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 Forum index » Meta » General META Discussion
Viral Marketing that rubs me the wrong way...
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labfly
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 		Viral Marketing that rubs me the wrong way...
i'm not the sort of person that likes to crack open a can of worms... but i'm wondering how people feel about marketing people setting up "rabbit holes" that simply lead to chatting up a movie or a product. i'm not talking about the good stuff - ala Blair Witch or any ARG associated with a product... or extended reality - those all come with a "payoff". i'm talking about the stuff that is just put out there to make people "aware" and then ends... or fades away or just dies... for me, it feels like sex without an orgasm - sorry, but that seems like the best way to describe it. would love to hear what others have to say about this.. especially players. have you run across this sort of thing lately? do you like it? maybe just falling down a rabbit hole is enough. does it turn you off to ARGs? or does it just make you more interested?
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PostPosted: Mon Oct 15, 2007 10:45 pm
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rose
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 		I can point you to the META thread I started on 1-18-08 and game design. Games that are all buzz may work to sell tickets on opening weekend, but they do nothing but irritate a number of people and fail to build up anything lasting beyond that first showing. If the movie isn't good, no amount of buzz will save it.

As long as I'm complaining, I can add to this list the Atlanta City Church attempt to virally market their Christian Youth Conference through using tags on Youtube videos for 1-18-08, ARG, alternate reality game. I know this isn't exactly what you started this topic for, but it definitely fits in the topic of viral marketing that rubs me the wrong way. I have no problem with them making a "game", if in fact it is, or even with them using viral marketing. My problem is why don't they just use tags like "Christian" 'Youth" or things that they are actually looking for in their target audience. I'm sure they would find an audience that wants to follow their stuff, espicially in the South as there seems to be a strong Youth Christian fundamentalist sort of movement down there. But using unrelated tags just to get people to look at their rather unimaginative video of a guy saying everything is going to change...I don't like it. They have a clearly defined intent to change youth culture in America to reflect their brand of Christian values (values that not all Christians share and certainly values that the many other non-Christian in the US and the world don't share -like having to believe in Jesus to be saved.) I don't like them not being straight about their intentions in their marketing. It just seems dishonest to their audience.

PostPosted: Tue Oct 16, 2007 12:34 am
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xnbomb
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 		Monarch or Viceroy
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What it does for me is it shows me some of the complexities here: There is no doubt that when something begins enticingly and goes nowhere, it disappoints me. But the essential problem is trying to discern from the beginning of something what it is going to be.

There's a couple of things going on here. The first issue is a problem that is sort of inherent in the form: An alternate reality game cannot acknowledge itself as such if that reality is going to be intact/believe in itself, so it is forced to sort of dance around the issue of just what it is. That makes it particularly tricky for a game to communicate to its potential players just what it is going to be. And the second issue is also, in a way, inherent to the form: Part of what makes alternate reality games neat is that they don't explain themselves from the get-go. A big part of the play is the figuring it out, the unraveling of the mystery/the building of the structure, and just how that is going to go cannot be entirely spelled out up front.

I've written the last paragraph to illustrate how ARGs have a difficulty here, in the sense that they cannot reveal all their cards explicitly and/or right away. Now, to be sure, talented designers can find ways to meta-communicate certain kinds of information to potential players so they can form expectations about a game. I find the analogy of jazz musicians improvising together appealing here: They have a common goal (making music together), don't know exactly how they are going to get there (precisely what they are going to play), but are able to communicate their intentions to each other on some level so they can work together (don't ask me how, if I knew, I'd probably be a jazz musician). Similarly, talented puppetmasters can meta-communicate with talented players.

But in many ways, this is still an emerging art, and if you have played (or puppetmastered?) any number of games, you know some are more talented than others at this. There are other impediments too: A group of jazz musicians probably play together for a long time before they get good at that on-the-fly improvised collaboration, whereas in the case of an ARG, it can be a new cast of characters (i.e. players and puppetmasters) every time. This leaves a lot of room for difficulty and error in meta-communication, even when everyone has more or less the same goals.

