Game Consoles on the Rise
Can you remember when gaming systems were advertised mostly towards children and teens? Can you remember how simple gaming systems were, like Nintendo, Game Boy, and Sega Genesis, just a few years ago? Well today gaming systems are beginning to take over peoples lives. According to Neilson and Ad week, more than two fifths of U.S. households posses some type of video game console, a number that has increased 18.5% in the last two years. This means that 47 million American homes or 41% or American homes own some type of console. People are continuously upgrading their gaming systems and it is not only children. Today, as opposed to the past, adults mostly male are buying these new gaming systems.
Adults should be viewed as a completely different target audience when discussing advertising of gaming consoles. With the rise of so many adults buying these consoles, advertisers should find new ways in order to obtain this new markets attention. Issues may surround advertising games to adults due to the graphic nature of so many games today. On the other hand advertisers must abandon their traditional ways of advertisings video games and attempt to try new advertising techniques. By techniques, I believe advertisers should attempt to utilize different types of media’s that appeal more towards adults than children for certain types of gaming features.
Also discussed in the article is the lack of advertising in the games themselves. With almost half of the homes in the United States owning at least on type of game console, as provided by Neilson, it is inevitable that advertising is going to take video games by storm. Soon advertisers are going to be running live advertisements throughout game play. This means now not only does your computer have pop-ups, but now your video games have pop-ups as well. Since many gaming systems connect directly to the internet today, this new feature of live running ads during game play makes it incredibly easy for companies to run live ads. This feature can be extremely helpful and successful for advertisers, but can also be terribly annoying for the consumer. I believe that if a company is going to advertise during a video game, they should do so in a subtle and discreet manner. Advertisers should portray their advertisement before or after a game, but not during, as this could turn consumers away from the products.
Gaming systems are continuing to grow as you have seen the drastic change from only a few years ago. The Neilson Company is launching a GamePlay Metrics later this year which will attempt to be the equivalent to television ratings data for game consoles and will help to provide more precise information about the use of gaming systems.
posted by Scott Duffy @ 5:10 PM
4 Comments
4 Comments:
I feel advertising during video games is running a little risky with the issue of private owned and purchased property, but on an advertising side of things, very effective. It all depends on how they go about this "live ad" idea and the extent of pop-ups that will occur. I think product placement is very effective in video games especially with the viewer seeing the product everytime they play the game however I am also interested to see how live ads would come into play with video games. I would personally as a consumer be annoyed that I purchased a video game for the amount they run for to have to sit through ads before I can play the game. I'm wondering how that would be legal or how they would work their way around it, but I'm sure if the video game is going to make money off of advertising then it wouldn't be a problem.
I also think advertisers have to be careful what advertisements are placed in which video game. I know that many male adults purchase video games however you can't be guaranteed who will be playing and or seeing the video game. I know personally my 17 year old brother plays video games but my 10-yea old twin brothers often play with him. That's two different age groups so I feel the advertising would have to be very general and may not be effective at all. I know the games are targeted to a specific age group but that doesn't mean thats the only age who plays them, especially now-a-days and I think advertisers should be careful in what they advertise, especially if younger children are exposed to ads that were meant to be seen only by adults. There's where you can run into a problem.
It was bound to happen sooner or later. Product placement in video games wasn’t far enough. After reading a few different articles about the subject, it seems as though current product placement in video games is easily tuned out. Even streaming advertising, at least while a user is playing a video game, might turn into the ignored world of wed advertising. What has been suggested is that streaming ads will be a way to create brand loyalty and awareness rather than induce trial or persuade consumers to a product. This is interesting and companies will probably end up spending big bucks for their products to be associated with some of the most popular video game.
A whole new genre of advertising strategies may become available to media planners. I wouldn’t be surprised if companies teamed up with games to create unavoidable interaction with their products. Also, is it possible we may begin seeing interactive ads along with the new interactive gaming systems? However video game advertising is executed, media planners and advertisers will have a great new way to reach niche audiences. An audience of “gamers” probably spends much more of their free time with a gaming system rather than watching television or reading magazines. Maybe video games will take some of the characteristics of new cell phone advertising- you get your games cheaper if you can put up with being consumed with yet more ads. Whatever happens, we all saw it coming. Now we’re left wondering, what’s next?
As we discussed in class, this is very interesting, Scott. I'm interested in what you think this means for advertisers. I agree with Dana -- ads embedded in the programs don't worry me half as much as this "live ad" idea. Advertisers have no way of knowing who is playing a game. Will parents be able to "block" ads if they don't think content is suitable? A media plan including video games might cause more trouble for an advertiser than it's worth if ads were "inappropriate" for the children playing the game, even if they'd be fine for adults.
I don't believe the rise and fall of online or "live" ads will be from the subtlety of the ads, but rather from the ads making sense in the context of the online world. When I had free time (which is never this semester) I would go on line and play against people. Some games are perfectly suited for advertisers. For instance, NCAA Football and Madden employ a variety of advertising techniques.
The two most interesting of these are ESPN's dominance in this online world where they even provide free ESPN radio (complete with full ad schedule) in the waiting lobbies while matches are loading. They also advertise certain music artists by featuring their songs and album information.
The most startling form of advertising is that all four branches of the military have some form of advertising. For instance, whenever I play a reality shooter like Call of Duty 4, free banners, backgrounds, themes, etc seemingly materialize from nowhere. These covert "ads" have their names plastered all over them. Lets not forget that the military is still considered advertising. I just imagine a room full of military analysts logging on and scouting the future super soldiers by looking at high scores and kill ratios.
The real travesty is that many young men and women are oblivious to this type of advertising. The most dangerous types of ads aren't the ones that annoy, its the ones that people don't see as ads in the first place, yet they are and they have a very real impact.
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