Gismart, the mobile game and app developer, has launched a partnership program Games for Artists where partner musicians can promote their brand and music via Gismart’s new hyper-casual games. The company offers artists a range of opportunities to reach a multi-million audience: from lookalike in-game characters and in-game content to music and merchandise integrations and more. In addition to these customised promotional opportunities, partners will receive a profit share of the game.
Hyper-casual games generate approximately 1 billion downloads every month, with most of these being new games. With simple gameplay and design, and little to no game plot, hyper-casual games are currently one of the most popular gaming niches with the widest audience reach. According to NewZoo analytics, half of hyper-casual game players are over 31 years old, of which 46% are women. The audience demographics vary from game to game. These games are also free-to-play for the users as the most popular monetisation model for hyper-casual is in-game advertisements. On average, one player watches from 5 to 10 video ads per game session, which partially might be used to promote a partner artist’s new music releases, gigs or merchandise, etc.
Gismart has been working with the music industry for a number of years, as half of its product portfolio are music-based apps and games. The company has already partnered with the world’s largest music publishers – Universal Music Publishing Group and Sony / ATV Music Publishing and has previously collaborated with the American EDM duo The Chainsmokers, and other emerging artists including Judah & the Lion.
With implications for many businesses due to the pandemic, the music industry has also been significantly impacted. With artists unable to perform live shows and other activities as usual, Gismart now offers musicians their hyper-casual games as an alternative platform for connecting with a massive audience to promote their brand, music, merchandise, and any other businesses associated.
When a musician joins the Games for Artists program, they will be integrated into the game based on what works best for the artist’s needs and the game experience. Gismart will be responsible for game marketing and monetisation, including a multi-million-dollar budget that will be used for game advertising, guaranteeing a large audience. In addition to using the game as a platform for marketing, the artist will share the game’s profit with Gismart.
There are more than 10 hyper-casual games in Gismart‘s portfolio. Some of the most successful games [e.g. Cool Goal!, Domino Smash] were ranked number one in the game charts in 62 countries and have over 60 million downloads. Overall the company’s portfolio has over 500 million downloads. Over the past three years, the company has shown strong growth, partly due to successful hyper-casual game releases. In 2020, the Financial Times named Gismart the fastest-growing company in the games industry, placing the company sixth overall out of 1,000 European companies.
“The hyper-casual gaming market is one of the hottest spaces in the mobile market today. With monthly downloads reaching one billion and most of them coming from brand new games, hyper-casual games are the new medium to reach out to a massive audience instantly and to offer strong marketing opportunities for entertainment brands, including music artists. We are open to collaborate with artists to fit their custom needs, and create suitable, native integration options in our new hyper-casual game releases.” – comments Lana Meisak, VP, Business Development and Marketing at Gismart.