It is that uncertainty, that difficulty in meta-communication, that room for error that leaves a huge gap through which someone who is not making a game to entertain, but rather an advertisement to sell***, can get access to the attention of players. As a player, you see how something begins, and you try to assess what it is likely to become. If you're an optimist (as I am in this regard) and you're willing to accept that it takes a while before a game starts to hit its stride sometimes, you necessarily give it some rope. And that can give the viral marketer plenty of time for you to pay attention to their meme, and still never deliver any of the things in a game that you as a player find enjoyable.

I don't think there is an easy solution here. The hard, long-term solution is the continuing refinement and improvement of the emerging art of ARG meta-communication, so that players and puppetmasters can recognize each other and form some mutual expectations. But I don't think there is any absolute defence against mimicry. A viral marketer can, if they have similar meta-communication skills (but applied for their purposes), present what is essentially an advertisement as an ARG***. Potential players enter this relationship on faith: They make their best guess as to what they can expect, based on the signals they can discern (which may be intended as earnest or deceitful), and they are at the mercy of the creator of the experience (be it marketing or game***) as long as they are willing to give them their attention.


*** This is a bit of an artificially crisp distinction, but this is how labfly has set it up: On the one hand you have an experience that is entertaining and has a payoff, versus one whose sole purpose is to get your attention/sell you an idea and then send you on your less than merry way. If you prefer, see these at the endpoints of a continuum, and recognize that experiences that many have called ARGs do fall somewhere in between these extremes.
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PostPosted: Tue Oct 16, 2007 12:37 am
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labfly
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 		i think what i'm worried about are the marketing folks that are very hip to the ARG world but simply not interested in spending the time, skills, or money to do an ARG, but they want to take advantage of grabbing "the eyes" of this audience by creating rabbit holes. these rabbit holes don't go to a story world or any sort of game.. the rabbit hole is just seen as a device that they know will attract an online community.

rose, i read thru some of the 1-18-08 meta thread and you're right... there is a ton of frustration being expressed there. it is always irritating when you see the potential of what could have been. makes me cringe. and what you described about the atlantic city church is just another example of what concerns me. it is dishonest - and so much of what this genre depends upon is players trusting puppetmasters. if these viral campaigns continually abuse this trust.. i think it will have some negative impact on ARGs. i know there are some that believe there are enough good ARGs to out weigh the faux-ARG rabbit holes to nowhere.. but i don't know - sure, there are many more people that understand this new form of entertainment now.. but there are still many that don't - and these new audiences may never find there way to the wonderful world of ARG-ing because the web (and elsewhere) is littered with these rabbit holes to nowhere.

xnbomb, you're right. we all love that we don't know where we might end up when we begin down these paths.. and to flag a game "a game" would take away from some of the thrill. (sigh) i don't have any answers - it just bums me out - and i do believe we will be seeing more and more of this "set up" of grab their attention and send them on their less than merry way... because it works and it is cost effective for those creating these "set ups".
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PostPosted: Tue Oct 16, 2007 12:28 pm
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rose
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 		The best answer to poorly done games, or games that are just rabbitholes are the brilliant games that some of us have had the chance to play. I know that cost is important, but I don't think that 1-18-08 had to spend a fortune to make a compelling game.

If all you care about is "buzz" measured by the number of hits, page mentions, or some easily quantified amount, then I guess you can do these viral rabbit holes that lead nowhere. The problem with that is that people will get very tired of that very quickly. I think both IRIS, for microsoft and 1-18-08, for any JJ Abrams project (those who weren't turned off by the Lost Experience of advertising hell), has turned off anyone who played those games from expecting anything great from them in the future.

If you care about things like brand identity and loyalty, and I'm sure there are ways to measure those, then the shallow buzz machine isn't enough.
Just attracting an online community isn't enough if you don't produce. The online community can be a tough crowd if they turn against you. If you want to get eyes on your product, but you don't deliver quality, then you won't get the result you want.

