By Kristin Snyder
October 8, 2009
ADVERTISEMENT OR GAME?
What do you get when you combine a commercial with a game? You get advergaming! Advergaming is the practice of using video games to advertise a product, organization or viewpoint. It can be played on the internet or even on your mobile phone. There are advergames for all ages, with some advertisement are subtle while others are more direct. The gaming industry is very large and it continues to grow, but does incorporating brands within the game work?
It comes down to interaction. Instead of consumers watching a :30 second commercial, advergaming allows consumers to interact with a brand for an extended period of time. The engaging nature of advergaming holds the attentions of consumers longer, allowing e-tailers to educate them about new products or product features.
Further, advergaming lines up with social networking when one consumer emails the game or link to friends and they forward to their friends, this aids in extending the advertising reach.
In January, 2009 ComScore released a study which showed that “the category has grown 27 percent during the past year to 86 million visitors in December 2008, while the total time spent playing online games has jumped 42 percent. Americans’ total share of Internet time spent playing online games grew from 3.7 percent in December 2007 to 4.9 percent in December 2008.”
ComScore
ComScore
Advergames are typically free but some sites do require consumers to create an account, and sometimes actually pay to play the games. In addition some advertisers just throw their logo on any game, games that do not have any correlation with the brand. If budgets allow, advertisers need to create custom games that integrate the brand into the game in a function that creates a natural association.
The facts are in, advergaming works. It is time to try this advertising medium, if you do, do it the right way and spend the money to create a game that makes since for your brand. Don’t be just another PacMan game with a logo thrown on it.
