An in-depth exploration of the market performance of Honkai: Star Rail and analysis of its successful marketing strategy in UK.
Honkai: Star Rail (HSR), miHoYo's latest creation after the success of Genshin Impact, has captivated gamers worldwide. As a free cross-platform turn-based RPG, HSR combines silk-punk ACG themes with a profit model based on gacha mechanics, earning player acclaim for its stunning visuals, immersive storytelling, and user-friendly gameplay.
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Anime-style Gacha RPGs have surged in global popularity, offering unique art styles and collectible elements. Revenue from these games has steadily climbed, establishing them as a crucial growth point in the mobile gaming market.
miHoYo's strategic brilliance is evident in HSR's exceptional market performance. On launch, it dominated free charts in 114 regions, generating $206 million in revenue within the first 5 days and $1.12 billion within 30 days. miHoYo's precision in content and marketing strategy showcased both their expertise and HSR's inherent appeal and market potential.
RPG games play a crucial role in advertising expenditures, averaging 2,800 advertisers and 850,000 unique creatives per month, making it the second-largest category in advertising spending. This data indicates the high importance advertisers place on the RPG game genre, willing to invest significant resources to attract and retain players.
Within the RPG category, image creatives account for 21%, while video creatives dominate with approximately 77%, highlighting the leading role of videos in RPG game advertising, likely due to their ability to vividly showcase game scenes and stories, attracting potential users effectively.
MMO mobile games, with real-time interactive AI, redefine social gaming. This innovation enhances immersion, providing players with richer experiences and new social interactions, differentiating MMOs from other game genres.
HSR's outstanding creative promotion with over 1,000 daily content pieces breaks the mold. In Q2, it rivaled Genshin Impact's overseas revenue, challenging traditional notions that anime-style mobile games don't invest in user acquisition.
Honkai: Star Rail performs exceptionally well within its category, competing with the top players in the market. Using FoxData's intelligent data analysis platform, the game's ranking in the RPG category demonstrates its strong performance in the mobile app market.
With high-quality content and user experience, the game stands out in fierce competition, indicating that miHoYo successfully translates its brand value and game design experience into market competitiveness.
The usage of Honkai: Star Rail in different regions indicates that the game has effectively penetrated the market. Through segmentation by region, device, and consumer type, miHoYo can precisely target its audience and develop market expansion strategies suitable for each region. This strategy helps improve the efficiency of user acquisition costs and better meet the diverse needs of players in different markets.
Considering the global audience, optimizing the application for different language app stores can increase visibility and downloads in non-English-speaking countries.
In terms of App Store Optimization (ASO), the ranking of keywords indicates that Honkai: Star Rail has achieved success in ASO practices. By optimizing keywords, the game can increase its visibility in the app store, attracting more potential users. Effective keyword strategies help allocate marketing budgets to areas most likely to generate returns.
With a 4.6-star rating, HSR reflects widespread user satisfaction. Utilizing FoxData's review monitoring, , it is possible to quickly understand user sentiments, identify issues, and make timely improvements. This feedback mechanism is an essential tool for enhancing user satisfaction and increasing user retention.
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With each update of Honkai: Star Rail, miHoYo promptly updates screenshots, descriptions, and other relevant content in the app store. This practice not only showcases the latest features, content, and improvements of the game but also communicates the development team's commitment to continuous improvement.
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Updated app store content can attract new users and rekindle the interest of existing users, crucial for maintaining and increasing the user base.
HSR's successful marketing strategies include:
HSR's pre-registration campaign achieved significant success, attracting over 5 million pre-registered users and 2.5 million social media followers. miHoYo transformed the pre-registration process into a community-oriented activity by setting milestone-based incentive systems, effectively activating community participation.
According to Fish Ling, HoYoverse's Senior Director of Global Development, HSR achieved remarkable results with its omni-channel strategy worldwide. After the game's launch, it attracted over 10 million pre-registered users, with over 2.5 million from regions outside China. This data indicates that the Chinese player base contributed 75% of the pre-registration volume.
Further analysis shows that HSR's downloads in Western countries accounted for approximately 70% of non-Chinese downloads, mainly concentrated in North America, South America, and European regions such as the United States, Brazil, Mexico, France, and Germany.
This suggests that HSR's pre-registration campaign not only succeeded in the Chinese market but also performed well in attracting Western players. The success of "Genshin Impact" in its 2020 launch and its outstanding performance to date may have played a crucial role in this, as it helped miHoYo establish strong brand influence globally, especially in Eastern and Western markets. Utilizing this advantage, miHoYo invested heavily in a combination of influencer marketing, brand building, and performance marketing to attract a large number of Western users.
Among these, we speculate that HSR's influencer marketing strategy played the most crucial role, as it is more economically efficient when achieving large-scale launches compared to pure brand or performance marketing. Further in-depth analysis reveals the multi-layered effects of this strategy.
HSR initiated influencer marketing a year in advance through a dedicated content creator recruitment campaign, providing creators with the opportunity to access the game's closed testing and thereby invigorating the creator community.
HSR utilized various channels, including TikTok, social media, and city promotions, for brand marketing. Through innovative activities, the game attracted user participation, enhancing the visibility and influence of the brand.
HSR's success not only brings substantial revenue to miHoYo but sets new standards for mobile turn-based RPGs. Leveraging HSR's income potential, addressing product issues, and improving revenue efficiency will be critical for miHoYo in the coming years.
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Honkai: Star Rail's triumph demonstrates the potential of pre-registration campaigns and the importance of multi-channel marketing in the fiercely competitive gaming market. This case offers valuable insights for marketing experts, aiding in the formulation of more effective plans for future app marketing strategies.
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