K-Pop band Twice Surges to 3rd Place with 15 million monthly visits
Every week we at Metaverse Marcom publish exclusive research about how brands are activating on the Roblox platform. And at the start of each month, we gather data on how many visits branded games have gotten on Roblox during the previous month in order to see what's currently popular on the platform.
+7% Monthly Increase Across Top 20 Branded Games
When looking at the top 20 branded games combined, overall visits rose +7% month-over-month. In March, the top 20 games collectively had 135.2 million visits, versus having 144.7 million in April.
Massive Surge for K-Pop Experience Twice Square
In last month's brand rankings, Twice Square (created by Karta) debuted in 7th place with 4.9 million visits. While a very respectable debut, it was overshadowed by Karlie Kloss' 10.4 million visit launch from Sawhorse, which was good enough for 5th place.
Typically, we see new branded experiences launch with a strong start with about 4-6 million visits, which can propel them into the top 10, usually around 6th-7th place.
Past Brand Ranking Debuts:
10.4 million - Karlie Kloss - Fashion Klossette (5th place, April '23)
6.4 million - Walmart Land (5th place, November '22)
5.8 million - NFL Super Tycoon (6th place, March '23)
5 million - Warner Music Group's Rhythm City (7th place, March '23)
4.9 million - Twice Square (7th place, April '23)
4.8 million - My Little Pony (6th place, November '23)
4.5 million - AO Adventure (6th place, February '23)
4.4 million - SHEIN x Klarna Wonderland (7th place, January '23)
4.1 million visits - NCT 127 World (7th place, February '23)
It's been hard for newer branded games to break into the top 5, which has historically featured My Hello Kitty Cafe, Sonic Speed Simulator, Warrior Cats: Ultimate Edition, Ben 10 Super Hero Time, and Miraculous RP.
So it came as a big surprise when Twice Square not only remained in the top 10 for a second consecutive month, but it also hauled in 15 million visits, which was good enough for 3rd place in our monthly rankings. To get there, Twice beat out perennial brand leaders Warrior Cats, Ben 10 and Miraculous.
What Drove Twice Square's Success?
Twice Square
Lifetime Visits: 19,908,385
April Visits: 15,001,595
So the big question is, "How did they do it?" As in, how did Twice and Karta bring in so many visits after having already had a "successful" launch?
As usual we look to Roblox game pages, Twitter and TikTok for clues to help us understand what drove success. While we didn't find anything particularly notable on Roblox or Twitter, we found very interesting info on TikTok...
Talent Involvement
This screenshot above shows a video that Twice recorded about their new Roblox experience. In the video, they start out by saying that they are excited to open Twice Square on Roblox.
Not every brand has talent they can use on camera to connect with fans. But when talent can get involved, it can be both simple and effective. This video looks like it was filmed very easily in a hotel room or apartment with just one camera, some lights and talent in full hair, makeup and wardrobe. You can tell that some of the singers are reading their lines, so it probably only took 15 minutes to shoot this. Overall, this simple social post looks like it required a small lift but resulted in a pretty high ROI in terms of the 5.8 million views it has racked up to date.
Fan Call to Action (CTA)
Where this video gets really interesting is when the bandmates share the following:
"Share videos with your best dance moves with the hashtag #TwiceonRoblox for a chance to be featured in our special Roblox video."
Wow, this is so brilliant.
Not only do they encourage players to check out their Roblox game, but then they give them a very clear way to get involved - recording and sharing a video from within the game. That gets fans into the game, invested in creating their own content, and then becoming a virtual street marketing team by sharing the assets to their own social media platforms.
Again, this execution is not very expensive or complicated. It doesn't cost much to announce a fan program like this. And the prize for participating is nothing extravagant or costly. It's simply inclusion in an upcoming Roblox video, which will be fairly inexpensive to edit together.
Low lift required and high ROI. 👏🏼
Roblox Support
Brands launch new experiences on Roblox just about every single week, but most of them do not get any direct acknowledgement from Roblox itself. So it's a very big deal that this video was released on the official Roblox TikTok account. Not only does the account boast a massive following of 12.7 million, but more importantly it is a powerful line of communication with the Roblox community. If you're a brand that wants to reach Roblox players, there's very few better ways to reach them than with the direct support of Roblox itself.
Loyal Fanbase
Clearly, Twice has a large and dedicated fanbase that cares about them deeply. Once again, not every brand can rely on that being the case. But when that is present, it can be very powerful and lead to considerable success, especially if that brand's audience already hangs out on Roblox.
Vita Coco Has Strong Debut
Vita Coco
Lifetime Visits: 6,614,377
February Visits: 6,614,377
Although it landed all the way in 8th place this month, Vita Coco's Roblox game had a very strong debut with 6.6 million visits in April. The game came out at the tail end of the month, so it likely would have had an even more impressive debut had it come out earlier in the month. As of May 8th, it has 11.1 million visits to date, and we wouldn't be surprised if it returns in next month's rankings.
What was most interesting about this game was that the brand tied together a sustainability initiative (planting trees IRL) to actions taking within the game.
Here's more about what the game offers fans from the description...
🏝️ Introducing The Coconut Grove. Grow your own tree nursery using the nutrients you earn from playing fun and engaging mini-games. You can grow a variety of trees, each with its own unique benefits and coconuts to harvest.
🌴 Every seedling planted in the game = one distributed in real life through Seedlings for Sustainability!*
🥥 Meet the real farmers who will benefit from your efforts!
👕 Collect five unique and awesome accessory items!
🪙 Earn Cococoins!
✨ Unlock new tree skins!
📌 Join the Vita Coco Roblox group: https://www.roblox.com/groups/17226264/VitaCoco#!/about
👍 Please thumbs-up and favorite if you enjoy the game. ⭐
🔔 Hit follow for game updates!🔔
Thanks for playing!
*Up to 100,000 seedlingsMy Hello Kitty Cafe - Maintains Top-Ranked Branded Game
It was a fairly close race for the top spot again this month, and My Hello Kitty Cafe came out victorious over Sonic Speed Simulator.
My Hello Kitty Cafe
Lifetime Visits: 274,282,414
March Visits: 25,981,791
Sanrio's Hello Kitty game celebrated it's 1 year anniversary on Roblox and offered fans a special 20% discount off of gems. Gems are used within the game to purchase tickets that allow you to earn new cafe employees. Essentially, they help you move faster and level up in the game. I personally took advantage of this anniversary discount, which was quite satisfying as a semi-regular player.
Brands Ranked 11-20
Here are the remaining brands from this past month:
11. Squishmallows - 3.5 million
12. George Ezra's Gold Rush Kid Experience - 3.3 million
13. Festival Tycoon - 2.8 million
14. PacSun Los Angeles Tycoon - 2.8 million
15. Sunsilk City - 2.6 million
16. Vans World - 2.2 million
17. Beyondland - 2.1 million
18. Spotify Island - 2 million
19. Gucci Town - 2 million
20. Sesame Street Mecha Builders - 1.9 million
*Note - I happened to notice my 6-year-old son playing this game just today. While slightly above the regular Sesame Street viewer age, it's interesting to see how the IP has been able to age up with this game.
Stephen Dypiangco is the CEO of Metaverse Marcom, a strategy and consulting firm helping entertainment and sports brands enter the metaverse.