An AI study app · B2C · Helium customer
Put a Flappy Bird game in the paywall; higher scores unlock up to 50% off
Beat the existing paywall in an A/B test on 10% of users; no numbers given
Workedpaywallpricing
What they did
Built a Flappy Bird clone inside the paywall with Helium's AI chat (no hand coding). The higher the score, the deeper the discount, capped at 50%; at e.g. 30% the offer pops up and the user can keep playing for more. Shown to ~10% of users as an experiment. Best for whimsical, already-gamified apps with a young audience, not focused business apps.
What happened
Won the experiment against the control paywall ('the craziest win I've ever seen'); no figures given.
- Stage
- live app
“they literally built Flappy Bird in a in a paywall and then the higher your Flappy Bird score is, the deeper discount you get up to 50%”
“And that paywall won. Like it just straight up won an experiment.”
“it was like in the student category, I would say.”
Related topics
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More from this episode
- Show the paywall half-empty, then slide the trial details in from the sideWins 'really aggressively' in Helium tests, per the guest; no numbers
- Keep small animations moving in the onboarding background to hold focusWith animations beat without in a Helium test; no numbers
- Add a 'creating your experience' screen near the end of onboardingConversions up 11%, a founder told the host
- In a sleep-sounds app, play the sounds during onboardingConverts better, confirmed by two competing apps; no numbers
- For older users, ask 'Who referred you?' with options like 'My personal trainer' or 'TV ad'Works well with older audiences, per the guest; no numbers
- Test separate paywalls for users over and under about 35
- Run 8 or 9 paywall tests at once and keep the one that winsUsually 8 are a wash and 1 makes a difference
- Charge through Stripe with an in-app Apple Pay prompt, not a trip to SafariBetter trial-to-paid, retention and ARPU; first conversion slightly lower
- App Masters: Send buyers from the paywall to a web checkout page in SafariBig drop-off every time; did worse than Apple in-app purchase
- Build for iPad, where few competing apps bother to go$1.4M of a client's $2M ARR came from iPad
- Default to a 7-day trial; offer 14 or 30 days to people who close the paywallConverts better as a fallback, clients say; anecdotal
- Helium: Ask sign-ups for their revenue; call the big apps, let small ones straight in