My favorite game growing up was LIFE. You spun a wheel to see how many spaces to move your car around a checkered path, making an obligatory stop to get married, before possibly picking up some peg kids. Maybe you’d land on Pay Day and get an extra Share the Wealth Card or you might loose some money gambling on Lucky Day, but you always got something just for playing. Everyone bought a house and everyone retired.
Now Shakespeare’s “all the world’s a stage and all the men and women merely players,” may have a new modern day application. As Jesse Schell, a game designer and Carnegie Mellon University professor, predicts a "gamepocalypse” is coming where all of us players will win points for our daily activities. And the game has already begun…
Of course, loyalty based rewards programs aren’t new. Almost daily I earn discounts from my Starbuck’s black and Loehmann’s diamond cards as other consumers rack up credit card and grocery store cash-backs. But Schell envisions a much more saturated game-like life experience in which brands track and reward our consumption everday (he uses the example of daily teeth brushing) and incentivize positive behavior. As he notes, we’re talking about positive behavior from the brand’s perspective (a.ka. frequent use), which may be aligned with consumers’ best interests at Colgate, but what about at Coca-Cola or Camel?
Game developers saw the life-as-a-game future coming in 2008, coining it “funware” but only now are consumer packaged goods (CPGs) marketers starting to be convinced that “the brand can be the game” and much more engaging and interactive than the dying 30-second ad spot. At the MI6 game marketing conference last month game marketers discussed how if “the game makers and the brand experts get together, figure out how to create long-term brand loyalty through engagement, then everybody is going to make a pile of money.”
Why is “funware” gaming attractive to the non-gaming masses? We want to play something we know that we can win. And while we can’t level-up in our marriages or accumulate points for sensitive communication with our teenager, in the gamepocalypse we may be rewarded for the number of miles we ran and cups of frozen yogurt devoured.
As we move toward incentive-based, interactive brand experiences, the role of marketers and PR professionals may just be to ensure consumer’s best interests take center stage and that everyone playing this game of life gets to feel a little more victorious.
It was clear at Digital Hollywood’s “Content Rights and Technology Solutions” and “Monetizing Digital Content” sessions that the DRM debate has shifted from how to control usage to how to engage consumers and embed more value in legitimate content. The panel of tech vendors encouraged content providers to listen to consumer demands for universal access to purchased content. Anti-piracy remained a hot topic, but with the belief that satisfied consumers are less likely to stray and may in fact be willing to pay more for high quality, legitimate content.
Mark Isherwood, director and co-founder of Rightscom Ltd, explains how content access and protection is changing in the following clip.
Creating compelling content for smart consumers was top of mind as Digital Hollywood kicked off with packed sessions, prestigious speakers and conversations that often returned to how to best engage online consumer audiences who are spread out across many, many sites. Everyone agreed that the entertainment industry maxim "content is king" is critical to reaching today’s empowered consumers who pick and choose what they read and watch and for the most part bypass advertisements.
As the role of marketing and public relations increasingly becomes that of content creator, buzz builders can learn from the playbooks of Hollywood marketers. Monday’s session "Strategizing the Campaign; Selling Movies, TV and Video on the Web" revealed tips from top brass at Comcast /Fandango, Microsoft, Fox, Paramount who have kept box office ticket thriving this spring through their creativity, tenacity and innovation
Know your target audience so that you can personalize the online experience to their individual tastes. Survey your customers to determine their interests. You may find some surprising results that can become a part of your online brand experience.
Be experimental, but integrate too. Online allows marketers to try something new and get immediate feedback. Develop your digital marketing strategy in tandem with traditional marketing to create a single multi-faceted campaign.
Budget time and money for "clever" content. Don’t let content be an after thought. Consumers expect free, unique compelling content that intelligently starts a conversation that they can participate in.
Provide depth for online audiences to dig deeper into content, get involved and be "in the know." Make your biggest fans feel special with exclusive content (like WATCHMENS’ multiple trailers and WOLVERINE’s contest for the red carpet premiere) or prizes (swag, anyone?)
iPhone apps are hot - but then you knew that. Fandango had a WAP platform for years, but had little traction until it launched an iPhone app 6 weeks ago with basic functionality to buy tickets on-the-go. Half a million downloads later, consumers are now watching mobile trailers too.
Listen to consumers, and respond - Fast! The beauty of instant online feedback is also a responsibility. Consumer’s told Fandago they wanted to be able to log into their accounts on their iPhones rather than enter credit card info to buy tickets. Fandango listened and built in the functionality within 2 weeks.
Enlist Viral Armies - Every marketing campaign should include an "Alpha Fan Strategy" to engage a Digital Street Team to be your online ambassadors. First you need to get to know your #1 fanboys -- the 10-15% of your audience that wants more than to consume or share content. Give them the tools to create a mash-up, design a T-shirt, build an add-on widget to extend your brand experience.
Don’t Stop the Feed - Keep evaluating engagement measurements to determine what’s working, what’s not and what to do next. Most importantly, keep giving fans more of what they loved, but with innovations. You’ve got their attention - now you need to keep it by getting even more creative.
