Crossing Games With Lighting Creates Marketing Heat

Gaming’s cultural and technological impact is so great these days that it’s reaching into unusual new areas. Immersive gaming is a key phrase you’ll hear from virtual reality proponents, and that’s something you can get now thanks to a partnership between Royal Philips, the global leader in lighting, and Frima Studio Inc., Canada’s largest independent game developer. Frima has made Phillips Hue lighting interact in real time with the gameplay of its popular title Chariot, exclusively on Microsoft’s Xbox One. It’s a combination that opens up a new market for Philips while adding some marketing heat to the Xbox One and Chariot. “Chariot has been a great title in our ID@Xbox portfolio since it launched into Games With Gold last year. We’re thrilled that Frima is pushing the boundaries with this new technology from Philips Hue and are really excited to see it come to Xbox,” said Chris Charla, director of ID@Xbox at Microsoft.

Chariot is a popular couch co-op platformer with rich, vibrant colors — and now it can control all the Philips Hue lights in the room to reflect in real time what is happening in the game. Different lights are connected together to create a unique ambiance with hundreds of colors for the ultimate immersion in the game universe. When enemies attack, Hue lights blink red. When colorful plants bloom, their colors are reflected in the room. From subtle shifts to sudden bursts, everything onscreen is reflected in a Hue-enabled space. “With its stunning art and mesmerizing environments, Chariot is a perfect fit to demonstrate the full potential of Philips Hue for games and Frima is the ideal partner to help us showcase a technological world premiere,” said Wout Verhagen, director of strategic alliances and partnerships at Philips.

Cyrille Jean, Associate Brand Manager at Frima Studio, spoke with [a]listdaily about the game and the cooperation with Philips and Microsoft.

This a fascinating and unique extension of gaming into the home. Where did the idea originate?

At Frima Studio, we have employees whose job it is to develop ideas and innovate. It’s the company’s philosophy to encourage initiatives and good ideas. In this case, Chariot was an internal initiative. Last January an employee saw the opportunity in the new technology developed by Philips — an opportunity to bring a game experience to another level. The studio gave the green light to the employee to approach Philips, and they believed immediately in the idea.

How difficult was it to implement the control of Hue Lighting within the game?

Luc Beaulieu, CTO at Frima Studio: Once the R&D portion was done, it was quite simple. It took about a month to implement the Philips Hue lights into Chariot and another month for it to be production ready on Xbox One. Balancing the lights with the gameplay so that it feels right was a good challenge.

Will Philips be using this connection with gaming in its marketing for Hue Lighting?

The Philips Hue Lights change the way we always used lights at home. Now, the consumer can control them (colors and intensity) as you wish via an app or other systems. The initiative came from Frima which had the objective of offering players a more immersive game experience. We can’t deny that both sides benefit from this partnership and the visibility that resulted, but the first objective was for Philips to offer many possibilities to the consumers with the Hue Lights, and for Frima to offer a better experience to gamers in their living room. This brings attention to Chariot and we appreciate it because we’ll keep surprising you.

Will we see other games connected to Hue Lighting?

The door is now open and the idea public. The experience is great, so I’m sure that other developers will make Philips Hue Lights compatible with their games.

What sort of response have you gotten from gamers about this connection?

We’ve had a very positive response from the community. The majority of players enjoy the new experience offered by the association with Philips Hue.

Here are some quotes from players:

“Seriously, this is like the coolest thing ever. I hope this gets seen by the Xbox team and they try to implement it as a system feature. The immersion factor is really impressive.” said one Reddit user, among many other laudatory comments on Reddit.

 

Digital Ad Market Growing In 2016

While worldwide advertising spending was originally projected to drop this year from previous estimates, U.K. based marketing research service Warc has changed its tune, mainly due to the shifting of online Internet advertising.

A report from Mediapost indicates that advertising spending is now expected to rise 2.3 percent for the year, mainly due to the U.S. and Chinese markets. Separately, the U.S. will grow 1.4 percent and China will increase even more by nine percent. India is expected to go even higher by 16.1 percent, while Russia will actually drop by 13.1 percent

In this report, Warc also details a drop in worldwide TV advertising, by 1.9 percent for this year, although it’s expected to pick back up again by next year, by 2.5 percent.

