Mobile Gaming World Record Set in Star Wars Pinball
Hundreds of thousands of players from around the world competed in Star Wars Pinball: Balance of the Force January 24-26, during the Kiip Mobile Gaming Championship competition. The top score from the competition set the World Record for Star Wars Pinball. That record belongs to Todd from California, who posted a score of 1,960,548,846, smashing the previous high score. The average score from the competition was 4,496,797, establishing Todd’s score as something extraordinary. This score secured a spot in the Guinness World Records™ 2015 Gamer’s Edition. Todd also won the Star Wars: The Complete Saga for his amazing score, among other prizes. The Kiip Mobile Gaming Championship has since set four World Records, establishing Mobile Gaming as a rising source of worldwide competition.
Over 2B Kiip reward moments reached by mobile app users in 2013.
Mobile app users reached 2,082,402,824 reward moments with Kiip last year. That’s 10X last year’s total.
That's 2B opportunities to excite a real person with a brand experience unrivaled in the mobile space. M&M's, Hulu, Propel, McDonald's, Ford, Teen's Choice Awards and many more made for a great 2013 of rewards.
2014 is primed to be a huge year.
For more information about Kiip rewards, please contact [email protected].
Last year we posted an in-depth analysis of trends across the Kiip Fitness Network. Interesting insights included New Year’s Resolutions user behavior, most popular workout times and most popular workout days.
This year we moved beyond user behavior trends, and explored how the Kiip fitness category has grown as a whole.
Fitness Users Grow by Over 2x
We saw over 2X growth in fitness users compared to last year. The charge has been led by new app partners FitStar, Seven, Adrian Peterson Driven and Dwayne Wade Driven. Meanwhile, existing apps Nexercise, C25K and Gympact continued their growth.
New Users Month Over Month
While Year over Year growth was healthy, the Month over Month growth from December 2013 to January 2014 was heavily attributed to New Users entering the network with a 171% increase (New Year’s resolutions seeming a likely explanation). Similar to last year, these trends held steady throughout the month of January.
Huge Session Growth
Fitness users logged more than 65 million session in January 2014. This is up 387% from last year. Both new app partners and the natural growth of users contributed to this growth but the most interesting stat is the number of sessions per user. Kiip fitness users logged over 11.4 sessions per month compared to five sessions last year.
We expect to see more exciting growth. As connected devices get smarter, user adoption increases and Brands continue to show more interest in mobile fitness, the link between fitness and mobile devices grows stronger.
Here’s an example Kiip reward in Fitness:
That have been exciting for people:
I just won a $2 Amazon MP3 credit from Secret by doing well in GymPact! #KiipReward http://t.co/T9LeszhM
— haerie pyo (@haeriepyo) September 15, 2012
To learn more about getting your brand or app into the Kiip Fitness Network, please contact [email protected].
Kiip Up #34: The World's Best Mobile Gamer Is Crowned
Hello Kiipers!
After hundreds of thousands of players from around the world competed in five grueling competitions over the span of three months, the Kiip Mobile Gaming Championship has officially crowned the world’s best mobile gamer—16-year-old Aryana Garza from Brownsville, Texas.
Aryana beat out the other 17 finalists competing in the final round, recording the high score in a weekend tournament of Star Wars Pinball: Balance of the Force. To the victor goes the spoils, and she took home a PS4, Star Wars: The Complete Saga on Blu-ray, the Guinness World Records 2014 Edition Book, the coveted 1st place trophy and much more.
This has been an awesome experience that put mobile gaming on the map and gave it the worldwide competitive tournament it deserved. We couldn’t have done it without the support of Guinness World Records, Twitch, the developers who opened up their games to host the competitions and the hundreds of thousands of players that made this a fierce battle to the very end. Be on the lookout for our next tournament in the spring and kiip playing!
Kiip Press and Happenings
I was honored to be featured on Forbes’ 30 Under 30 in marketing and advertising list again this year. (No comment on my outfit)
As part of the 30 Under 30, I had the chance to sit down with Forbes Executive Editor Michael Noer and talk about how Kiip is redefining mobile advertising.
We debuted a new product called Challenges—think of it as Swarms on steroids.
Our Self-Serve program is proving to be a huge success for brands that sign up. BeachMint discussed how Kiip is helping its jewelry and apparel brands attract new customers.