Another point: creating websites and telling a story or creating an extended reality for an online community isn't doing your customers a favor. You aren't giving us a bonus or a treat that we should appreciate. What you are doing, mostly, is trying to sell something. You are trying to sell it to your target audience in a way that is compelling for them and in the location where they are. You don't know how to reach them in "traditional" ways - no one watches TV ads anymore - so you are trying to reach them in other ways.

Maybe as people who know what they are doing with online marketing and storytelling come to higher positions in marketing firms (or start their own) the general quality will increase. Marketing people who just want to get "eyes" on their projects, which may be valid for some projects, don't really understand the potential of what they could do.

I heard an author from Wired say he was tired of the time and energy it took to explain things in video games to people who don't get them. He had written an article on machinima for the New York Times magazine and was intensely frustrated at how much space he had to devote to just explain Halo, so that he could discuss Red v. Blue.

His answer: just wait a while, those people will be gone. Their replacements will understand gaming, gaming culture and the permeable boundary between the virtual world and the real world. While I don't agree with giving up on trying to explain gaming to non-gamers, the point that culture change will inevitably happen with time, may apply here.
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PostPosted: Tue Oct 16, 2007 12:51 pm
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Star Spider
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 		A change of mind...
No matter what you do - or where you go - or what kind of world you decide to become a part of there will always be someone around to take advantage of it. Cheap thrills - quick bucks. This is the way of the world and even as certain things mature there will always be someone with that mindset. And to be perfectly honest it is well within their right to do so. Fake rabbitholes and dead ends will never be a drawback to someone who is a true lover of ARG's and they shouldn't be - just as a couple of television commercials don't get in the way of people watching their favorite shows.

But think of the advertising awards. If you look close enough you will see that, independent of the let down you might feel from not finding a true ARG, some of the false leads and fake rabbitholes can be works of art in their own right. Why should we close ourselves off to something that is new and inventive just because it does not fulfill our particular desires?

I think the advertising is a good thing - it is the sign of a healthy environment. If the people who want to make money are coming around that must mean that the ARG industry is expanding in new directions and becoming more well known - which is great - it allows more access and more ideas to filter in. Without evolution and growth things can become stagnant.

Secondly there is something else to consider. The people who are not able to put the time and (brains) into the complex puzzle solving and intense following that ARG's take. When they are offered small pieces of the pie they can get a taste of all the possibilities that are out there. Peeking into the magical worlds that are exisiting at all times. It might even make people more determined and interested in taking a closer look at the world of ARG's!!!

So instead of trying to change what is happening one can just take a look from another perspective and suddenly things become a little more interesting Smile

Have a great day!

PostPosted: Tue Oct 16, 2007 2:16 pm
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Silent|away
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But think of the advertising awards. If you look close enough you will see that, independent of the let down you might feel from not finding a true ARG, some of the false leads and fake rabbitholes can be works of art in their own right. Why should we close ourselves off to something that is new and inventive just because it does not fulfill our particular desires?


I'm going to have to agree.

Some people may actually like the "everythingisgoingtochange.com" viral campagin. Why therefore do you want to take away from the fun? Sometimes, you just want the cheap thrills, and those games are popular. Other times, you want an ARG that is devoted to your interests, and if there is an ARG solely for Chrisitans, why should we stop them?

Plus, the more "buzz" you have, the higher chances you are of finding someone who may actually really like the work. If you send 1,000 people spam mail, 1 person will buy the thing in question. The more you get the word out to people, the more likely you will get sales, and in fact, the more likely you are of getting people who actually like the work you put into the game. Buzz works.

As for misleading tags, that's about as annoying as banner ads. We'll get used to them.

PostPosted: Tue Oct 16, 2007 2:58 pm
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rose
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 		Just to be clear, I mentioned that my only issue with everythingisgoingtochange was the misleading use of tags. Obviously their intention is to increase the number of views of the video. My problem with that is that it is dishonest, from day 1, to their audience. Other people may not see it as a big deal.

