Marketing Stategy: In-game advertising (Obama & EA)

October 16, 2008 | By Marc Porcelli | No Comments »

I came across a very interesting post last week on Gigaom, “Obama Campaigning on Xbox 360?” At the time the post was unconfirmed – it was confirmed on Monday. Talk about an interesting marketing strategy! Even if the campaign did not yield any significant results, or measurable (which would be very difficult considering the amount of exposure) it’s a huge boast to in-game-advertising.

Very interestingly, the ads are all very targeted which appear on games offered by Electronic Arts (EA). “Only gamers playing online in 10 states can see the ads, which appear as stadium signage or billboards, Rockwood said. (The ads are downloaded when gamers log on to the Xbox Internet service.) Unsurprisingly, all 10 states are swing states: Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Indiana, Montana, North Carolina, New Mexico, Nevada, Ohio and Wisconsin. President Bush won all of those states in 2004 except for Wisconsin.

The other Xbox games where the ads appear are “Burnout Paradise,” “NASCAR 09,” “NHL 09,” “NBA Live 08,” “Need For Speed: Carbon,” “Need For Speed: ProStreet,” “NFL Tour,” and “Skate.” All of this per Walter Alarkon’s post, “Obama Runs Ads in ‘Madden’” of The Hills Briefing Room.

Further to the targeting of the ten swings stats, the ads also hit users aged 18-34…well done Obama Campaign! Funny enough, there is an interesting spoof on the whole campaign which makes fun of McCain trying the same thing.

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Category: Marketing Strategy, Online Marketing

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