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- Thread starter dukmahsik
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ugh...I can't wait for the 22nd of November, not just for X360...but the end of Microsoft Viral campaigns
pegisys said:Do you really think that is going to end it, it's going to be one for every first party game that come out
I hadn't thought of that...thats actually true. Halo 3 viral campaign comes to mind
Belmontvedere
Newcomer
With all these viral marketing campaigns we're gonna need a doctor!
How is "viral marketing" supposed to even work? It seems like the only people who would care would be people who are planning to buy the product anyway. I mean I'm sure as hell not going to run around playing some phone tag game for some video game franchise I'm kinda iffy on.
fearsomepirate said:
It's got a thread posted here with the URL in the title, it's basically already working. People continually talking about the product means more people will hear about it. Each new feature or game or whatever that gets announced will get talked about and spread without too much work being done by the marketing drones.
It's a way of exploiting the fans to hook the casual buyers. Just keep everyone talking by making them guess about stuff, add a new bit of vague hype-flavoured nonsense any time it simmers down....
However, is it actually any more effective than a straightforward campaign. eg. The recent Origen thing. Did the increase in bandwidth of lots of curious visitors make for a more beneficial response than just announcing the competition? Did the backlash of 'Is that it?! What a waste of time!" really do MS any favours? Would not a basic announcement of a competition see as much linkage anyway?MrWibble said:
As another example, the giantology campaign for SotC. The site doesn't at all mention SotC an it was only someone mentioning it here that I knew it was talking about that game. Yet the game itself is receiving loads more coverage and praise. What exactly is this obscue website contributing to mass appreciation that the quality of the game itself cannot muster? Granted it may attract visitors that otherwise wouldn't care for gaming, but in doing so they learn nothing about the game's existence.
Shifty Geezer said:
What they are announcing isn't the point. The point is to get people talking and keep them talking so that casual passers by hear the buzz created and learn of the product in question.
The backlash is kind of irrelevant. I doubt the disappointment generated by finding out that what you've been discussing for weeks has turned out to be very minor will actually stop you from buying the thing you were probably going to get anyway.
If they announce something trivial, the hard-core won't care and the casual buyer isn't worth the effort of an expensive enough campaign to inform them. So by using it as an excuse to launch a pretty cheap viral site you can generate a lot more hype.
Even just this conversation about the merits (or lack thereof) of viral campaigns serves their purpose. Every time the thead bumps to the top of the page, there's a chance a few more people will see it and investigate.
Well it doesn't always work
Karma Police
Regular
So anyone have an idea what happens on Nov 14th?
I still question the whole thing. What kind of truly "casual passers by" heard about Halo 2 because of "ilovebees" who didn't already have friends interested in Halo 2 who would have been talking about the game anyway?
I think this may be one of those things with quickly diminishing returns. At first, ilovebees was "what the heck is this?" With the new viral marketing, it's "This is about Xbox 360." Well, we all know what X360 is, what it's supposed to do, and have quite a few screenshots and early looks at games. There's already too much known about X360 to make following an obscure website that might show you a corner of a car from PGR3 worth it.
The most I've seen is that it gets hardcore fans talking about how cool Microsoft is for doing viral marketing.
I think this may be one of those things with quickly diminishing returns. At first, ilovebees was "what the heck is this?" With the new viral marketing, it's "This is about Xbox 360." Well, we all know what X360 is, what it's supposed to do, and have quite a few screenshots and early looks at games. There's already too much known about X360 to make following an obscure website that might show you a corner of a car from PGR3 worth it.
The most I've seen is that it gets hardcore fans talking about how cool Microsoft is for doing viral marketing.
I don't care what their behaviour is elsewhere, as long as they behave themselves here. To date I haven't seen fearsomepirate acting out of tone. And as for visitors from other forums, one hopes that they've realized there's higher-brow places to visit and can leave the smut behind them
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