Lakupo said:
You're not the only one into advertising, but it comes down to a difference of philosophy. A lot of the P4 group (and a few notable entries of the MM9 group) are viral marketing type ads. They're enigmatic on purpose to grab your attention and make you wonder "What's that about?" An ad that reads like the back of the box tends to be basic information wrapped up in empty hype speak. Basic information is everywhere on the internet, just waiting for interested eyes. Grabbing that interest is the higher priority of advertising in this day and age.
I'm very well familiar with viral marketing. Many of these wouldn't cut it as far as that goes. Many of these assume familiarity with the product on some level, and don't engage the viewer to ask more about it, nor do they communicate what the product could conceivably be "about."
Additionally, when you're wanting to market in a viral manner, you often don't rely on traditional advertising methods, in this case magazine ads.
I'm not arguing against using viral marketing as a backing for the ads people are putting up. I'm saying that I think a lot of people aren't starting from the starting point they should be, which is to ask what the message is they are trying to convey. Some of these seem like they're starting from making a visually appealing image and then throwing the message or tagline on top. Of course, this could be due to unfamiliarity with the product, too (some people have noted this). But there's a line between something that would be appealing to current fans and something that would draw outsiders in.
Obviously we can differ in opinions on that last point, about the effectiveness of the ad.
PantherLotus said:
Lakupo nailed it, and throw my name in there with a background in big-C Communications (I'm graduated in the advert/PR side of the triangle). While Comm is always three tiered process (advertising, marketing, public relations), we need to be able to recognize the purpose of what we're spending our money on.
Because timetokill's concern is strictly a marketing one; "how much is it?, when is it on sale? what does it do?", his goal is clearly identifying the product at hand. But the best advertisers never have to answer any of those questions, because the goal isn't to define the product, the goal is to define the lifestyle and get the audience to buy into it.
If we know our audience and know it well, they will do the work for us. We sell them an image, they investigate further and tell us whether they want to be a part of it.
If I reduced it to a stomach-punch one-liner, it would be:
Marketing vs. Advertising:: Walmart Glossy Ads vs. Abercrombie's Teenage-Sex Posters
Both do their job (and well), but both clearly have different goals -- and vastly different audiences. Now ask yourself: "who is our audience?"
The answer depends on the game, but for most of our purposes:
Males 12-35, extraordinarily tech savvy and entrenched in popular culture, but nearly oblivious to standard marketing. Lifestyle and Viral marketing is most effective for this group. Show them what they want and they will do the rest.
My concern is more that these are stated to be magazine ads. We can assume we know the audience based on the magazine they would be in -- most of them would be in a gaming magazine or in a Maxim or whatever (based on the games chosen so far -- maybe an anime magazine for Persona 4, if I were running things). But beyond this, I'm not arguing that we should be putting screenshots on every page with a list of features, how much, etc. I'm saying that I think a lot of these ads would be ineffective as either direct, viral, or other types of marketing. I'm offering constructive criticism.
You're right that lifestyle marketing can be very effective to young males -- but we haven't seen many (if any at all) of those yet. Part of that is because games haven't traditionally been sold in a lifestyle method as much as a self-image method. The lifestyle advertising of Nintendo's marketing are far different from the "extreme" ads we saw a lot of in the 80's and 90's, and they accomplish different things. But from what I've seen, I don't know how effectively you could defend more than maybe one or two of these as being "lifestyle" ads.
Obviously audience is a huge deal. I think the Megaman ads produced were far more effective even on this level. There were a lot of nods to nostalgia that were communicated very effectively. Persona obviously doesn't have nostalgia going for it. Overall, actually, I think Persona is a pretty tough product to market because it's very niche. In general I don't know that I would make magazine ads for it at all because I'd imagine with a game like that, your marketing budget is pretty limited and I think there are probably better ways to access that market. Though if I was going to make a magazine ad for it, I'd probably put it in an anime magazine.
But beyond just identifying the audience, though, is the question of what the audience wants, what their habits are, etc. How is this product going to meet those needs? Our answers to those questions don't need to be spelled out on the page but they should be informing the designs of the ads themselves. With the US Persona 4 audience we can probably assume that they are into Japanese culture at least to some degree, are probably web-savvy, and so forth. A web address, at the very least, should be appearing on more of these ads, instead of just the logos of who makes the game. Maybe a puzzle or something clearly Japanese on the page to grab their attention. If you wanted to make it viral, do something that grabs their attention and invites them to ask more instead of just hoping the visual quality does it. Maybe a plane ticket to Japan is on the page, with the address for Persona 4 or a specialized viral website address there. Something that plays to the Persona 4's audience's appetite for Japanese things. These people probably would love a trip to Japan, and have thought about what it would be like to go to school in Japan when they're watching an anime on the subject. Maybe the page has a plane ticket or a train ticket or something, and a tag of, "Congratulations on your new transfer" or something. I imagine if I asked my girlfriend more about the game then I could get more information to help me in that regard. Maybe another ad is a ad for Junes, done in a realistic style, but something seems a little off -- again, here the specialized viral website ("www.shopjunes.com" or similar) would go a long way.
All in all this is just a bunch of constructive criticism
I had my doubts about the thread coming in, but I have been really impressed overall, but I think there's room for improvement as well, and I hope that nobody is taking it as though I'm saying what people have done here is trash. It's all awesome, seriously!! Just some suggestions.
Anyway I don't want to derail the thread further, so maybe if people want to discuss this more we can do it in PM?