Our brand partner Mondelez International was honored as the 2013 Mobile Marketer of the Year. Very proud to have contributed to that with the work we did for Sour Patch Kids.
Check out a video interview I did at CES, and my thoughts on the four things that brands learned from CES this year.
I talked with Elite Daily about how working long hours is a small price to pay when you love what you do.
Latest Notable Partnerships
We continue driving the retail redemption movement, this time with a Passbook/Toys “R” Us rewards campaign in Unblock Me.
More work with Unblock Me: we’ve been helping HotelTonight drive more downloads of their app by inviting gamers to spoil themselves with a $25 credit.
Our fitness channel continues to grow at a rapid rate. First there was Tony Gonzalez and FitStar, and now we’re powering fitness rewards in Dwayne Wade and Adrian Peterson’s Driven Fitness apps.
Upcoming Events to Catch Kiip
SXSW is a little over a month away. Come join us at my SXSW talk: “Mobile Zen: The Data Behind Happiness”.
If you’re in San Francisco, stop by the Terra Gallery on February 19th, where our BD Manager Ryan Lessard will be giving a lightning talk at Developerweek called “Art of the App Track”.
I’ll be speaking at Tumblr’s headquarters on February 24th.
Without further ado, here are our favorite links from the past few weeks:
Digiday exposed the shady practice of mobile app install ads, which automatically redirect users to the download page for an app, even though they haven’t even tapped on an ad. It’s the latest questionable move in “the bizarre world of online advertising”, and illustrates why measuring performance purely on installs is the wrong approach, as it encourages this type of abysmal advertising.
This past Christmas, 29 percent of online sales came via mobile. That mobile accounted for nearly a third of all online sales in the most shopping-heavy period is very promising, and shows that mobile commerce is maturing fast and quickly coming into its own. We released an infographic showing the top mobile e-commerce brands (the #1 brand might surprise you).
Mobile advertising’s own State of the Union showed the industry is strong and had a banner year in 2013. On LinkedIn, I discussed three digital marketing tips every brand should know for 2014.
TechCrunch notes Facebook is officially a mobile ad firm now that over half of its ad revenue comes from its nearly one billion mobile users. How did they cross the halfway point? A combination of Facebook’s mobile app install ads and the introduction of new mobile app re-engagement ads. After all the troubles they’ve had with mobile monetization over the past few years, it’s exciting to see they’re on the right track.
Mobile gaming could drive the entire video game industry to $100 billion in revenue by 2017, underscoring that any mobile advertising strategy that doesn’t include games is a shortsighted one. I discussed the future of game monetization in a LinkedIn post (hint: it doesn’t involve banner ads).
Last but not least, Nintendo is expanding into mobile with smartphone apps following struggling Wii U sales. How does a Kiip reward for a 1-UP sound?
Twitch.tv prize pack (Twitch live streamed the final round of gameplay)
The Kiip Mobile Gaming Championship 1st Place Trophy
When asked what her plans for the PS4 were, Aryana said, “I’ll probably give it to my dad and brother,” because she enjoys mobile games more.
Aryana loves pinball in the real world, so she was really excited when she discovered the Championship Round would be Star Wars Pinball: Balance of the Force. Her secret to having the top score? Persistence. Aryana played 60 times over the Final MGC weekend. She also advocates focusing on the game’s many extra bonuses.
To reach the final round, Aryana competed in the qualifying competitions finishing 8th overall across all four games: Into the Dead, 7x7, Lane Splitter and Flick Kick Football Kickoff.
When we asked why she participated in the Mobile Gaming Championship, Aryana said it wasn’t about the prizes—she just wanted to prove she was the best. Spoken like a champ.
Congratulations again to Aryana and stay tuned for our next Mobile Gaming Championship in the spring!
Think your game belongs in the next Mobile Gaming Championship? Let’s talk! Start a conversation.
Announcing the Mobile Gaming Championship, Final Round
“Try not. Do or do not. There is no try.”
The Mobile Gaming Championship Final Round will begin January 24th. Anyone can compete, but only 18 will battle for the title, “World’s Best Mobile Gamer”.
