DNS - In Stat Report Reveals Reasons Why Online Gaming is So Popular and Lucrative

Online game maker Zynga has carved a wide pathway through the online gaming business. In the past few years the company has successfully made revenues in excess of millions of dollars by selling everything virtually.

Zynga (News - Alert) has a different concept in that the user pays per transaction and not a fixed price per month for an online game. Each transaction costs anywhere between 5 cents to $10. Games can be played on your PC as well as on your mobile phone.

The reason why the company has been so profitable is because of the smaller fees that the customers are willing to pay for playing and/or "augmenting" games. More and more people are getting involved in online gaming and most don’t mind paying a small fee to take part in the "free to play" online gaming world.

A recent report from market research firm In Stat indicates that the revenue generated from sale of virtual goods has increased 245 percent -- from $2.1 billion in 2007 to $7.3 billion in 2010. The report also indicates:

--73 percent of the revenues are earned by the top ten virtual goods selling companies
--A 2D virtual market worth $2.3 billion is formed with the emergence of games on social networking sites and other sources
--USA and the EMEA regions today account for 30 percent of the virtual good sales -- Asia Pacific accounts for the remaining 70 percent of the sales
--The forecasts by In-Stat (News - Alert) reveal that the revenues of online virtual sales will rise to $14 billion by 2014 -- however there will be several tax and legacy issues which will be responsible for creating a multimillion dollar market

You can check out In Stat's Virtual Goods in Social Networking and Online Gaming report for more details. The report provides an in depth look into the entire virtual goods industry, categorized by region, users, and company total revenues. It also includes an overview of the key players in this market.

Kunal Vahalia is a TMCnet freelancer. He has several years of freelance writing experience, including a stint working for drugdelivery.ca as an SEO content writer. To read more of his articles, please visit his columnist page.

Edited by Patrick Barnard