Suggestion: Funding this game
Day 2,682, 04:08
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Published in United Kingdom 
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by
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by Max Blue
In this article I am going to suggest some new ideas of how the admins could fund the improvement of eRepublik in the future. People dislike the reliance this game has on Gold and that is a fair position, but how else will the developers be able to finance improvements? Well...
Option 1.
eRepublik is one of the few websites I use that does not use external adverts to support the sites existence. Simply, eRepublik makes a space on the homepage for an advert. Each time you go to your homepage there is a new add there. This page gets a lot of traffic so the game could generate revenue relatively quickly from just one add. This is not suggesting video adds or adds with sound as this would be irritating just a standard visual add.
Possible locations that are not too intrusive and still have high view locations.
Ads for jeans, holidays, even insurance in picture form is not irritating in my oppinion.
Option 2.
Launch a crowd funding campaign. These typically last for around a month. The person or company starting a project sets up a page on a crowd funding website. They explain what they need the money for and offer rewards to those that back the campaign with donations. Only when the project reaches its target goal donations get accepted. This is a community project and is a great way to get a large boost of revenue for a particular goal. Rewards don't have to cost eRepublik much, they could be an Investor Medal (just like CP or BH medals), a tour around eRepublik development HQ, sneak peaks at the changes you are funding, draft copies of ideas the admins had (in paper form or digital) and for a high enough donation a meeting with the owners of erepublik (translator included)? This is just a suggestion, don't hate the concept of raising money this way if you don't like the idea of the reward/s.
Nice crop-top?
A crowd funding campaign would utilise the relative size of the player base and expose the game to crowd-funding-page regulars.
Option 3.
Watch videos for Gold. Create a page where players can go to watch ads and earn Gold. Advertisers want you to watch their ads. Advertisers pay eRepublik per ad the player watches. The player then gets paid the amount in Gold for watching the ad that eRepublik got in cash for the ad being watched.
Players would be able to chose which ads or even categories of ad they chose to view. Say you like watches, well then you chose watch ads. Going on holiday this year? Holiday ads. The same people that pay youtube will pay eRepublik for confirmed views of their videos (it may be a different rate but believe me businesses want to sell products and they will come to do business).
I want to see large improvements to the game I enjoy. I believe the game will benefit if it does not rely so much on Gold sales for financing. Comment with all the options you think would be a good idea to and get more improve the development of eRepublik! I will send this article to the admins after 48 hours.
Vote, shout and endorse this article if you like it. I will have more suggestion articles in the future and information on the international group 'IDA' soon, so subscribe now for those.
Option 1.
eRepublik is one of the few websites I use that does not use external adverts to support the sites existence. Simply, eRepublik makes a space on the homepage for an advert. Each time you go to your homepage there is a new add there. This page gets a lot of traffic so the game could generate revenue relatively quickly from just one add. This is not suggesting video adds or adds with sound as this would be irritating just a standard visual add.
Possible locations that are not too intrusive and still have high view locations.
Ads for jeans, holidays, even insurance in picture form is not irritating in my oppinion.
Option 2.
Launch a crowd funding campaign. These typically last for around a month. The person or company starting a project sets up a page on a crowd funding website. They explain what they need the money for and offer rewards to those that back the campaign with donations. Only when the project reaches its target goal donations get accepted. This is a community project and is a great way to get a large boost of revenue for a particular goal. Rewards don't have to cost eRepublik much, they could be an Investor Medal (just like CP or BH medals), a tour around eRepublik development HQ, sneak peaks at the changes you are funding, draft copies of ideas the admins had (in paper form or digital) and for a high enough donation a meeting with the owners of erepublik (translator included)? This is just a suggestion, don't hate the concept of raising money this way if you don't like the idea of the reward/s.
Nice crop-top?
A crowd funding campaign would utilise the relative size of the player base and expose the game to crowd-funding-page regulars.
Option 3.
