Article printed from SiteProNews: http://www.sitepronews.com
  HTML version available at: http://www.sitepronews.com/archives.html

Google's Next Move - Video Game Ads?
By Adam McFarland of iPrioritize (c) 2006

Since AdWords was launched in 2001, Google has expanded to image
ads, video ads, and print ads, and has frequently been rumored
to be entering radio and television. While many think that
television ads (ala Spot Runner) could be Google's next major
move, they may be neglecting a potentially larger opportunity:
in-game video game advertising.

Earlier this year Massive Incorporated, a video game advertising
network, announced a landmark deal with Major League Baseball
and 2K Sports to provide dynamic advertising in the popular
video game Major League Baseball 2K6. According to their press
release (http://www.massiveincorporated.com/site_network/pr/
04.05.06.htm), "Massive's Network and technology allow MLB
Advanced Media and 2K Sports titles to leverage dynamic
advertising for ever-fresh brand messaging in their games,
mirroring the rapidly changing and expanding advertising
opportunities in the live action sports industry."

Why Should Google Care?

The Entertainment Software Association put U.S. sales of video
game hardware and software at $7.3 billion back in 2004, a
figure that rivals Hollywood box office revenue. In-game video
game advertising is nothing new for the booming game industry –
large companies have been buying static advertisements in games
for years. What is new is the expansion of online gaming into
the mainstream. Once reserved for only PC Gamers, console
gamers have now discovered a whole new world of competition over
a broadband connection.

In a recent interview with TechNewsWorld
(http://www.technewsworld.com/story/51221.html), EA's John
Schappert, who oversees the largest interactive game studio in
the world, was asked about in-game advertising: "In-game ad
integration is a growing business where we see both advertisers
and consumers looking for more. It's an additional revenue stream
that is still small, but growing. There's the potential for
scalability in this area with dynamically-served ads. It's still
in the early stages [in terms of] how in-game ads will grow in
significance."

Starting with Microsoft's Xbox and Sony's PS2, and continuing
into the next generation of online gaming with Microsoft's Xbox
360, Nintendo's Wii, and Sony's PS3, it has become a virtual
certainty that nearly all gamers will be playing while connected
to a broadband connection. With that broadband connection comes
an advertising opportunity that's hard to ignore.

Is History Repeating Itself?

The potential flaw in what Massive Incorporated does is that
their ad network still only includes the large advertisers.
Massive's website gives no specific information regarding how to
purchase advertising, only mentioning that "blue-chip"
advertisers can work with their "veteran" sales team to start an
account. I think it's safe to say that small businesses aren't
their target market. So while they are implementing dynamic
ads, those ads are still only affordable to larger businesses.
Anyone familiar with internet advertising can see the potential
for history to repeat itself.

Way back in 1996, long before Overture (now Yahoo! Search
Marketing) and Google AdWords, a company called DoubleClick
pioneered website advertising. Their downfall, however, was
that they required a formal sales contract, limiting their
potential client base to only large companies. Overture and
AdWords made it easy for the small advertiser and small site
owner to participate in their ad networks, essentially opening
their service to anyone on the web. Several years later, one
would think that Google is keeping a watchful eye on what's
going on over at Massive Incorporated. Massive may be the first
to enter the market, but it's hard to ignore the fact that the
small business owner remains shut out. Could Google make
Massive the next DoubleClick?

How Would Google Do It

There's no doubt that with the best programmers in the world
Google is capable of developing and improving upon the
technology that Massive has. It's also not hard to imagine
advertisers paying per thousand impressions (PPM) for their text
or image ads to be shown in specific games, much like they do
now for specific sites. The tough part for Google, however,
would be the distribution of those ads.

As opposed to signing up websites to display their ads by
copying some code on to their site, Google would have to work
with game programmers throughout the development process. This
would be much more time consuming and would be a much larger
risk for Google. In the same way that Massive signed the
contract with 2K, Google would have to sign large contracts with
game developers and work with them for several months to
integrate their ads.

This enforces the fact that the main difference between what
happened with DoubleClick and what could happen with video games
is that it would probably be more work for Google to distribute
their ads over multiple channels (i.e. more games). Since each
game is programmed differently, there is no game equivalent to
the JavaScript used in all AdSense ads. Every game would need
to be tailored to Google's ad network individually. Difficult:
yes. Impossible for Google: no way.

When Will They Do It?

In my opinion it's not a matter of if, it's a matter of when.
The potential revenue from the gaming industry is too big for
Google to ignore. Oh, and if you still aren't convinced,
consider this: Microsoft, one of Google's main competitors, also
produces the Xbox 360. If Microsoft decided to integrate their
newly launched adCenter into Xbox games, would it really
surprise anyone if Google countered by announcing a deal with
Sony or Nintendo to integrate in-game dynamic advertising for
the PS3 or the Wii?
================================================================
Adam McFarland owns iPrioritize - simple to-do lists
(http://www.iprioritize.com/) that can be edited at any time
from any place in the world. Email, print, check from your mobile
phone, subscribe via RSS, and share with others.
================================================================

Copyright © 2006 Jayde Online, Inc.  All Rights Reserved.

SiteProNews is a registered service mark of Jayde Online, Inc.