"Television is a problematic market for advertising to certain demographics, and it's no secret that magazines are in trouble. Online destinations are just starting to come into their own. So where does that leave opportunities for advertising? Video games. A new study, attractively titled "Eye-tracking Analysis as a Means to Visualise the Effects of In-Game Advertising" by 11 Prozent Communication and the University of Offenberg shows that marketing to gamers can be very effective... if you follow the rules.
The first challenge is to make sure the ads fit into the game world. "Advertisements that do not fit into the context or do not provide more realism to the setting of the game or even obstruct the game’s flow, might ruin the whole effort and generate irreparable damage," the study stated. Sports games and racing games are easy in this regard; we're used to being deluged by ads at both types events in real life... why should gaming be any different?"
Pangloss has been intrigued ever since she discovered in 2007 that Google hadfiled a patent for extending their targeted advertising model into advertising presented in games, using information collected in games , via both networked consoles and/or online games. Google have since said they have not followed up that patent but if in-game advertising is the next big thing someone, somewhere, will surely design a Phorm for online games?? After all people play these things for DAYS. Who could resist such a fertile source of personalising data??
Which really does make you wince because think of the information that would be collected - "hmm , this guy regularly tortures, kills and buys virtual genitalia. Oh and he's a junior civil servant with 3 kids (we got that from Doubleclick) but in the game he's a green alien called Grrrarg who despises all females . . Quick, advertise an extreme porn cable channel to him!" Hmm....
1 comment:
There's an in-game advertising webinar series starting in October - http://www.marketkey.co.uk/ingame/
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