Watch videos for Gold. Create a page where players can go to watch ads and earn Gold. Advertisers want you to watch their ads. Advertisers pay eRepublik per ad the player watches. The player then gets paid the amount in Gold for watching the ad that eRepublik got in cash for the ad being watched.
Players would be able to chose which ads or even categories of ad they chose to view. Say you like watches, well then you chose watch ads. Going on holiday this year? Holiday ads. The same people that pay youtube will pay eRepublik for confirmed views of their videos (it may be a different rate but believe me businesses want to sell products and they will come to do business).
If you think companies won't pay eRepublik or any other website for cold hard views of their video ads you are mistaken.
I want to see large improvements to the game I enjoy. I believe the game will benefit if it does not rely so much on Gold sales for financing. Comment with all the options you think would be a good idea to and get more improve the development of eRepublik! I will send this article to the admins after 48 hours.
Vote, shout and endorse this article if you like it. I will have more suggestion articles in the future and information on the international group 'IDA' soon, so subscribe now for those.
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Comments
I believe option 1, 2 and 3 are a good idea.
But where would they place erep related commercials 😃
Anyway I think eRep already makes a bit of money from tracking our other internet activities. I would dislike the idea of half my screen being covered by half-naked people as I have to log in in University at times.
Ads in your country are all half-naked people? In the UK these are few in my experience. What about option 2 and 3?
I was refering to the pics in your screens. half-naked ppl maybe doesn't cut it but it makes the page look a bit ... not reputable at least. That wouldn't be a major problem since I believe most people use popup blockers but that'd defeat the purpose (kind of) and I'd never trust a page that wants me to turn it off. The main problem with that is that it makes erep even slower.
eReps public image does not allow for option 2 and I don't think they'd be willing to do what it takes to work on this.
3 may be an option but how do you determine when and how many vids you have to watch. I'd hate if in the midst of a battle erep would tell me oh you have to watch this video now. Watching one vid after the daily tasks may be an option or adding it as an additional daily task (watching 5 vids on 5 different days will give you some minor advantage)
Honestly I wanted to find the best looking picture of someone wearing jeans to try and keep peoples attention on the article and not clicking off. I have obviously failed if all you can think about is that. 🙂
I was thinking of embedded ads not pop ups.
Also it would be you don't have to watch any ads at all, but if you want to make some extra Gold you can. Its like the buy Gold option, you don't have to do it, but its an option.
I wouldn't mind seeing half-naked people, at least then we can have some fun on this game!
lana 🙁
Cheetah, you are really like me.
Not bad ideas, all of them, but admins will only use this to top up their cash flow rather than replace gold buyers
why the heck we need to help/fund plato? do you know that plato gets thousand of euros every year?
do you know how many goldbuyers are in erep? do you know how much profit does plato get from combat packs, war stash, tycoon stash, blabla-tash?
and, you're joking right?
http://i.imgur.com/wPg8h9Q.gif
Do you not see the game relies heavily on Gold buyers? 🙂
If Plato has more revenue streams he will not be so dependent on Gold buyers and will allow the average 'free player' to get more out of the game as not as many things will require Gold.
Even if Plato just brings in extra money and keeps Gold buying a key feature, he will have more to invest in improving the game. New economy module? New military module?
If you have seen Plato's facebook you will see the huge amount of people eRepublik employs. Take wages (even if you assume they are the lowest possible for their field), building costs (again assume the lowest figure and it is still large) and infrastructure upkeep costs, then how much profit is being made? Answer, probably not that much. He took a loan out a couple of years ago, how much of that has he paid off? You think he will not invest more money in trying to sustain his company? Without continued investment an internet based game is going to be non-existent in no time. He will invest in his own future, i.e. this game. If he gets more money, more will go into the game.
Good ideas 🙂
One of the things I DO like about eRep is that there are no ads, so I'm not sure how much I'd be behind that suggestion. However the vid watching one might be ok.
