To make things a little less daunting I’ve listed a few considerations that had we known earlier, I would most likely have more hair on my head, and still remember what my children look like. Hope it helps!
20.09.17
5 things creatives should consider when working on programmatic creative (in gaming)
OPINION
Eye-D Creative
September 2017
The gaming industry is one of the fastest growing sectors and is having an ever increasing influence in the development of the technology sector. The rapid growth of gaming has lead to small gaming publishers and larger publishers sticking to the old formula of brand content marketing. In 2016 ThinkGoogle discussed the “new formulae”, which we have been trying to introduce in partnership with some of our bigger clients over the last year.
NEW FORMULAE | creative + data + media
To make things a little less daunting we’ve listed a few considerations that had we known earlier, we would most likely remember what our children look like. Hope it helps!
1. ENSURE THAT THE CLIENT THE CREATIVE AGENCY AND THE MEDIA-BUYERS / PLANNERS ARE ALL IN SYNC
Before beginning or planning a programmatic campaign ensure that all parties involved are working together in order to achieve the campaign objective. Discussing the media plan and budget with all parties helps massively in ensuring that all creative ideation is within scope and is able to run on the required media buy, and is in line with the proposed targeting strategy.
As a creative the inquisitive side is fulfilled by what you learn from closer relationships with all stakeholders – media agencies can teach creatives so much about the development of new specs and the capabilities of what can be achieved on specific platforms, targeting audiences and most importantly RESULTS!!, clients give you an amazing insight into their consumers and the high level objectives that are not always visible – and when it comes together the picture becomes clearer and your objectives appear in reach. Creatives need to start looking further than the ads on there screen, and think about the environment the ads will ultimately be consumed within.
2. UNDERSTANDING YOUR AUDIENCE
Ensuring the creative resonates with its audience, and having a thorough understanding of the audience’s needs is often overlooked by creative, however it is one of the foundations for a successful brainstorm and ideation session. Data and audience goes hand in hand, so if you understand the origins of your data and can identify data signals , it can give you great insight into your audience. Understanding your audience is also directly tied into the campaign targeting strategy, looking at affinity, contextual and topic targeting, its important the creatives have some insight into the methodology the media agency intends on executing.
| WHO ARE VIEWING YOUR ADS
| HOW THEY ARE VIEWING YOUR ADS
Although this may feel a little more like strategist / marketing territory, creatives working on campaigns ultimately have to understand the audience, micro-moments and the ever changing path-to-purchase to ensure what they create resonates.
With the huge increase in mobile and console gaming comes a wider audience and a more diverse audience. (e.g. Skewed male 51% – 49% according to New Zoo). Knowing your audience and understanding micro-moments and path to purchase can become very budget intensive, however even a slight consideration will have results.
The problem for an agency is what is the best way to utilise micro-moments, you begin to understand that a slight tweak in copy delivered at the right moment can make a difference with interaction rates and engagements.
3. RELEVANT CREATIVE CONTENT
Creating relevant content can mean utilising a wide number of designs based on the audience and their specific demographic. One of our larger releases, required a seamless correlation between a theatrical release and one of the game’s key characters. The narrative of our design leveraged the similarities in interest from both audiences, through a programmatic approach.
We used subtle changes in copy lines to ensure the ads are relevant on the most granular level possible. For copywriters and designers alike creating relevant content becomes much more achievable once understanding who the content is targeted at.
4. RESULTS AND MEASUREMENT
Obtaining results is extremely important as it allows you to look at your process, approach and reevaluate what worked and what didn’t. Getting results from clients can sometimes be a bit of a nightmare but keep pushing and you will prevail.
Results allows you to understand what works and what doesn’t in greater detail. It also shows other clients that you know your stuff. As a creative it is important for us to know that our creative approach is executed inline with all the relevant strategic thinking and data considerations.
Having a closer relationship with a media agency will ultimately make obtaining results a much smoother process. Google Brand lift studies are great from initial impression to final conversion, and include metrics such as brand awareness. (Yes you measure brand awareness :0).
Read more on Google’s Brand lift studies
As an example, take a look at Shadow of War, which is one of our most recent campaigns for Warner Bros. Shadow of War showcase