In-Game Advertising and Gamers’ Behavior in App Environment: An Abstract

The Global Games Market Report released by Newzoo has shown that almost 2.2 billion gamers across the world are estimated to have generated sales volume of US $108.9 billion in 2017. Mobile gaming is performing as the most lucrative segment with the highest potential growth. More than half of the US population play games on their smartphones and tablets and the percentage of population who play games on smart devices is expected to hit 63.7% in 2020. The time people spent on gaming apps accounts for 32% of the total time spent online. Not surprisingly, with the trend of increasing time spent on gaming apps, companies’ expenditure on mobile gaming apps advertisements is increasing accordingly. Mobile advertisement spending is estimated to hit US $195.55 billion which accounts for 70.1% of digital ads.

Even though there is a noticeable market value in the mobile gaming apps industry, there has been limited research examining experiential value of gamers in respect to in-game ads in gaming apps. This study addresses this gap in the literature by examining factors associated with “Experiential Value of Gamers through Ads in Gaming Apps (EVGAGA)” as well as investigating its antecedents (in terms of cognitive and affective involvement) and consequences (positive word of mouth and continuance intention to play gaming apps). A total of 600 valid responses from gamers were used to test the model fit, measurement and structural models, conditional probabilistic queries, and nonlinearity. This study found that EVGAGA is a second-order factor of four constructs: escapism, enjoyment, social affiliation, and entertainment. The structural paths between cognitive/affective involvement and dimensions of EVGAGA are supported. Surprisingly, only social affiliation and entertainment values predict positive word of mouth and continuance intention to play gaming apps. Furthermore, the results of multi-group analysis indicate that the relationship between Enjoyment → Continuance intention to play gaming apps is stronger for those having high level of attachment to games. The findings have important implications for companies that could help develop brand and communication strategies. For instance, by understanding factors associated with experiential value of gamers, companies could leverage specific advertisement formats and present their ads to the right audience in the right gaming apps and at the right time.