So where is the rise in this spending Online. The report shows that Internet advertising will actually become the biggest ad medium for next year, with 16.1 percent this year and 12.9 percent over the next year. Considering that the Internet is already the biggest ad platform in half of the world’s markets, this will expand this growth even further.

However, that doesn’t mean all the markets will thrive. With the big shift to digital, regular print – magazines and newspapers – will see a drop. Declines of 10.4 percent for magazines and 9.2 percent for newspapers are expected this year, and even more next year, by 7.4 and 5.8 percent, respectively.

As far as which markets will dominate in terms of advertising share, the United States will continue to have a hefty part of it, leading with 36.9 percent. Coming up in second is China by 19.3 percent, Japan in third with 8.9 percent, and the U.K. (5.6 percent), Germany (5.5 percent) and Brazil and India (5.2 percent each) rounding out the list.

These estimates aren’t likely to change, but considering the popularity of certain ad mediums – like in mobile – there’s always a possibility.

Crackle’s Streaming Success With ‘Joe Dirt 2’

While Netflix and Hulu aren’t exactly spilling the beans about specifically how many people watch their original programs, Crackle has no problem spilling the beans about how well David Spade’s Joe Dirt is performing for it.

The Sony-owned streaming network recently added the exclusive film Joe Dirt 2: Beautiful Loser to its line-up this past week, continuing the adventures of Spade’s hillbilly-ish character as he attempts to make right in his life. Crackle has indicated that the movie’s addition to the channel has been an imminent success, garnering more than one million views in its past five days, according to Adweek. In its first day along, it was viewed over 278,000 times, the largest for a streaming program to date (in terms of what numbers were revealed, anyway – Netflix still isn’t talking.

“Joe Dirt 2: Beautiful Loser has garnered record-breaking viewership that we’re excited to share,” said Eric Berger, general manager of Crackle and executive vice president of digital for Sony Pictures Television, in a statement. “The reception we are seeing from viewers in such early stages of the film’s release bodes very well for our original movie efforts—we are looking forward to continuing to develop and produce quality content on Crackle.”

The company has also said it will continue to report ratings for its original content in the months ahead, though nothing was specified just yet.

18 million people use the service on a monthly basis, watching shows like Jerry Seinfeld’s Comedians In Cars Getting Coffee and others. It’s preparing to launch a new drama this fall called The Art of More, featuring Dennis Quaid and Kate Bosworth among others in its cast. Those could mean big numbers down the road as well…and we won’t have to play a guessing game in terms of how popular they are.

As Joe Dirt might say, “Daaaaaaaaang!” The trailer for the movie can be found below.

Brands Go Big On Music Festivals To Reach Large, Captive Audience

Music fans are already paying an arm and a leg to attend their favorite music festivals this summer, whether it’s Lollapalooza or the Electric Daisy Carnival. So marketers are doing whatever it takes to ease this financial burden, while at the same time spreading the word about their products.

Via a report from Adweek, Anheuser-Busch’s Bud Light brand is offering plenty of goodies to fans through its “immersive digital toolkit,” which provides fast passes, backstage tours, exclusive downloads, photos with artists and free schwag, amongst other goodies, provided they take part in some form of their marketing.

A number of festivals see advertisers such as this taking part in one form or another, including Stagecoach, Bonnaroo, HARD Summer and Rock In Rio, among others. But like Bud Light above, they’re looking for the right approach – and a small sampling just isn’t enough.

“There aren’t many places to reach 100,000 people in a day in a captive environment,” said Andrew Klein, senior vice president of global partnerships for ARG Live. “We tell brands to come big or don’t come at all.”

Various sponsors have rolled out different programs at these events, including Sephora’s beauty patio at the Coachella event and Malibu Rum’s devoted beach house, in the midst of a rainy FarmBorough event in New York.

Other promotions are jumping in as well. Uber paired up a popular country artist to ride along with fans during Chicago’s Windy City Lake Shake, while 7up and H&M have created limited edition merchandise for their Electric Daisy Carnival and Coachella appearances, respectively.

