Our Metaverse Innovation team at SuperAwesome is always looking for new ways to connect brands with the audiences inside Roblox. Our branded integrations for customers like Nickelodeon, LEGO and Paramount are some of the most exciting and engaging ones out there – but it’s by tapping into user trends that we’re really able to innovate.
One user trend that’s become particularly interesting to us is the frequent equipping and changing of a user’s Roblox avatar. For users, this is the most important element of how they show up in game (56% of Gen Z say styling their avatar is more important to them than styling themselves in the physical world) and the creativity that can be deployed around avatars knows no bounds – one of our Roblox-loving team members currently shows up in Roblox as a fish in a pink velour tracksuit.
There are millions upon millions of different accessories that a Roblox player can use to augment their avatar. Despite their ubiquity, UGC (User Generated Content) Limiteds are in high demand by users of the Roblox platform – particularly the ones that are limited in stock (rare) and even more so those that are given away for free.
One of the key traffic drivers for Roblox developers looking to get more players into their games are UGC Limiteds that can only be claimed inside their games. If those items are free (rather than requiring Robux for purchase), they become even more powerful, since there are very few items available for free on the Roblox avatar marketplace.
In our first experiment we had a few items locked to our Roblox experience (Game With Me, a platform that enabled Roblox players to sign up for events to game with their favorite Roblox influencers). Players who register for events on the GWM website could then claim the items inside our Roblox game once the event was over. This incentivised players to sign up, and also allowed us to see whether they would follow the user journey into the gaming experience itself.
However, when we put the items on sale we noticed that players were claiming them even though they were not registered on the GWM website. That raised a serious question – how were players finding the items?
Uncovering the hacker networks inside Roblox
Answering this question led us to uncovering a vast network of UGC hackers who we traced through a YouTube video telling them exactly how to get our UGC limiteds for free.
This YouTube channel was linked to a Discord containing hundreds of thousands of hackers.
Replicating their behavior enabled us to figure out how they were doing it. Hacking Roblox games requires downloading special software, then executing client side code to trick the Roblox experience into prompting the official “Claim UGC Limited” pop-up.
Blocking the hacker community from redeeming our items
It was clear to us that there was very little value to clients in our experiments if anyone and everyone with access to some hacker instructions could redeem our free items. This meant that our rare and exciting items weren’t going into the Roblox backpacks of fans, but rather into the ownership of players looking to exploit the system.
To take control back, we added a special final check on the Roblox server to make sure the player was in our database – this stopped the exploit.
There’s a lot of people out to exploit your UGC
Even though we’d found our own fix, we continued to monitor the hacker community and noticed that hundreds of games were getting their free UGC limiteds hacked. It’s not that surprising. It’s hard to verify that your UGC limiteds are being hacked if everything happens in game and not via external websites (as with our experiments).
Games use free UGC limiteds to incentivize engagement with core features, like obstacles courses (Obbies). Since Roblox raised their prices, free items have become expensive to mint – so it’s important that any brand utilizing free UGC to drive brand awareness and engagement is confident that their items are going to the correct audience. We have seen press articles citing “UGC limiteds selling out in under 10 minutes” only to find a video on YouTube with thousands of views showing how to claim them instantly.
While it may be true that the items are under high demand, with hackers operating so quickly, it’s almost guaranteed that the items are having very little consequential ROI on the audience brands are wanting to reach.
How to make sure your UGC Limiteds are going to the right audience
When working with developers to bring your brand to life in Roblox, it’s important to check that they’re taking measures to ensure that UGC Limiteds associated with the campaign are actually helping to drive brand awareness and engagement.
Here are some tips (we’ve learned through experience):
- Ask for more than one data point related to UGC Limiteds (for example Time taken to complete obstacle course + UGC item unlocked). You should be able to tie increased engagement to the free items.
- Ask for funnel analysis so you can see if engagement matches the number of items claimed.
- Ask what measures they are taking to avoid hackers claiming items. The key element here is that it should not be easy for the client to call ability to claim avatar items.
- Externally validate whether a player is allowed to claim an item, like being registered for a live event.
Our experiments have shown that kids are willing to take multiple steps to redeem free UGC, making it a powerful tool to drive engagement. But this engagement will only have an impact for your brand if it’s the right audience getting items. If you want to ensure success within your target audience, get in touch about our storefront product – the guaranteed way to make sure that your items go to dedicated fans only.