We have three HUGE announcements to share:
[1] The game
[2] Open Guinness World Records™ record competition
[3] Live gameplay will stream on Twitch
[1] “That’s no moon, it’s a…” pinball
Zen Studios’ Stars Wars™ Pinball: Balance of the Force (Android / iOS) will be the final test for competitors in the Mobile Gaming Championship. The 18 qualifiers will compete for rewards including a PS4, Xbox One and Kiip Mobile Gaming Championship 1st Place Trophy.
Others can join during the competition for opportunities to earn MGC rewards, including Star Wars: The Complete Saga Blu-ray, Kiip Prize Pack and the Guinness World Records 2014 Book.
But we have another exciting announcement.
[2] “Impressive. Most Impressive.”
Anybody can compete for the Guinness World Records™ Record. Download Star Wars Pinball: Balance of the Force during the Final Round to record a score for the Kiip Mobile Gaming Championship. The top score by any player during the competition will earn the Guinness World Record™ Record for Star Wars Pinball: Balance of the Force.
The Guinness World Records 2014 Gamer’s Edition just came out, and whoever earns the record during our Final Round will secure their name in next year’s edition.
And one last awesome announcement…
[3] Live MGC Gameplay will Stream on Twitch
Competitors that earned a spot in Finals will be streaming their gameplay on Twitch. See how the best perform on this quest for the crown. Help make this a huge community event by tuning in to Twitch January 24-26.
Want to stream your Star Wars Pinball: Balance of the Force gameplay? Email us!
More info to come…
Follow us on twitter or our blog for the most up-to-date information on the Mobile Gaming Championship.
ZeptoLab and Kiip have partnered to deliver happiness to the entire ZeptoLab games library.
That means players of Cut the Rope, the popular puzzle game with more than 300 million downloads worldwide and one of the most recognized mobile gaming brands in the world, will receive Kiip rewards for their achievement moments.
ZeptoLab and Kiip will also reward players in Cut the Rope: Time Travel and Pudding Monsters. Players can earn rewards in both Android and iOS versions.
This partnerships demonstrates the growing confidence in Kiip as a mobile monetization solution for game and app publishers. Kiip is enabling over 1,500 of the world’s most favorite mobile apps such as Any.Do, 8Tracks, Recipe Search and games from PikPok to use our moments platform to create rich, native engagement with their users while bolstering monetization in “the moment”.
This partnership with ZeptoLab follows closely with an announcement made this past Fall, when we announced a similar relationship with Yahoo! Japan.
Time to lace up your cleats, it's Flick Kick Football Kickoff time! Play Flick Kick Football Kickoff this weekend until 11:59am ET Dec. 1. First place earns a Moto X smartphone. Second place earns a Sphero Original game controller.
Post the highest score to set an official Guinness World Records™ record.
Download Flick Kick Football Kickoff below. Good luck!
*Competed in Into the Dead, Lane Splitter or 7x7 during the first rounds of the Kiip MGC? Make sure you submit your score using exactly the same name / email for your cumulative MGC score.
We are excited to announce our [Self-Serve](http://kiip.me/selfserve?utm_source=tumblr&utm_medium=blog&utm_campaign=self-serve-launch) platform is now open to the world! Now, any company can boost its customer acquisition efforts by rewarding Kiip's 60 million users across our network of 1,500+ games and apps.
The [Self-Serve](http://kiip.me/selfserve?utm_source=tumblr&utm_medium=blog&utm_campaign=self-serve-launch) platform has been in beta for five months and we're excited to share the results. Over 50 brands ranging from established e-commerce companies like Hulu and Hotels.com to emerging startups like Lyft.com and BarkBox have run more than 100 campaigns. Kiip has become a strategic partner to generate leads, acquire new customers and drive sales during this holiday season. Some other partners offering reward include: ProFlowers, BeachMint, Vistaprint, Homejoy, Exec, invino, Shutterfly and more. These brands have offered free cab fare, exclusive discount codes, subscription trials, and a free year of movies! Performance has been outstanding with industry-leading **in-app engagement rates of 5-7%** and average **email open rates of 30%.** Creating a Kiip reward campaign is simple. Decide what reward you want to give away, who you want to give it to and set it live. We offer real-time analytics to follow your campaign as it performs.  Pretty soon you'll discover that users love to share their Kiip Rewards.