Finding the right “groove” for this fans is key for a program to work. “Fans are asking, ‘What did you do for me ‘ There’s a higher expectation of what a brand will bring to a festival,” said Mike Raspatello, manager for digital innovation and strategy at Anheuser-Busch. “You want them to be glad you’re there.”

However, connections aren’t just made in person – companies can also get into the action online, where an even bigger audience can await. “It’s not just about those three days, it’s about the six or eight months surrounding the festival,” said Maureen Ford, president of national and festival sales for Live Nation. “Everyone’s being challenged in a good way to tell their story over a longer period with unique content.”

One example of this is Yahoo’s recent livestream from EDC Las Vegas, where 130,000 fans  tuned in every night. 7up took advantage of this with specially made cans designed by DJ’s Tiesto and Martin Garrix, among others. “Being on the ground and launching special product demonstrates to fans that we’re part of the culture,” said Eric Blackwood, director of marketing for 7up. “And the livestream allows us to take it to a much larger scale – millions rather than a few hundred thousand.”

And the bigger brands aren’t just taking part – DoSomething.org continues to be a big part of the Vans Warped Tour, one of the summer’s more popular events. However, some are catering to a new audience, since 70 percent of these concert-goers happen to be female. “Some brands got away from experiential marketing for a while, but they’ve come back to it because of the emotional connection,” said Lyman. “When they create a hybrid activation, with social media to amplify it, that’s a winner.”

Rock on, fans.

Chris Columbus Makes Video Games Funny With ‘Pixels’

This summer will see a pair of very different video game interpretations. There’s the 20th Century Fox action flick, Hitman: Agent 47, which opens Aug. 21, and there’s Sony Pictures’ comedy, Pixels, which bows July 24. Director Chris Columbus, who’s helmed a string of big budget Hollywood comedies featuring the latest visual effects, takes on video games in Pixels. The film, which focuses on an alien invasion in the form of life-sized 1980s video game characters, assembles a cast of former arcade champions to save the world for real. Columbus talks about entering the video game space in this exclusive interview.

Chris ColumbusChris Columbus

What attracted you to Pixels?

Reading the Pixels script felt so original, so unique, that I just had to do it. I loved the blend of comedy mixed with action, which gave me an opportunity to do something I hadn’t been able to do since Harry Potter. It enabled me to push the comedy as far as we could, but also create this very intense action adventure film. For me, it’s Gremlins meets Goonies meets Harry Potter – it gave me the opportunity to create something really fresh using the tools I had gathered over the years. It would be an original summer movie that took you back to the 80s in an evocative, nostalgic way.

What was it like working with Professor Iwatani?

Well, the guy in the trailer, interestingly enough, is an actor playing Professor Iwatani. However, Professor Iwatani came to the set on several occasions and he has a cameo at the beginning of the film. Getting to know him a little bit, I found out he initially started his career as an arcade game repair man. So his cameo in the movie is him repairing a Pac-Man game.

How did you go about choosing which arcade games to focus on and what characters to bring into Pixels?

When I read the script it had bounced back and forth between a few writers, and I had read a draft by Timothy Dowling which was really very good, and kind of close to what we ended up shooting. From my recollection, Centipede and Pac-Man were already in the script. There was a completely different finale at the end of the movie, and it just didn’t feel as unique as what preceded it. So we were told Donkey Kong will never be in this movie, and eventually we persuaded Nintendo with really beautifully illustrated artwork and story boards and pre-animated sequences. Nintendo was very impressed by what we were doing, so that’s how we ended up getting permission for that one. And then there were other moments that we wanted to get into the film, as well as other games.

Some of those classic games have a pretty high learning curve. They weren’t the easiest games to play.

Oh, no, not at all. In fact, I realize that now. Donkey Kong was a little easier than Galaga, which was a pretty tough game. I know them fairly well when you’re doing the movie version of them, the gaming companies were very explicit in terms of telling us that we needed to stick to the traditional gameplay. So no matter how we were portraying these characters, it had to be based on the actual gameplay. We were able to have some artistic license here, particularly in the design of the characters, but I had to know the games pretty well to design a sequence.

Bandai Namco is coming out with the Pixels mobile video game. Were you able to work with them on that?

