How do Telegram games make money?

"The Ton ecosystem is on the eve of takeoff, and this has been said for three years." This was a joke that Ton chain was often made some time ago. In the eyes of many people, as Telegram's public chain, Ton was once in the top of the crypto financing rankings, but for many years it has always been like a plane circling on the airport runway, never taking off.

But today, as if to make up for this joke, the mini-games on Telegram have entered a prosperous stage.

"Now there are at least more than a hundred mini-games running on Telegram, and more than 2,000 games are being prepared for launch at the end of this month. I guess Telegram itself didn't expect this day, and suddenly so many mini-games would pour in." Zong Yue (pseudonym) said excitedly.

In the previous article " The domestic small and medium-sized game manufacturers that are trapped in the bottom of the box are being saved by the TON chain ", we discussed the development of the Telegram mini-game market from the perspective of game developers. However, developing game code and technical services is completely different from successfully operating and making profits on TON.

How can the project parties of Telegram mini-games achieve profitability? Will anyone really charge money for Telegram mini-games? With these questions in mind, I talked to more game project parties.

Traffic business, the ruling area of the Chinese

When discussing how Telegram mini-games can make money through hybrid monetization models, selling traffic ads is one of the important ways.

In addition to doing his own projects in the cryptocurrency circle, the 30-year-old Zong Yue is also a middle-aged man who loves to play games. He believes that he has a deep understanding of the game industry. He pointed out that most of the revenue of small games on Telegram comes from advertising revenue from other project parties, rather than player recharges.

"Most of the domestic game market is such a business. For Chinese people with Internet thinking, this is their dominant area." In fact, it is better to say that the current Telegram traffic business is prosperous rather than the current Telegram small games.

If you are a newly established project party and need a traffic platform to help the project party get more exposure and real traffic, what methods will you use? Finding cryptocurrency media may be one way, such as the rhythm BlockBeats.

Another method that was widely used before is to find some mainstream web3 task platforms. However, according to Zong Yue, after testing their traffic channels, these platforms now have almost no real users, "Basically, studios are doing it, and few individual users use these task platforms."

Newly established project parties need a traffic platform to gain exposure and real traffic, and Telegram mini games just provide such a platform.

Most Telegram mini games are the same business as these web3 task platforms. The core is to make money by accepting advertisements from project parties. They are doing traffic business, so they have caused a lot of competition for traditional web3 task platforms.

Zong Yue pointed out: "Even if the flow and traffic were good before, the prosperity of Telegram mini-games may indeed lead to the elimination of traditional web3 task platforms, unless they also go out to do BOT and eat up this part of the market."

Not only the project parties, but also smart VC capital has set its sights on TON's traffic gold mine and personally participated. Vertex Capital is one of them. Investing money in a project does not mean that everything is fine. Most capitals also have post-investment business, including helping projects to incubate and support resources.

Therefore, in order to activate users of different project parties under its umbrella, especially its NFT projects and metaverse projects, such as HAPE and Meet48. Vertex Capital is developing a Mini game Token hunter on Telegram.

Token hunter game beta test image

Like most VCs, Vertex Capital is also optimistic about the market for Telegram mini games. "Although it is mainly wool games at present, from a technical point of view, Telegram mini games are very similar to WeChat mini games and can fully support some exquisite games."

It is said that VCs cannot get involved in the TON ecosystem, but Vertex Capital has used another way to get involved. Their needs are very clear. The game functions do not need to be too deep. They should be simple and interesting, convenient for web2 users to enter, and the development process is easy to iterate. It seems that there is nothing more suitable than the Telegram mini game channel.

"And Telegram has lower audit compliance costs, and the game market is likely to surpass the WeChat mini-game market. This means that this will be a market with hundreds of millions of monthly active users and tens of billions of annual market revenue." The relevant person in charge of Vertex Capital told BlockBeats. They believe that with the user volume of Telegram, many new project parties will gain a huge potential user base.

Will anyone really recharge TG mini-games?

At first, I was skeptical about whether players would recharge Telegram mini-games, but the communication with Sleepy changed my mind.

"Everyone thinks that Telegram mini-games are all about wool-pulling and airdrops, but in fact, this is an information cocoon and a misunderstanding." Sleepy is the founder of NFT Weirdo Ghost Gang (Little Ghost), which was founded and operated at the end of 2021. It is one of the well-known web3 NFT brands in the Chinese-speaking region. Recently, they officially announced their own Telegram mini-game " OUTA ", which is expected to be launched in August.

Unlike the business of selling traffic in Telegram mini-games, Sleepy wants to provide a game that can better carry IP for the holders of Little Ghost NFT, and he is also confident in the possibility of players recharging in the game. "Including other project parties we have contacted before, they all said that the number of users who play games with krypton gold far exceeds their expectations."

Some official announcements of OUTA games

For example, Scarlett, an investor of Pluto, the publisher of Catizen, revealed that through the paid purchase module of game props, Catizen has achieved more than 16 million US dollars in revenue and more than 500,000 paying customers (Atomic Wallet). This shows that players are willing to pay for virtual items and value-added services in the game.

"In addition to Catizen, some top projects generate revenue through advertising, with a monthly turnover of 1.8 million US dollars. This is a considerable income that can help them stabilize the market and make the game last longer." The person who said this was Jeremy, who has two Telegram mini-games under his command, QGame and PalMiner, which are being launched.