I just earned a $12 off BarkBox subscription by doing well in Zombie Road Trip Amazon! #KiipReward http://t.co/9OZRSqK72I
— Miguel Gorham (@MigIzzel) October 29, 2013
Yippee!! I just earned a Buy One Get One Free Birthday Cards from Treat by doing well in Appstros! #KiipReward http://t.co/Fmw3vF4p0K
— Le'Crissa's SBA (@PinkCandleLady) November 19, 2013
With Black Friday and Cyber Monday right around the corner, now is the perfect time to get started with your first Kiip reward campaign.
Reach mobile users when they’re happy. Get started today.
Second Guinness World Records™ Record set in Kiip’s Mobile Gaming Championship
Round 2 of the Kiip Mobile Gaming Championship has concluded revealing 17-year-old Michigan high school student Parker Sutton as the winner!
Congratulations to Parker, who beat out all of Lane Splitter’s global participants over the weekend that ended Nov. 3. He has earned a Guinness World Records™ Record for the highest score ever in Lane Splitter: 344,820. For his fierce mobile gaming skills, Parker won a Samsung Note 3 smartphone.
His advice for other Kiip competitors: “Basically, don’t think you’ll be bad at the game forever. Honestly, when I first started playing I was awful. I just kept getting better and better scores. I was obsessed with the game and was playing it a ton. Once I had enough practice I started getting really high scores. Anyone could become a world-record holder if they just put the time into it.”
Parker’s winning round was just one of nearly 54,000 attempts from players around the world, with a combined world score of 143,771,117. It was the most participated-in Kiip Swarm ever!
The Guinness World Records™ record-setting Swarms are part of the world’s first Mobile Gaming Championship. The Mobile Gaming Championship features thousands of players around the globe, four different games and only one champion proving victorious over the world’s best mobile gamers.
Parker advances to Kiip’s final championship competition, to be held in December, to attempt to earn the title of “World’s Best Mobile Gamer.” He will be joined by Round 1 winner, 21-year-old Minnesotan Alayna Felton. Alayna destroyed the competition by posting a score of 32,858 in the game Into the Dead. To read more about her achievement, visit http://blog.kiip.me/post/64779907150/kiip-mobile-gaming-championship-round-1-new-guinness-wor.
Players aren’t the only ones posting huge numbers. Developers participating in Kiip’s Mobile Gaming Championship have welcomed healthy engagement increases for their titles.
PikPok, makers of Into the Dead, saw a 27 percent increase in new users. Topping that, PikPok also saw a 34 percent increase in revenue over their previous weekend. These increases were recorded during PikPok’s Mobile Gaming Championship Swarm for Into the Dead.
The third round of the Mobile Gaming Championship wrapped up Nov. 11. The final round will run from Nov. 29 to Dec. 01, with players competing in the game Flick Kick Football Kickoff. Rewards for winning Round 4 include a Moto X smartphone and a Sphero gaming system. Players will also have a chance to set a Guinness World Records™ record.
Kiip urges developers to express their interest in participating in the second Mobile Gaming Championship, taking place next year. Contact [email protected] to find out how you can have your game in MGC in Spring 2014.
Hope you’re focused, its puzzling time! Play 7x7 this weekend until 11:59am ET Nov. 17. First place earns a Nintendo Wii U. Second place earns a Samsung Galaxy Gear smartwatch.
Post a score higher than 47,832 to set an official Guinness World Records™ record.
Download 7x7 below. Good luck!
*Competed in Into the Dead or Lane Splitter during the first round of the Kiip MGC? Make sure you submit your score using exactly the same name / email for your cumulative MGC score.
Kiip Delivers Outstanding eCPM Rates to Mobile Developers
Kiip was created to give mobile app developers an alternative revenue solution that doesn’t treat users as if they are invisible. We wanted to build something that adds value for users, engages them with interesting content, and drives incremental revenue.
After just three years, 200 million+ rewards and over 1,500 apps we’re confident that we are building the right solutions.
Games were just a starting point for Kiip. We continue to see explosive growth in our gaming category with our real reward, virtual reward and tournament products. Early last year we expanded Kiip into new app verticals including Fitness, Productivity, Sports and other Lifestyle apps. There’s a massive opportunity to offer our brand partners a network that reaches their demographics during all parts of the day. The growth has been stunning with SDK integrations into the FitStar: Tony Gonzales fitness app, Any.Do productivity app and Yahoo! Japan.