I suppose it all depends on whether the developers believe the effort needed to make these changes will bring in more money than just relying on gold buyers.
The best way of Plato making money is to stop dumbing down of the game and make it a lot more fun and interesting circa 2010 or so. By increasing the playerbase then you get more revenue even if a low % of the players might invest. The problem with the way Plato does things is that everything feels like a money grab.
Down the years in various games, I have donated probably thousands of pounds but usually only for sites where I feel I want to support it.
I used to play Alien Adoption Agency in the early 2000s and didn't mind chucking a fiver every month for the upgrade pack that would enable a few cosmetic things like custom avatars etc. The moment Webby (or was it Dave? Or was Webby's real name Dave??) forced people to pay £5 a month or people would be forced out of 95% of the content - you'd have to spend your entire time using your energy trying to farm enough to buy credits to be able to access the other 95%. But then you'd have no energy etc in which to do anything in the other 95%... I stopped playing then.
Pay circa £15 a year for what is largely a cosmetic upgrade in games like Battrick or Hattrick? Not a problem as it is a choice.
The problem with eRepublik is in the past you could get away with buying gold although it was always a useful boost if you wanted it. Gold never dictated what you could do as the economy modal back then enabled you to trade and make money if you wanted it. Back then I did quite a bit of gold buying. With all the dumbing down, you basically need to donate to get yourself anywhere. If I started playing more recently then I certainly would not donate. Back then, it seemed like an investment.
All in all, Plato would be better off finding a way of rewinding the game back to its glory years and get the income that an increase of the playerbase would cause. Not try desparately to squeeze out as much money as possible out of a decreasing playerbase...
Interesting points, similar to you I used to buy gold, now I think meh. Ironically making the game more gold-centric has made me stop buying it!
i like option 3. thats how alot of games make money.
I've seen a few games use option 1, and loads use option 3. I don't think I would be happy about ads, but option 3 is a good idea. I would say I'm surprised that eRepublik isn't already using option 3 but then if you look at the way the game is being run I wouldn't ever expect it.
I agree with Cheetah.
o7
I mean no disrespect, but these options of yours is advertising 101. Plato more than likely has considered outside advertisements and without a doubt has decided against it.
The real question is not how Erep can advertise, but rather, why has it chosen not to? Figure that out and we may end up on the same page as Plato.
You're right its not rocket science. 🙂
I think I understand the idea behind his logic but I'm not sure I agree with it. The only reason I can come with why Plato doesn't advertise is because he wants us to become wrapped up in his virtual world. Seeing RL ads breaks the 'spell' if you will of keeping game play at the top of players minds will on eRepublik.
I've put my money where my mouth is
For the first time in my life
http://www.erepublik.com/en/article/1-2509724/1/20
In the past, you could watch videos for gold. What you have to realise is that the majority of eRep players are not in the regions that get the most amount of money per click/view. Those regions, UK, US, Singapore, China, Japan, South Korea, etc, are either hugely underpopulated or can't access the site at all.
Even then, when they did have this a few years ago UK based players could get maybe 1-2 gold a day with new offers. The majority of offers required you to start an account on another game (paid), begin a subscription with a company like Lovefilm, or open an online betting account.
Those Idea's? Let me think! I said let me think!! SILENCE!!!! Em, oh yeah, those seem fair enough 🙂
o7
Let's just hope that we don't have to pay for everything in the near future like Club Penguin!!!
Keep it a freemium game Plato
o/
Inb4 I get eurovision trash ads because of ArcanicMindje.
o7
3 would be good, maybe 1, I don't like ads, but maybe one wouldn't be a problem.
o7
http://www.erepublik.com/en/article/i-really-don-t-like-plato-endorse-journalist-2509477/1/20
please comment too
o7
I don't mind a few adverts if we get something worthwhile in return
a comment you say?
COMMENT
Amazing, well done