{"id":1477,"date":"2017-02-21T09:01:20","date_gmt":"2017-02-21T16:01:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.taterboy.com\/blog\/2017\/02\/arkadium-doubles-down-on-its-web-games-with-quiz-app\/"},"modified":"2017-02-21T09:01:20","modified_gmt":"2017-02-21T16:01:20","slug":"arkadium-doubles-down-on-its-web-games-with-quiz-app","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.taterboy.com\/blog\/2017\/02\/arkadium-doubles-down-on-its-web-games-with-quiz-app\/","title":{"rendered":"Arkadium doubles down on its web games with quiz app"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Jessicageneric<\/a> CEO of Arkadium” srcset=”http:\/\/1u88jj3r4db2x4txp44yqfj1.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/jessica-rovello-2-578×322.jpg 578w, http:\/\/1u88jj3r4db2x4txp44yqfj1.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/jessica-rovello-2-300×167.jpg 300w, http:\/\/1u88jj3r4db2x4txp44yqfj1.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/jessica-rovello-2-768×428.jpg 768w, http:\/\/1u88jj3r4db2x4txp44yqfj1.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/jessica-rovello-2-800×445.jpg 800w, http:\/\/1u88jj3r4db2x4txp44yqfj1.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/jessica-rovello-2-780×434.jpg 780w, http:\/\/1u88jj3r4db2x4txp44yqfj1.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/jessica-rovello-2.jpg 900w” sizes=”(max-width: 578px) 100vw, 578px”><\/p>\n

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After a tumultuous 2015, Arkadium<\/a> returned to its core business of providing games that can be embedded in the websites of media companies. During the last year, it added 300 publishers for its games, bringing its total to 450.<\/p>\n

The company has also launched Asky, a quiz and poll app that journalists can use to embed interactive content in their websites.<\/p>\n

Asky lets publishers create custom quizzes and polls that can easily be embedded on\u00a0their pages. It is the first of several new in-article content solutions that Arkadium will\u00a0introduce this year, said Jessica Rovello, the CEO and cofounder of New York-based Arkadium, in an interview with GamesBeat.<\/p>\n

Rovello said that Arkadium had a disastrous year in 2014 and 2015<\/a>. In the spring of 2014,\u00a0the Russians invaded Ukraine and took over Crimea, where Arkadium had more than 100 employees.<\/p>\n

Then, at the end of 2014, the Obama administration declared sanctions, making it a crime for U.S. companies to do business in Crimea. Rovello found that her studio was now an illegal business. Instead of shutting it down, she and her husband and cofounder, Kenny Rosenblatt, asked the employees what they wanted. About half of them decided to continue working, and they wanted to be part of Russia. So they relocated the studio across the Russian border, in Krasnograd, and reopened in a place where they weren\u2019t subject to sanctions.<\/p>\n

\"Arkadium's<\/p>\n

Above: Arkadium\u2019s wall of \u201clil wins\u201d sticky notes.<\/p>\n

Image Credit: Arkadium<\/em><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Within the course of a few months, Arkadium lost about half its people, going from 150 employees down to 75. Rovello said the company decided to stop making free-to-play mobile games, where it was just one competitor among a million. Mobile seemed like the future, but it was too hard to get traction with the smaller team.<\/p>\n

So Arkadium refocused on its core business, including its flagship white-labeled Arena games offering, and it staged a comeback in 2016, Rovello said. It focused on signing up hundreds of publishers during the past year.<\/p>\n

Now it is adding Asky, the self-serve quiz and poll technology, to help publishers shore up their metrics, such as time spent on-site, session duration, and user retention.<\/p>\n

\u201cPlatforms like Facebook are\u00a0increasingly cannibalizing media content,\u201d Rovello said. \u201cAs a result, publishers are demanding tools\u00a0that help their editorial teams build contextual interactive content that engages readers\u00a0and keeps them on-site. Asky delivers on that need, making it easier than ever for them\u00a0to build and embed quizzes and polls.\u201d<\/p>\n

Editorial teams can use it to create custom\u00a0quizzes and polls in support of their articles. Asky\u2019s content is interactive, highly visual, and easily embedded \u2013 complete with publisher branding \u2013 on a page. Asky improves monetization and comes with a growing library of more than 200 journalist-written quizzes\u00a0and polls that can be used out-of-the-box or customized as needed.<\/p>\n

These quizzes and\u00a0polls are guaranteed to be brand-safe, copy edited to Associated Press style, and with rights-cleared\u00a0images. They are developed by Arkadium\u2019s expert editorial team, which includes current\u00a0and former contributors to publications as diverse as The New York Times, Bleacher\u00a0Report, and TMZ. New quizzes and polls are published every week, free for Asky users.<\/p>\n

\u201cPublishers know that visual and interactive content is the key to audience\u00a0engagement,\u201d said Ben Widdicombe, Arkadium\u2019s editorial director, in a statement. \u201cBut creating that\u00a0content at scale is challenging without the right resources in place. Asky completely\u00a0changes that. It is an easy-to-use, self-service solution that helps editorial teams quickly\u00a0add winning content to their pages.\u201d<\/p>\n

Asky quizzes and polls are live on the websites of hundreds of top publishers\u00a0worldwide. Northern & Shell, a U.K. publishing giant, has embedded Asky custom\u00a0quizzes and polls on its article pages to dramatically increase audience engagement.<\/p>\n

\"Arkadium's<\/p>\n

Above: Arkadium\u2019s offices in New York<\/p>\n

Image Credit: Arkadium<\/em><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

The publisher has already cited an average click-through rate of 8.43 percent. Some custom\u00a0content \u2014such as a quiz created for the U.K.\u2019s Daily Express around last year\u2019s Brexit\u00a0vote \u2014 has seen a click-through rate above 11 percent.<\/p>\n

\u201cAsky is unique,\u201d added Rovello. \u201cIt was created by journalists, for journalists, with the\u00a0features a modern newsroom needs to innovate. Publishers are hungry for innovative\u00a0tools that make their pages more interactive, more visual, and which monetize\u00a0effectively. Asky delivers on all these needs.\u201d<\/p>\n

Arkadium hired more than 30 people to help deal with growing demand and to launch Asky. Arkadium also has a team maintaining its games for Microsoft, such as Solitaire, on its Windows platform.<\/p>\n

New clients include\u00a0TMZ properties, Sports Illustrated, and New York Daily News. In 2016, users engaged in more than 223 million sessions, up 13 percent from the previous year. Game\u00a0starts grew to 522 million, up 10 percent. Rovello anticipates that 2017 will be even stronger than 2016. In June last year, Inc. Magazine put 15-year-old Arkadium on its cover for \u201cbest places to work.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cEverything we\u2019ve been able to accomplish this year is because of our amazing staff in New York and Russia,\u201d Rovello said.<\/p>\n

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