I looked at a few things, but I haven’t had time, to be honest with you. I’ve been completely and utterly — and still am — bombarded with visual effects. When I get off of this conversation I’m going into the editing room to look at some visual effects.

Do you feel there’s further opportunity for Pixels as a video game?

Yeah. It’s funny because I’ve seen my son play those games. I tried to play games like the Madden football game, the FIFA soccer game and the MLB game. I was more drawn to the sports games, but I still couldn’t play. It’s like I don’t want to waste the hours with my son trying to learn how to hit a fake baseball. But in my office we have two arcade games. We have a Donkey Kong and a Pac-Man game in our editing room offices, and they’re they old-fashioned arcade games. Pac-Man is very impressive. It’s signed by Professor Iwatani, but I find myself walking over playing it. It’s really mesmerizing and it’s simple and it’s just beautifully done. It’s challenging and it’s a great way to relieve some tension. There are these arcade bars popping up in cities across America. I know there’s a couple here in San Francisco that just opened, where you go in and you have some drinks and you play arcade games. So that speaks to me because that’s how I started getting into these games.

What impact do you feel the broader acceptance of gaming today will have on the audience for Pixels?

Of course, the parents out there are going to remember playing these games at a video arcade, and their kids will be just as amazed by the characters — there are a hundred jokes in the movie that work for parents, and a hundred that work for their kids. But it’s more than that.  Theres a lot of nostalgia for these games and about the 80s in particular. I certainly hear it all the time — I talk to college kids and their favorite movie is The Goonies. There’s a lot of love for that era right now.

What was it like working with video game special effects for this film?

Most visual effects movies — including movies I’ve been involved with — set out to create extraordinarily realistic visual effects. Even if you’re creating a dragon or a monster, you try to give it the texture and skin of a real creature. On Pixels, we were aiming for something you’ve never seen before. When these videogame characters come to life, they take on this pixelated form with an aura lit from within, and constantly moving. It’s literally a three-dimensional version of the 8-bit games you used to see on your arcade screen.

Jukin Media Takes the Leash on The Pet Collective for Tiny Riot!

by Todd Longwell

Viral video purveyor Jukin Media announced on Thursday that it has partnered with FremantleMedia North America’s (FMNA) digital studio Tiny Riot! on joint a venture to manage the latter’s channel The Pet Collective.

The Pet Collective takes the ever-popular animals-do-the-darndest things genre a step farther, with clips ranging from a Batman-costumed pug playing tug-of-war to a makeover of Charlie the L.A. shelter dog, which accumulated more than 14 million views and led to his adoption.

Currently, content from The Pet Collective is distributed primarily on YouTube and Facebook. With the new joint venture, the companies are looking to further explore opportunities for branded integration, as well as new distribution options, including OTT platforms and linear TV.

Keep reading…

This article was originally posted on VideoInk and is reposted on [a]listdaily via a partnership with the news publication, which is the online video industry’s go-to source for breaking news, features, and industry analysis. Follow VideoInk on Twitter @VideoInkNews, or subscribe via thevideoink.com for the latest news and stories, delivered right to your inbox.

 

Now Hiring This Week: July 22nd

[a]listdaily is your source for the hottest job openings for senior management and marketing in games, entertainment and social media. Check here every Wednesday for the latest openings.

  • NBC Universal – VP Marketing, Consumer Products (Universal City, Calif.)
  • Zynga – User Acquisition Manager (San Francisco, Calif.)
  • Pocket Gems – Director, Performance Marketing (San Francisco, Calif.)
  • Ayzenberg – Account Director (Seattle, Wash.)
  • Ayzenberg – Senior Tech Developer (Pasadena, Calif.)
  • Ayzenberg – Sr. Social Media Strategist (Pasadena, Calif.)

For last week’s [a]list jobs postings, click here. Have a position you’d like to place with us Email us at pr@ayzenberg.com.

 

7 Signs Influencer Marketing Is A Big Deal

Influencer marketing has been having its moment for some time now and is showing no signs of slowing down. In fact, twenty-two percent of marketers have cited influencer marketing as the fastest-growing online customer acquisition method.

It’s all happening for a reason.

