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 :)