Virtual Goods’ Holiday Boom, More to Come in Next Few Years
As reported by VentureBeat in a recent report, virtual goods and prepaid game cards experienced great sales on this Black Friday and Thanksgiving weekend. The overall sales of prepaid game cards were up 48% on Black Friday as compared to last year, and even 60% higher than a week before Black Friday.
Virtual goods is an emerging market for retailers and advertisers, and also another way to spin the biggest discount holiday shopping day of the year. Several companies made good business during the holiday season including PlaySpan, the seller of Ultimate Game Card prepaid online game cards. These cards can be used in over 1,000 online games at over 50,000 retail locations.
The PlaySpan marketplace experienced a steep sales hike of 56% on Black Friday as compared to last year. The overall sales were 19% higher than last year, just in the four-day holiday period.
On the other hand, the console video game market saw a reduction in business, of 8%. Still, the overall business of virtual goods in United States is much less (approx. $1.6 billion in 2010) than console game business that is currently at $20 billion. Still the rate of growth rates are considerable. Besides, PlaySpan is also planning for ongoing development of its digital goods offerings as a result of its partnership with game developer Square Enix.
We are also watching the growth of mobile market for virtual environments as mobile gaming platforms swift on expansion. A couple include OpenFeint and Apple. Moreover, mobile shopping tools are also influencing holiday shopping and sales, with an increase in PayPal usage during Black Friday this year. The overall sales saw a whopping increase of 310% through mobile shopping, with 27% increase in total payment volume.
Since you’re here …
… We’d like to tell you about our mission and how you can help us fulfill it. SiliconANGLE Media Inc.’s business model is based on the intrinsic value of the content, not advertising. Unlike many online publications, we don’t have a paywall or run banner advertising, because we want to keep our journalism open, without influence or the need to chase traffic.The journalism, reporting and commentary on SiliconANGLE — along with live, unscripted video from our Silicon Valley studio and globe-trotting video teams at theCUBE — take a lot of hard work, time and money. Keeping the quality high requires the support of sponsors who are aligned with our vision of ad-free journalism content.
If you like the reporting, video interviews and other ad-free content here, please take a moment to check out a sample of the video content supported by our sponsors, tweet your support, and keep coming back to SiliconANGLE.