Word Of Mouth Is More Powerful Than Ever

It may seem like a no-brainer, but don’t discount the power of word of mouth as a way to drive sales. According to Nielsen, 92 percent of consumers will believe a recommendation from friends and family over other forms of advertising. As such, word of mouth is a primary factor in 20 to 50 percent of all purchase decisions.

“A brand is no longer what we tell the consumer it is–it is what consumers tell each other it is,” says Scott Cook, the founder and CEO of Intuit.

Brands Are Going All-In On Social

A whopping 70 percent of brands are planning on increasing their spend on social media advertising this year and 59 percent of marketers plan to increase their budgets specific to influencer marketing. To make the most out of this increase in spend, brands can look to work with influencers that make the most sense for them, in terms of tone, voice and audience, to create content that is more organic and engaging.

 

Google Searches for ‘Influencer Marketing’ Are Blowing Up

If anything is a good indicator of what’s hot out there, it’s Google.

 

Where There Are Big Opportunities, There Is Big Value

A recent survey has provided insights into what kind of returns marketers are seeing from their investments into influencer marketing. On average, they are seeing $6.50 for every $1 spent, while 70 percent of marketers are seeing a return of $2 per $1 spent. For those who have used influencer marketing most effectively, the top 13 percent of marketers are gaining $20 per $1 spent.

“Marketers are already shifting budgets to influencer marketing but the market sizing data is not quite there yet,” says Jon Roth, Executive Director of ION.

“This is typical of early markets like search and social before they grew quickly. Brand dollars are now shifting to integration with these new preferred content forms, just like dollars shifted previously to search marketing and social marketing as the sectors matured.”

According to Misha Talavera, that gap will be closed in due time. “Influencer marketing is currently an arbitrage. There is a massive supply of influencers, but few marketers running influencer campaigns, meaning that the cost of buying an influencer promotion is below its real value.”

Influencer Marketing Cuts Through Banner Blindness

Eighty-six percent of consumers “suffer” banner blindness– that means only 14 percent are able to remember the last display ad they have seen.

“What all marketers are dealing with is an absolute sensory overload,” said Gretchen Hofmann, executive vice president of marketing and sales at Universal Orlando Resort, to the New York Times.

It makes sense that 70 percent of consumers prefer content instead of traditional advertising to learn about new products. It’s working— purchase intent is 53 percent higher and brand lift is 82 percent for native ads at large.

Data, Data, Data

The transition to a digital way of doing things has afforded marketers access to data that would have previously been much more difficult, expensive and less accurate. By leveraging this data for influencer marketing, we can further define which influencers are key and put a number on not just views but also engagement, so we can build better and better campaigns to scale.

“Influencer campaigns are so much more accountable than traditional vehicles like broadcast or outdoor billboards. Ultimately, those figures are estimates based off industry standards,” says Steven Lai, ION’s talent group director. “But digital content like influencer campaigns can be granularly tracked from impressions/views to clicks to purchase. Setting up campaigns properly, we can track every action a user takes as they progress through the purchase funnel and optimize in real time.”

The Content Shift Of Power Has Already Happened

“The shift with respect to preferred short-form influencer content has already occurred,” says Roth. For Roth, this key moment happened when Disney had acquired Maker Studios for a reported $950 million in March of 2014, to incorporate niche and often personality-driven short form video content into Disney’s existing content mix. A flurry of other major MCN deals have occurred before and after, but it has taken some time for brand dollars to follow.

According to Pixability and Google, the world’s top 100 brands have 55 percent increase of monthly views on YouTube over the past year, with an increasing quantity of videos produced. YouTube’s belated rival, Facebook, says video accounts for 22 percent of total ad spend.

According to Tapjoy, native ads are slated to continue to grow, especially on mobile, with budgets shifting from TV to mobile video as well. By 2018, eMarketer predicts that digital video advertising spend will finally eclipse TV.

Join us for part two of the Influencer Marketing Webinar series to take a deep look at the next crucial step in building influencer relationships – Create. Request an invite.

 

YouTube Doesn’t Fear Online Competition

With Facebook Video managing to get record results in just a short amount of time – as well as growing audiences for Snapchat and Spotify – one would think that Google’s YouTube execs would be concerned with hefty competition. However, that’s not entirely the case – despite its continuing success.