I never said that I wanted to "take away the fun"; nor did I say that Christians (or any other group) should be stopped from having ARGs. In fact, I said the exact opposite.

Quote:
But think of the advertising awards. If you look close enough you will see that, independent of the let down you might feel from not finding a true ARG, some of the false leads and fake rabbitholes can be works of art in their own right. Why should we close ourselves off to something that is new and inventive just because it does not fulfill our particular desires?


Which works of art do you mean? Please let me know what I've missed here. I'm not sure that I would use advertising awards as a judge of what is "new and innovative", but I would love to know which campaigns you are referring to.
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PostPosted: Tue Oct 16, 2007 3:34 pm
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labfly
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rose wrote:

Which works of art do you mean? Please let me know what I've missed here. I'm not sure that I would use advertising awards as a judge of what is "new and innovative", but I would love to know which campaigns you are referring to.


me too. i would love to see some great examples of rabbit holes to nowhere that are satisfying "as is" - believe me, i'm in no way saying that someone must create an ARG or extended reality with every rabbit hole... i do think there are many ways to artfully use the rabbit hole for a mini viral campaign... so that you don't leave the audience with a bad taste in their mouth. (i just can't name any off the top of my head) and, obviously, the world will go ahead and create anything they'd like and plop it on the web for others to consume - but, i can tell you, from experience, that there are people out there looking to take advantage of the ARG set up - and that worries me as both a player and puppetmaster. and i don't think we can compare it to suffering thru a couple commercials for our favorite show. it is more like leading you to believe there is going to be this great "new show" that you might really really like, but when you take the time and tune in.. you realize there is no show at all - it was just a way to get you to tune in.
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PostPosted: Tue Oct 16, 2007 4:03 pm
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Star Spider
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 		Hmm... Maybe I didn't make myself clear enough. I think that the false leads and ARG type marketing is very much like television commercials. Some people will ignore them - others will find them annoying because they feel as though they take away from the value of the show and even more will find value in them. But no matter which way you look at them it is something of value in our world that is changing so quickly. The use of media is expanding and people are always trying to find a way to integrate themselves into that which I think is amazing.

I fully agree that these marketing companies may very well be missing out on something amazing - but then again they may also be creating something amazing that fits their needs. For all of those people who don't have the time/money to invest in full fledged ARG's the bite sized bits are perfect. They offer the excitement and thrill of discovery for a short period of time and hopefully reach the audience they are aiming for.

As ARG's take up a vast amount of multi-media space (using various mediums) they have to share the space with a lot of emerging fields of entertainment and advertising as people test the waters of multi-level interaction. It is a very exciting time indeed!

I understannd where you are coming from with your concern but I think that it can be worked with and even enjoyed at the same time. Perhaps even figuring out ways in which to work together to enhance some of the dead ends! Secondly I think that if there is a major concern that these marketing people are lacking information we should make it our goal to inform them!

As they always say: If you want something done right - you have to do it yourself Smile

PostPosted: Tue Oct 16, 2007 4:45 pm
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xnbomb
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Star Spider wrote:
I fully agree that these marketing companies may very well be missing out on something amazing - but then again they may also be creating something amazing that fits their needs. For all of those people who don't have the time/money to invest in full fledged ARG's the bite sized bits are perfect. They offer the excitement and thrill of discovery for a short period of time and hopefully reach the audience they are aiming for.

And this illustrates my point. The nature of the form is that you cannot necessarily tell beforehand what something is going to be if you are a potential player of a game / consumer of an advertisement. Because you don't know beforehand you go in blind and can be disappointed, and rather than enjoying it you feel let down by it.

Sure, it's easy to look at the menu of options after the fact and say that it is great that some things are a 5-course meal, and some are just bite-sized. And maybe it is even easy to look at it that way if you are a creator of experiences and perhaps not necessarily too concerned if along with the audience you are aiming for you also sweep up a lot of other people who were looking for something else entirely. But that's my point: What if you are one of those other people, and you do not through blind luck stumble into the scale of experience that you are desiring?

