My game got popular in Russia, not at all in USA

michalsrb said:

Hello,

I am writing mostly because of curiosity. I made an android game inspired by one DOS game I used to like when I was kid. With several added features, like online multiplayer, you can search for "Annelids" if you want to check. (I can't send links yet.)

After initial struggling it got more or less popular, but what is interesting:
About 25 % of all downloads come from Russia and only 4 % from USA. According to Google Play statistics, average in Arcade games is having 5 % from Russia and 13 % from USA. Downloads from other countries are close to the average values.

The game doesn't have Russian localization and until recently we didn't even have Russian translation of Google Play page. We didn't do any kind of promotions for Russia.
I am not complaining at all, but I wonder how could that happen. :laugh:

Any possible explanations?

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Click to collapse

michalsrb said:

Hello,

I am writing mostly because of curiosity. I made an android game inspired by one DOS game I used to like when I was kid. With several added features, like online multiplayer, you can search for "Annelids" if you want to check. (I can't send links yet.)

After initial struggling it got more or less popular, but what is interesting:
About 25 % of all downloads come from Russia and only 4 % from USA. According to Google Play statistics, average in Arcade games is having 5 % from Russia and 13 % from USA. Downloads from other countries are close to the average values.

The game doesn't have Russian localization and until recently we didn't even have Russian translation of Google Play page. We didn't do any kind of promotions for Russia.
I am not complaining at all, but I wonder how could that happen. :laugh:

Any possible explanations?

Click to expand...

Click to collapse

michalsrb said:

Hello,

I am writing mostly because of curiosity. I made an android game inspired by one DOS game I used to like when I was kid. With several added features, like online multiplayer, you can search for "Annelids" if you want to check. (I can't send links yet.)

After initial struggling it got more or less popular, but what is interesting:
About 25 % of all downloads come from Russia and only 4 % from USA. According to Google Play statistics, average in Arcade games is having 5 % from Russia and 13 % from USA. Downloads from other countries are close to the average values.

The game doesn't have Russian localization and until recently we didn't even have Russian translation of Google Play page. We didn't do any kind of promotions for Russia.
I am not complaining at all, but I wonder how could that happen. :laugh:

Any possible explanations?

Click to expand...

Click to collapse

Codengo said:

I can't explain why it's done so much better in Russia but I would double my efforts in Russia ASAP including localizing and submitting to the Yandex store there.

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Click to collapse

tornadonoob said:

First of all, congratulations. Russia is not an easy market, it is very competitive, and your success shows you are doing things right.

However the number of downloads required for a game to make it to the top ranking in Russia and the US differ greatly. Of course ranking high means that you get maybe as many paid downloads (through advertising) as organic installs.

But to get to the top to be noticed by the top players you need the following number of daily installs:

Top 10 free, iPhone - sorry, dont have stats for Android: US - 17'161 Russia - 2362
Top 20 free US - 5509 Russia - 1256
Top 50 free US - 2712 Russia- 403

To get there you will have a CPI of $2-$3 probably (of course everyone wants a magic figure of $1,5 but only if your optimisation and traffic sources are perfect). If you have that budget, prepare to spend $34'000 for a few days because your competitors are going to be Candy Crush Saga by King.com, and they have money to keep paying to stay up there.

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