"The blockchain game industry has always had a problem with selling pressure, and the NFT market has almost collapsed. Many games have disappeared due to selling pressure, but the recharge channels in the game can partially alleviate this selling pressure." Before making Telegram mini-games, Jeremy also had a background in NFT projects.

Jeremy also pointed out that in order to attract more Web2 users to the game, the original intention of making games is to make the game more attractive and playable. Users recharge through game experience, rather than just recharging for airdrops, which can solve some of the selling pressure.

Talking more deeply about the topic of game player recharges, Sleepy believes that today's Telegram mini-games can better help manage players in layers, but it is difficult to do this according to the traditional blockchain game model. For example, users are divided into pure free players, light krypton gold players, and heavy krypton gold players. "There is no distinction between these players, they are all contributing to the game. But many projects try to convert light krypton gold users into heavy krypton gold users, which I think is difficult to achieve because these two types of users are essentially different."

The traditional chain game model restricts the participation of light krypton gold players, because many projects require the purchase of "shovels" to play, and these "shovels" are usually expensive. In contrast, the props of Web2 mobile games are relatively cheap. For example, a skin in Honor of Kings is about $5, while the price of many chain game props may be tens or even hundreds of dollars, which undoubtedly hinders the participation of light krypton gold players.

In contrast, small games can better attract these light krypton gold players to participate, and realize the "Twisted Tangle" mentioned above. Through small payments such as $0.99 and $1.99, small amounts can accumulate into a lot, and small profits but quick turnover can also be achieved.

As a player who has recharged thousands of dollars in Telegram mini-games, Zong Yue is also optimistic about and agrees with the recharge prospects of Telegram mini-games. "Although the playability is a little worse now, to put it bluntly, everyone is recharging for airdrops, but we will soon see some more addictive mini-games."

Hybrid monetization will be the mainstream in the future

Today's Telegram mini-games are benchmarked against WeChat mini-games, which has been deeply rooted in the hearts of the people. Therefore, most of the current Telegram mini-games can also learn from the monetization model of traditional mini-games.

The visible trend is that traditional mini-games are trying to increase their revenue sources through hybrid monetization, which means increasing the original single revenue channel to multiple channels of revenue.

Casual games that used to be monetized only through advertising may also suddenly explode into krypton gold casual games. Zynga's "Twisted Tangle" is a typical case. As a puzzle knot, it accumulates small payments to accumulate a lot. There is no $648, only $0.99 and $1.99 to buy gift packs without advertising. It gathers sand into a tower, and sells at a low profit but high volume. The in-app purchase income has soared, with a monthly turnover of nearly $30 million.

Not only light casual games, but also heavy games are trying to take the mixed monetization path. Many heavy games are also trying to see the necessity of advertising monetization. Adding a little advertising to non-paying players is also a trend. They are all business, so there is nothing to be embarrassed about.

In the game industry, especially in the Web3 industry, it is becoming increasingly difficult to buy volume for chain games. Mixed monetization has become an important means to convert non-paying players into paying users. Telegram mini-games are born with such capabilities, and can also help significantly increase profits through the combination of advertising and in-app purchases.

This can also be seen in Telegram games. According to statistics, Notcoin's monthly income exceeds 300,000 US dollars, and Catizen (one of the most popular TG games at present) has a total income of more than 16 million US dollars, including advertising revenue and player recharge. Then another question comes, with such considerable revenue, will these projects still issue coins?

Issuing coins is an art

"Most projects will issue coins." Zong Yue said firmly.

In Zong Yue's view, although many Telegram games are already very good in terms of revenue and traffic, the traffic business is a structural business with a time window, so projects that do not issue coins are short-sighted.

Issuing coins is also an art. "Many Telegram mini-games have not yet been listed on the coin. One possibility is that they are negotiating with large trading platforms, and there are many tricks involved; another possibility is that they don't even have channels and resources, and are not familiar with the management of coin listing, and are simply dragging users to PUA."

In the latest podcast and article , Sleepy also discussed in detail their views and strategies on coin issuance. His attitude towards coin issuance has undergone a significant change. Initially, Sleepy and his team were resistant to coin issuance, mainly due to compliance issues and long-term impact on project development. Sleepy believes that coin issuance is a double-edged sword. Although it can accelerate project development, it may also cause a project to collapse quickly if used improperly.

They believe that only infrastructure projects are suitable for early token issuance, because these projects have a long verification cycle, and it is difficult to maintain long-term development without tokens. However, for consumer, IP and application projects, Sleepy believes that issuing tokens in the early stages of the project may become a burden, because these projects need time to verify market acceptance.

After a period of development, Sleepy's business model gradually ran through, and they began to consider how to use tokens to motivate community members. They realized that there were many Telegram users willing to pay for content, and the number of users who paid for games was far more than expected. This changed their view on issuing tokens, believing that issuing tokens at the right time can promote the further development of the project.

More and more project parties and VC capital have joined this ecosystem, showing the huge potential of this market. Despite many challenges such as game playability and not "crashing" after issuing tokens, profitable income and huge traffic, Telegram mini-games are gradually proving their market value.

Perhaps in the near future, we will see a truly large-scale Telegram mini-game on TON, or perhaps it has already appeared in our field of vision, but people have not yet really realized it.

This article thanks all the interviewees who provided information. For privacy protection, the information of some interviewees has been blurred.

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