Games (Photo credit: Ian D)
Everyday our 9-year-old and 13-year-old sons plug-in their ipod touches and surf free app games. We know the name of most games because we closely monitor our children’s visits into cyberspace. This analysis allows for dialogue on what games are appropriate and how much time we allocate for playing them.
Given that many moms insert themselves into their children’s gaming, it makes sense that Brand Marketers jump into the free app game trend. This strategy can really work for Brands whose ultimate target is children, but they have to legally market to moms such as Candy brands. Will Marketers strike gold with apps that deliver TV-spot engagement levels? Kie Mae Heussner in “And the Brands Played On” in Adweek nails the insight behind this trend: millennials are hard to reach through traditional media channels so Brands must find them on their own terms.
The Adweek article cites very impressive case studies. Consumers downloaded the new Mentos game more than 1.7 million times, which according to the Brand team equates to 70 million 30-second TV spots. While TV ads drove consumers to the game, the level of the engagement impresses us. Pepsi’s Brisk Brand marketers claim that their game has helped drive a +35% increase for one liter sales.
So how do we manage the barrage of free game apps for our computers, mobile devices and iPads? We can create balance by also purchasing and encouraging the use of academic Apps like Kahn academy or Math Evolve which tech experts recommend. Also, we can talk with our children about how many games we should have on our devices at a time to avoid memory overload. Let’s embrace the evolving tech world and have some fun.
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