Success here is when both sides of the curtain manage to fulfill their expectations, including such things as getting a message across, creating a positive impression, and/or everyone having a good time. The difficulty is finding a way to make sure those expectations are fulfilled rather than ignored, whether in the name of commerce or art, and the means of doing so is by finding ways to communicate to people what they can expect without giving it all away and fundamentally changing the discovery part of the experience.
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PostPosted: Tue Oct 16, 2007 4:58 pm
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rose
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 		Just thinking outloud here...
If the main reason to use ARG-like rabbit holes to drive a viral promotion is simply to hike up numbers, it seems like the tool (measurement) is driving the design.

Maybe better measurement tools are needed so that people aren't just thinking - if I get 1 person per 1000, then, to be successful, I need to make sure I hit as many people as possible. ( This is the thinking behind spam I'm sure. ) I just don't think that the same tools apply everywhere. What is the point of getting a huge number of hits on your site or video if it ultimately irritates a number of your potential customers, reaches the wrong people or ends up losing you goodwill?

Example: not to beat a dead horse, but maybe the creators of everythingisgoingtochange would be better off using the word [Christian] as a tag, isn't that the audience they want? Is it worth it to reach a lot of people that may not be interested at the chance of missing lots of people who probably are interested? ( This is just an example, but nothing else comes to mind right now. I'm sure they are assuming they will get their regular audience through traditional marketing. Is that a safe assumption? I'm sure they think it is or they would have done this differently.)

More isn't always better.
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PostPosted: Tue Oct 16, 2007 5:37 pm
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thebruce
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 		not that I'm specifically defending the action of the group (I haven't been following it anyway), but I would assume that if this were an 'outreach' event, then they don't want to reach Christians specifically, but rather try to connect with people who aren't. There are many people out there who might see "Christian" and be repulsed without even giving it a chance... some ministries even avoid using the term Christian to describe themselves for that very reason.

So, if they're unversed in the genre, and simply see that you know, hey, there's lots of activity going on with this and that, and it's reaching the kind of people we want to reach here, well, let's attract those people here by associating ourselves with it... and also, for all we know, part of their 'product/service' may very well include references to the things they're tagging about and such.

But, that said, from within our community and our the knowledgable of the genre, their actions would be considered "bad form". But do they know this? *shrug*
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PostPosted: Tue Oct 16, 2007 5:50 pm
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rose
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Quote:
There are many people out there who might see "Christian" and be repulsed without even giving it a chance... some ministries even avoid using the term Christian to describe themselves for that very reason.


I see. I honestly didn't know this. So this event may be designed to reach people who wouldn't pay attention if they used the term "Christian." That would explain why they left it out. I understand what they are doing a bit better now. Smile

I'm trying to think of a more content-neutral promotion to discuss here but I'm drawing a blank. I can see that religion is probably not a good basis for discussion about marketing and rabbit holes.
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PostPosted: Tue Oct 16, 2007 6:05 pm
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Star Spider
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 		Value in Dead ends...
Ha Ha I am obviously new to the forums - what with starting an new thread instead of replying! Smile

I think it would be a really interesting excercise to figure out how to make sure the seperation between marketing and actual gaming was in place. But as the genre expands and gains popularity it becomes more and more difficult as there is a larger pool to draw from. It is indeed interesting that some of the largest and most popular ARG's that I have heard about were in fact marketing vehicles. But there is the difference between a company/organization willing to put more behind it then others. I think that is the way the world works though. Some people just put more effort into things.

But in essence if a short and to the point message is what they are trying to get across then that is what they will achieve and in the end they reach their goals. So how to keep it so intense ARGers don't fall into a false rabbit hole? Maybe there is a way - it is certainly food for thought - but if there is not I still choose to view it from a positive stand point and try to see the value in the dead ends.

PostPosted: Tue Oct 16, 2007 6:43 pm
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