In a story reported by Fortune, YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki stated that the company isn’t concerned when it comes to the competition in the online video market, recently speaking about the matter at the Brainstorm Tech conference in Aspen.

Despite Facebook’s growing numbers, video views on YouTube are different than those on the social site, according to Wojcicki. Users tend to visit to watch clips, while on Facebook, they play automatically. “We want our users to engage,” she said. “We want them to not be channel surfing. We want them to say, ‘I saw a video, I cared about that video, I commented on that video, and I continued watching it.'”

But she also believes that all the competition can thrive from online video’s overall success. “Facebook, Twitter and everyone has recognized it as a big opportunity and they’re coming into the market,” she said. “I don’t think that’s a surprise because of the size of the opportunity.”

With a big number of projects – including “mobile, mobile, mobile,” as Wojcicki puts it, there’s no concern for this competition. “Overall, I feel pretty encouraged,” she said regarding its growth.

But when it comes to mobile ads, there may be a slight cause for concern over at Google. A report from Adweek indicates this, with a research report done by Adobe Digital Index. It highlighted various key shifts in the industry, including Periscope dominating Meerkat in live streaming (for the time being) and increased support for retailers on Reddit, despite recent CEO fallout.

However, the biggest story is Facebook’s display-ad success, which is sticking closer to users than anyone Google is currently offering up, according to Adobe’s principal analyst Tamara Gaffney. “There have been radical changes that Facebook has done and less radical changes Google has done,” she said. “And consumers in the marketplace are feeling ads on Facebook are more relevant.”

Although ad impressions were down 50 percent, clickthrough rates have doubled for these ads, with more valuable ad impressions, even though they’re lower in count. Meanwhile, Google’s clickthrough is up 24 percent on display ads, although it seems that more users prefer Facebook’s. 51 percent of users polled said the social site’s ads were more attuned to their interests, compared to 17 percent on YouTube.

Other findings on the report, including Periscope’s effectiveness and the power of Facebook retail referral, can be found here.

SuperAwesome Continues To Grow With Fundraising

Emerging as one of the leaders for digital advertising platforms aimed at the younger set, SuperAwesome has managed to come a long way in the past year – and it’s aiming even better with a recent fundraising round.

TechCrunch has reported that the U.K. based company has managed to raise $7 million through a Series A funding, and will use the money to “grow faster and reach more territories,” according to founder Dylan Collins.

This expansion includes both more hirings in the United States, as well as Southeast Asia. Said Collins, “We’re hiring in the U.S., U.K., Asia and in several partnership conversations for specific regions.”

This funding was put together by IBIS MTM, Twenty Ten Capital and Sandbox and Co., along with participating partners like Hoxton Ventures.

It’s just the latest bit of good news for the company, which has managed to push its valuation 4.5 times since its previous seed round last year. “When we started SuperAwesome, the objective was always to become the global digital kids marketing platform,” says Collins. “Nobody has done this (most of the major media companies are concentrated in one or two territories) and the faster we build out this global kid-safe infrastructure to connect brands with content, the larger we grow this market.”

The company has more than a quarter of a billion young viewers for an audience, as well as a “compliance” platform that works considerably well, using cloud-based tools for Kids Web Services (KWS) to assure safety for parents, while at the same time producing content with the help of brands like Hasbro, Mattel and Lego.

Collins also discussed profit for the site, which will either exceed expectations or break even. “This year, we’ll drive tens of millions of advertising dollars into the kids digital content ecosystem with annual growth of 4-5x and we’ve got a clear route to revenues of $100 million + over the next couple of years,” he said. “By virtue of existing we’re materially increasing the size (and safety) of the digital kids market so by any analysis, our value comes from continuing to grow fast.”

SuperAwesome has made a number of acquisitions to continue its success, including Spain’s Ad4kids, and the sales and ad teams for kids’ virtual world Bin Weevils. But Collins insists it’s still a personal process. “All of our acquisitions have been for people, rather than technology (because of the very specific compliance needs, all of our products are built by our internal engineering team) so we continue to look at opportunities when they arise,” says Collins. “The kids market is extremely tough to scale up in so if any startup is interested in a strategic conversation, we’d be happy to have a chat.”

More information on this fund-raising can be found here.