The results are exciting.
Unlike mobile display networks, Kiip delivers revenue per engagement (claiming a reward in-app) and rewards your users, increasing retention. Developers make money on a CPE basis for every reward claimed in their app. It’s a model in which everyone wins. The users earn rewards for using their favorite apps. Developers engage and monetize users in a delightful way. Brands reach users during the most relevant moments.
Certain app genres have shown extremely high engagement with this model. We see the best results when timing and relevance work together. We call these occurrences “moments.” A Powerade reward earned after completing a workout in a fitness app is an example of a moment. Since Kiip’s fitness channel launched, it has generated a $37.5 eCPM and $0.54 CPE across all apps.
Below is real data displaying a Kiip-integrated Fitness app’s performance:
Learn how Kiip can work with your app. Send us a note to [email protected].
Put on your driving gloves, it’s Lane Splitter time. Play Lane Splitter this weekend from now until 11:59am ET Nov. 3 for a chance to earn a Samsung Galaxy 3 Note.
Post a score higher than 173,158 to set an official Guinness World Records™ record.
Download Lanes Splitter below. Good luck!
*Competed in Into the Dead during the first round of the Kiip MGC? Make sure you submit your score using exactly the same name / email for your cumulative MGC score.
Interesante Integrates Kiip for Spanish-Speaking Community
For the first time, we are offering Kiip rewards in a local Spanish app through a new partnership with the social platform Interesante. Interesante is a visually-driven platform that recommends content relevant to the user's culture, location and taste. We've integrated with Interesante's iOS app to serendipitously reward users for their 'moments' while using Interesante. This is the first app to integrate Kiip that is solely focused on reaching the Hispanic community in the U.S.
Hispanics are one of the most engaged demographics on smartphone devices today. Kiip now provides the perfect opportunity to reach Spanish-speaking users with the right reward, at the right moment and in the right language.
Interesante is part of the Manos Accelerator program backed by Google. The app is one of the best content sharing apps out there. We're excited for Interesante users to begin receiving rewards from brands they love while discovering the most interesting content in their community.
Kiip Mobile Gaming Championship Competition #1: A New Guinness World Record™ Record
The first qualifying competition of the Kiip Mobile Gaming Championship is over, and we have crowned our first winner!
Congratulations to 21-year-old Alayna Felton from Minnesota, who destroyed the competition. Alayna was one of Into the Dead’s many global participants over the weekend of October 11-13. This served as the first qualifying competition of the Kiip Mobile Gaming Championship to search for the best mobile gamers on Earth.
Posting an official score of 32,858, she smashed Into the Dead’s previous high score of around 23,800. It was not only good enough to take home the top prize (a Samsung Galaxy S4), but also put her name in the next Guinness World Records™ Gamer’s Edition. She advances to our final Championship competition in December to compete for the title of “world’s best mobile gamer.”
More than five weeks (870 hours) worth of gameplay were clocked.
The Swarm ran for only two and a half days.
Players ran 47,677,346 total meters away from zombies.
That’s enough to go around the planet more than once.
Double the number of people competed compared to past swarms.
Swarms usually have thousands of competitors. Doubling our largest number of competitors was outstanding.
Thanks to PikPok for hosting the competition and awesome job by all involved. If you missed out or want another shot at the top spot, don’t forget about the next qualifying competition.
The Lane Splitter competition takes place during the first weekend of November (the1st-3rd). Download the game for Android or for iOS.
See you then!
Think your game belongs in the next Mobile Gaming Championship? Let's talk! Start a conversation.
Announcing a New Kiip Product & Partnership with comScore
As our “moments matter” journey marches on, we’re excited to launch a new targeting product – Precision Moments Targeting (PMT). First and foremost, today’s announcement is about our ongoing priority to bring the best and most relevant rewards to users in Kiip-enabled apps and we’re constantly working toward completing the ultimate win–providing the right reward to the right person at the right time.
We built PMT as an aggregation of all the tools we’ve been using for the past three years, and its algorithm puts brands in front of highly sought-after demographics at the most engaged moments.
