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Research into Advergames + Small Update on Home

Haven't spoken to you guys for a while so I thought I would update the bloke with some nifty bit of research thats been released by the University of Missouri on effectiveness of advergames.

The study found that consumers expressed "strong positive relationships toward brands when they played advergames with strong thematic connections to the brands."

The study had participants play two types of advergames that differed in their levels of thematic connection to the brands. The examples given are of two titles designed for travel company Orbitz. One, called "Find Your Hotel," carried a theme relating to the company's travel services. The other, called "Paper Football," had no thematic connection to the company.

Kevin Wise, assistant professor of strategic communications in the MU School of Journalism, explained:

"While the games that related to the brand were not inherently more enjoyable than unrelated games, the transfer of enjoyment from the game to a positive attitude toward the brand was stronger when the game and brand were thematically related."

Nothing revolutionary here then, but its important to take note that when planning for any integrated activity, to make sure theres a relevant fit for the game and your own brand.

A good example of this is the ipod example that apple ran on MGS4. (scroll down a few posts)

Also Mercesdes recently took the Juiced racing game and made their own game based on Juiced's engine. The game is being given out at exhibitions and is available to download here

Within the game itself you are able to request a brochure for the Mercedes car featured within the game and also take part in a racing competition. with the fastest lap times being put on the Mercesdes website. (Have a play around, see if you can win an AMG driving experience :D)

Both are good examples of integrated activity and demonstrates the sort of thinking we should take when planning for these type of campaigns

Going off on a slightly different topic it seems Sony are quite keen to exploit advertising opportunities within home for the Playstation 3.
They have appointed a lady called Darlene Kindler who was the mastermind behind Adscape Media (In-game ad firm purchased by google last march)
They haven't released what sort of opportunities are available for the moment however this does show a statement of intent, that they do see the commercial opportunities available within the PS3 and it will be interesting to monitor how this develops.

As ever I'll keep you posted :)

Social Media Tracker

There's a lovely little piece of research from Universal McCann that looks at social media in some detail. It covers the fundamental question of "what is social media?" (something to do with an important shift in user interaction representing the change from web 1.0 to web 2.0 apparently) to how users are consuming this type of content ("video clips continue to grow massively and penetration is huge").

The report researched at the habbits of 17,000 users from 29 different countries. It's a good read that looks at social media from several different directions.

There's a prize for the person that can guess (based on thoroughly reading the document) how many million users are estimated to be using social networking world wide.

Enjoy.

Playstation Home

Been a while since I posted on here so I thought it would be a great time to update you guys on playstation home :)

Home is basically going to be a bigger,badder,better version of Second Life which will run on the Sony Playstation platform.

First up, the shots below show a pretty amazing-looking harbour area where, presumably, you'll be able to set up as your virtual residence and live a fantasy world of luxury (while you secretly sob about your real life in rainy Britain).

When you start off, players will get a basic apartment in Home for free, but can buy new apartments, furniture and other extras with real money, REAL MONEY. Sony is yet to offer any estimates on how much these lush apartments in Home will cost, but if it's any more than a two-piece KFC meal (£3), you'll be seeing me in the virtual ghetto.

Opportunities are yet to be defined, but potentially we can have special branded areas (i.e. Shops, Sponsorships, etc) where consumers will be able to interact with branded content as well as potentially being able to purchase goods within the application.

Anyways these photos have been "leaked" and your in game champion with his finger on the pulse has brought them staight to the people that matter!

Metal Gear Solid 4 + Ipod = Cool stuff!

With so much going on with Apple's marketing campaigns, I thought it would be interesting to talk about some of the In-Game activity that they have run recently with Metal Gear Solid.

Metal Gear Solid 4 was one of the most hugely anticipated games of 2008, just behind GTA 4. It was released last month and has been classed as one of the games of the year. With the hero having so many gadgets to hand, integrated opportunities within this were endless.

One of the functionalities within the game is that the user would be able to listen to music whilst playing the game.

Knowing this, Apple took full advantage of the opportunity and signed a deal with the game's publisher in which the in game music player would actually be an ipod.








This I feel is excellent product placement and should be the exact direction of where integrated game activity should be heading. Developing the brand association where music and ipods go hand in hand. The user interface for the in game ipod matches the exact look and feel of a real life ipod, with the user being able to browse the ipod using the PS3 joystick.

Content Partnerships

Bebo has worked well with advertisers recently, creating engaging video content for its users. As the Kate Modern series has proved there is a huge interest amongst this audience for this type of content, with series one generating 1.5m video views per episode. Paramount is the latest advertiser to jump on board by promoting its new film ‘Angus, Thongs and Perfect Snogging’ within Sofia’s Diary, another video series that is attracting a large audience on Bebo.

This is a great opportunity for advertisers to integrate their brands into the storylines, reaching users week after week within these highly popular episodes. With SN’s further embracing video content, it is another example of how this platform sits at the heart of social media, bringing video, radio, downloading, blogging…. all under one roof in order to sustain an audience.

New British Heart Foundation buzz video

The first phase of the BHF awareness raising campaign went live yesterday. The teaser video is meant to drive intrigue and create a buzz for the main event which will go live on 10.08.08.

The second phase will be the seeding of the 'Watch your own heart attack video" - aimed at driving awareness of what to do in event of a heart attack. For more information visit the BHF online.

The Most Important 2 Minutes of TV

"What do you want to watch today?! How about the most important two minutes you'll ever see?! What happens when you have a heart attack and how do you see it?! Pay attention and learn to save your own life or someone you love!"

(editors note: I do not approve of the cavalier approach to punctuation in this blurb... does each of those questions need to be exclaimed?!)

Like leprosy - but nicer, it's Viral!

Hello all,
I'm jumping on the blog bang wagon - and riding it hard.

As I have probably already bored you with I am the Viral Champion - not quite a seedy as it sounds unfortunately.

I'm currently working on a selection of case studies, show casing good examples of viral marketing. I am looking to roll out another presentation in a couple of weeks to the planning teams around the company on how, why and when we should be using viral.

There is a list of viral suppliers and contacts and any proposals/media packs I have picked up in 2008/Viral.

If you can't wait until then for your next viral hit The Viral Video Chart is a good start.

We have the BHF viral campaign going live this week, so if anyone wants to be involved in the seeding process let me know.

Hello from the Khanage

Following on from Sam's post i'll be keeping you guys up to date with all in game activity. From Advergames to Integrated activity, In Game Advertising is finally looking like its about to take off and there are loads of things happening at the moment. its absolute chaos. But never fear, your In Game nerd Champion is here, to filter the Lara Crofts from your Altered Beasts and making sure PHD are one step ahead of the game. (Pardon the pun)

Hello!

So, here we are, adopting the brave new world of social media.

We're all champions in our own right.... but myself, Olly and Asad are refining our championage into three different areas. Social networking, Viral and in-game advertising

I'm going to champion social networking. We all know ahellofalot about this as it's always in the news, so I'm going to focus specifically on how brands are effectively using this platform to engage with users. I'm also going to look at examples of some not so good activity so we can learn from other peoples mistakes.

We’ll be updating the blog regularly so make sure you keep coming back!