Dota 2 boasts the highest ARPU (average monthly revenue per active user) among the MOBA genre. Why? I claim that crowdfunding and crowdsourcing, the secret sauce of Dota 2 if you will, are the keys to this success. You can also view the presentation video at https://youtu.be/ETuwQ9sc2w8 The presentation is based on my blog post The secret sauce of Dota 2: crowdsourcing and crowdfunding at http://www.kilkku.com/blog/2015/09/the-secret-sauce-of-dota-2-crowdsourcing-and-crowdfunding/

1. The secret sauce of
Crowdfunding and
crowdsourcing

2. MOBA genre ARPU
• Dota 2: $1.54
• Heroes of Newerth: $1.48
• League of Legends: $1.32 (still by far the most successful in total revenue)
(average revenue per monthly user, according to SuperData Research, 2014)

3. Why is Dota 2 at the top?
• It is even giving everything gameplay-related away for free!
• More hardcore, maybe?
• Crowdfunding and crowdsourcing!

4. Crowdfunding of tournaments and teams
• In the past 2 years, more than $32 million of Dota 2 tournament prize pools
have been crowdfunded – dwarfing the over $8 million that has been
provided by the organizers
• Example:The International 5 compendium, sales of over $67 million,
25% went to the prize pool of the tournament
• Professional teams have a chance to get their branded cosmetic items, such
as HUD bundles, up for sale in the game store
• Compare to: Smite crowdfunded $2 million to its world championship prize
pool in 2014, making it the third-largest esports tournament of the year. Not
bad for a clearly smaller title!

5. Crowdsourcing of content
• It is possible for anyone to create new cosmetic items and upload them to
Valve’s workshop for potential inclusion into the game – and if selected, for
a share of the profits generated from that item
• This business model enablesValve to include much more items to cover any
possible taste – more sales!

6. Conclusions
• Crowdfunding gives purchases more purpose, making them about
something more than just buying pixels on a screen
• Crowdsourcing enables the creation of much more content to cover any
possible taste
• Combined, they form the basis of a different take on monetization