It’s 10 pm at night, and I glance up from my tablet, look outside and it’s dark. Have I really been playing candy crush for 3 hours straight? The constant voice in the back of my head, “I’ll stop after the next level”. It’s always the next level.
But what is it that is so addictive about these time-consuming mindless games? They have games within the games, reaching milestones at certain levels, using power-ups, in-game bonuses or free lives to get you to that next stage.
With the lockdown in place, gaming and more importantly gamification have increased hugely. Comscore found that in the UK in February 2020, individuals spent 29 billion minutes on a games-related website and the majority of this was via mobile rather than desktop.
We are now seeing the opportunity for brands to be involved in those games – take Animal Crossing for instance. The release of the new game that happened to coincide with the lockdown saw sales of the New Horizons game eclipse all three of its predecessors put together. Within the game, you are able to customise your character with clothing. This is where brands are now getting involved. You can choose branded clothes within the game.
Currently, Animal Crossing is free to join, but there are other games which brands are involved in that are monetised. The Sims formed a deal with Moschino last year and Fortnite the viral multi-platform game is free to play but there are many branded in-game upgrades that players can purchase.
What does this mean for brands?
We are seeing more gamified promotions available to customers. For example, last year Mando worked on British Gas’ augmented reality Easter Egg promotion where customers had to help Wilbur (the then British Gas mascot) to collect Easter eggs to win prizes. Mando also worked on the Vodafone #FindUnlimited promotion where customers had to visit specific locations and collect vatoms to see if they had won.
Both promotions engaged customers like never before, providing that fun entertainment factor whilst simultaneously being able to win prizes.
The future?
While no-one is entirely sure of the future, games are a sure-fire way of being able to get your brands in front of customers and consumers without them even having to leave the house; and there are multiple ways to get that gamification factor into their hands. It could be via a mechanic on your product’s packaging, or via your brands’ app, or through some form of add on an existing game, such as Animal Crossing.
With experience in gamified promotional solutions, and a bank of knowledgeable third-party technical support partners, Mando can guide you every step of the way to creating your first or hundredth gamified campaign, just get in touch using the contact form below.
Lauren Miles is Senior Marketing Executive at Mando and contactable at lauren.miles@mando.co.uk