Here’s a look into what PMT allows brands of all sizes to do:
Demographics (yes, we realize that the basics are boring but important) – Target consumers based on age, gender, etc.
Moments Verticals/Categories – Tap into consumer’s moments in Kiip’s app channels in gaming, fitness, health, productivity, food/cooking and music.
Neural Net – Uses machine learning to understand more about what reward would be much more appropriate based on a combination of lookalikes and first-party data through our survey product.
Location – Target consumers by their current location, historical location habits (and even by the local weather).
Mindset/Sentiment Tracking – Target consumers in peak happiness moments when they are in a mindset where they welcome a reward, or reciprocity.
Historical Redemption – Target consumers based on historical redemption patterns (e.g., most likely to redeem rewards around lunch).
For an example of PMT in action, imagine a mom going about her daily routine–logging a workout in the morning, finishing a to-do list in the afternoon and using a recipe app in the evening. That’s an ideal targeting opportunity for a CPG brand, and our unique insights into those everyday app moments will make interactions that much targeted and relevant.
Now for some numbers: we’ve been testing PMT network-wide in the past month and our redemption rates jumped 32 percent. Why is that happening? Better than ever before, we can really hone in on rewarding precise moments at volume for all kinds of consumers. Now that the consumer is so real time and wants to be instantly gratified, the ability to redeem Kiip rewards on the spot is extremely valuable.
But that’s not all.
At 500 million moments per month, 60 million global users and 1,500 apps across six verticals, the Kiip rewards network continues to grow at a rapid rate. After building up this massive volume, we are thrilled to announce that our contributions to research and measurement of audiences in the mobile ecosystem have been recognized and validated through a partnership with comScore. As the global leader in digital media measurement and analytics, comScore has turned to us – the global leader in mobile rewards – to become one of their insights and media research partners to enhance both of our mobile products.
What does this mean for Kiip?
First of all, that our data rocks! comScore’s stamp of approval is a major third-party validation of what we’ve been able to build as a company beyond our own ecosystem. comScore handles more than 1 trillion interactions per month, and as a result, many advertisers look to them for official validation. Now, the Kiip network gets to play a key role in determining that.
What does this mean for the developers and users in our network?
We are committed to continuously improving the Kiip reward experience. Our collaboration with comScore will enable our ecosystem to flourish even further – more brands are able to be compatible with buying into moments in our network, benefiting everyone.
It’s a proud moment for everyone here at Kiip, and a big win for us in the brand and advertising community. Be sure to circle back here for more updates as we own moments, one by one.
Guinness World Records & Kiip Seek the World's Greatest Mobile Gamers
Kiip and Guinness World Records™ are searching for the best mobile gamers. With a series of events leading to a final Championship competition, the greatest gamer will stand alone.
Crowning the world’s best mobile gamer won’t be easy. We will be hosting four worldwide qualifying competitions, each with huge rewards, in order to invite the best players to a Championship round. Players will compete in these four games: Mega Jump, Lane Splitter, 7x7 and Into the Dead.
There are a couple ways players can earn an invite to the Championship:
Play in all four qualifying competitions. Players will be assigned points for their performance in each competition. The top ten scores across all four events will receive an invite.
Play in one competition. The top two players of each competition will earn an invite.
Players will also have opportunities to compete for a spot in the next Guinness World Records™ Gamer’s Edition in certain games along the way. It’s one thing for Kiip to crown the best gamer, it’s another thing to walk away with a Guinness World Records record for your accomplishments.
“There are console and PC gaming tournaments, but no one has created a highly competitive experience for mobile – until now. We expect millions around the globe to participate and can’t wait to reward the best mobile gamer in the world.”
-Kiip CEO Brian Wong
Here’s the road to the Championship:
Qualifying Competitions
October 11-13 – Into the Dead, rewards include Jawbone JAMBOX, Samsung Galaxy S4 Phone
November 1-3 – Lane Splitter, rewards include Samsung Note 3, Leap Motion
November 8-11 – 7x7, rewards include Wii U, Samsung Gear
November 22-24 – Flick Kick Football Kickoff, rewards include Moto X, Sphero
Championship, December – Secret game, World’s Best Mobile Gamer Crowned
Follow us on Twitter, Tumblr and Facebook for ongoing updates on the Kiip Mobile Gaming Championship. There are still big announcements to be made!
