TechWeek played host to the Digital Gaming Forum Tuesday night and game developers from across the GTA got to show off their newest games.
All of them were pretty entertaining-the Golf Launchpad virtual golf tee was particularly busy all evening-but they also showed the potential for increased marketing exposure through online games.
Groove Media’s Utour Golf is the perfect model to increase exposure and revenue through games. Utour players connect with friends or others online and can start their own game, ask to join another, enter a tournament or launch one of their own. Chat feeds mean that gamers soon forge relationships-so like many games, Utour has a social network surrounding it.
It’s these social networks that make games like Utour ideal advertising opportunities.
In-game advertising is nothing new, of course, but combined with social activity the games have more avenues for ROI. A Utour Facebook application is launching this fall, which will only increase social activity around the game.
Sports games are ideally suited to in-game advertising because ads have long been a part of professional sport. Advertising actually enhances the game-digital sports seem unrealistic without them.
The exposure is far from static, either: in UTour’s case, advertisers can acquire naming rights to major tournaments with gamers from all over the world.
It all comes down to fit, of course, and audience-Canadian marketers need to reach Canadian gamers. . The bigger the Canadian gaming industry grows, the more marketing opportunities will come up for Canadian companies.
