases, such as vanity items & power-ups.

We develop strategy games rather than “casual games.” Our users invest a lot of time into playing the games, and so, with the popularity of tablets and other screens, it makes sense to launch a mobile version of our game. Mobile gives us the opportunity to provide more engagement for our users.

We’re getting ready to launch a game called Free Rider HD on mobile for iOS.

Free Rider HD is the sequel to one of the most played online games of all time with over 500 million plays and +1 million player drawn tracks.

 

We are doing the development work, while Ira provides the intellectual property (IP). For game developers a great strategy is to partner with someone with established, compelling IP. Of course, for startups this can be risky depending on the IP partner because there may be revenue expectations, and it can be tough to determine how successful your game will be.

What has been the biggest change since you started making games?

In the past it was challenging and expensive to develop games for different platforms. The challenge at the time was we could not respond quickly to user needs in order to optimize acquisition and monetization.

However, now with better devices and utilizing HTML5, it’s easy to update quickly across multiple platforms.

How do you acquire new users?

For desktop we typically work with partners such an online games hosting websites that help us to publish our games and worry about distribution so that we can focus on game development.

We started out on desktop at the dawn of Facebook. We have experienced a ton of success working with several desktop portals including Kongregate and Armor Games.

What do you think is the key mobile advertising for game developers?

For user acquisition on mobile a tool that can identify users by demographic and by OS would be important. We’re looking for relatively affluent, English-speaking users on iOS. So a tool that provides that degree of precision would be important.

Tim Teh is CEO of KANO/APPS has launched a number of new titles in 2014, and will launch even more in 2014. Check out the amazing trailers for some of their games here.

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Mobile Advertising Insights for Game Developers

Mobile advertising provides an additional tool to drive user acquisition.

With mobile advertising, there are tactics and strategies that optimize and dramatically lower the cost of acquisition. An approach for a developer like KANO/APPS might look like the following:

  • Create initial modest test campaigns targeted at iOS users in their target countries.
  • Target one at related games and APPS likely to be played by folks who would like their new game.
  • Target another campaign targeted at people frequenting mobile sites with related content.
  • Run the campaigns for a short while, gathering enough data to provide insights.
  • Look at performance by iOS version, iOS device, region, app placements, site placements and other factors.
  • Taking the just the highest performing pockets from the targets noted above, create new campaigns targeting just those pockets. For instance, there may be specific iOS versions and devices that dramatically outperform others, or there may be specific targeted APPS that work very well.
  • Get to work on optimizing those campaigns and scaling them up further as performance dictates.

Go2mobi is a Mobile Audience Targeting Platform and used by many different kinds of performance based advertisers, brands, and agencies around the world. The company is based in Victoria, BC.

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28th January 2015

Xbox Live Games With Gold For February 2015

Xbox 360Looking for something new and shiny to get you through the dreary month of February? Microsoft invites you to check out the latest Xbox Games with Gold offering, giving Xbox Live members one game for Xbox One and two additional games for Xbox 360: Read the rest of this entry »

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28th January 2015

Telefilm Canada Names Ten Canadians To Watch At 2015 Berlin International Film Festival

Telefilm CanadaTelefilm Canada has announced its list of the Ten Canadians to Watch who will be taking part in the upcoming Berlin International Film Festival and the European Film Market (from February 5 to 15). This list, presented for a second year running, comprises Canadians working in the film industry—emerging talents as well as seasoned professionals—who, through their creative talent or business acumen, are making their mark on the national and international scene. Read the rest of this entry »

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28th January 2015

Disney XD Canada Orders Second Season Of Gaming Show (In My Parents’ Garage)

disneyxdDisney XD Canada announced today a season two order for its innovative original series Gaming Show (In My Parents’ Garage) from Banger Films’ kids division, B-Minors. Ten new 30-minute episodes of the Canadian Screen Award nominated, live-action show brings the series total to 20, with production set to begin in Toronto next month. The series, which debuted in November with a six-episode run, currently ranks as the network’s #1 series for boys aged 6-12.1 Read the rest of this entry »

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27th January 2015

New Program Deadline For Canada-Wallimage Incentive

Canada Media FundThe Canada Media Fund (CMF) would like to inform all applicants of a change to the closing date for the Canada – Wallonia Digital Media Incentive for Multiplatform Projects program. Applicants can now submit their applications until February 17, 2015.  Read the rest of this entry »

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27th January 2015

Telefilm Canada Names Interim Director Of Business Affairs And Certification

Telefilm CanadaTelefilm Canada has announced that Roxane Girard, currently Director, Administration of the Canada Media Fund (CMF) Programs, will serve as Director, Business Affairs and Certification, for the coming months. Ms. Girard has nearly 20 years’ experience in the Canadian film and television industry. Read the rest of this entry »

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26th January 2015

Family Channel, Disney Junior and Disney XD Programming Highlights For February 2015

dhx mediaListed below you will find all of the Family Channel, Disney Junior and Disney XD program highlights coming your way for February, with a few sneak peeks at what’s coming up in March. All programming is subject to change, time zones as noted.  Read the rest of this entry »

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23rd January 2015

Canadian Government Announces Support To Build Capacity Of BC’s Creative Industries

Government of CanadaEarlier today Cathy McLeod, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Labour and for Western Economic Diversification, and Member of Parliament for Kamloops — Thompson — Cariboo, on behalf of the Honourable Michelle Rempel, Minister of State for Western Economic Diversification, announced $1.2 million in funding to Creative BC to build the capacity of British Columbia’s creative industries. Read the rest of this entry »

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22nd January 2015

Telefilm Canada Renews Micro-Budget Production Program

Telefilm CanadaFor a third year, Telefilm Canada continues to support emerging feature film talent through its Micro-Budget Production Program. This Program seeks to stimulate the use of digital distribution platforms in order to increase audience access to the work of new Canadian talent. In its first two years, the Micro-Budget Production Program supported the production of 22 films, several of which have been exhibited at important festivals. Read the rest of this entry »

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