Game-based Marketing for Luxury Brands

The potential of HTML5 games for engaging customers is groundbreaking. As an innovation, HTML5 games provide interesting, relevant, and fun content that can be tied up with events and promotions across the Internet.

Businesses, particularly luxury brands, have switched to sustainable, creative marketing campaigns such as community building, social media interaction, and other user-centric activities to boost brand discovery and customer acquisition in competitive markets.

We’ve worked with Bobbies, a luxury shoe brand to develop another HTML5 game for their seasonal game-based marketing campaign. Similar to our previous project with Bobbies, the branded game we’ve developed is equipped with leaderboards and prize mechanics.

Here's a short video clip of the game experience

Screenshot

Seasonal Event Mechanics

Seasonal events are timely marketing strategies that provide opportunities to engage customers. During these times, several businesses attempt to catch the attention of customers due to an expected rise in their willingness to spend. However, it’s not as easy as it sounds with competitors trying out creative stints to attract customers. One of the best ways to capture customer attention is to utilize HTML5 games as an innovative and interactive strategy.

Bobbies’ Christmas Challenge takes this principle into practice and goes one step further by introducing a game-based competition into a branded HTML5 game with actual rewards at stake. Each week, top players can win a pair of Bobbies shoes or a custom survival kit.

Here’s a preview of how the game-based competition looks:

Customer Engagement through Gamification

HTML5 games allow for a feasible medium for effective customer engagement. Compared to other marketing strategies, HTM5 games are built for the modern audience.

1. Unique and Interactive Content

HTML5 games provide highly innovative content that can quickly capture their players’ attention. Businesses can greatly benefit from this unique and interactive experience by building their own brand through customized games fit for their industry and customer base. With HTML5 games, businesses can make their brands stand out from competitors with its attractive and engaging form of promotion. It's no wonder that popular brands such as Gatorade, Under Armour, and Netflix have embraced using games to promote themselves.

2. Social Media Friendly

Word-of-mouth marketing goes a long way in building business reputation and brand recall. First-time encounters with a brand can easily be memorable through HTML5 games. Statistics show that in 2015, marketing through gamification has already been adopted by about 40% of the top 1000 Global organizations. In fact, it is expected that this strategy will achieve mainstream status at around 2020. Luxury brands such as Gucci, Chanel, and Hermès have already been dominating over 50% of online engagements and have continued growing with attempts to enter the WeChat and other messenger platforms through branded games.

3. Highly Compatible with other Marketing Strategies

HTML5 games are not the end-all-be-all of the marketing strategy. Instead, it enables all other creative forms of marketing strategy to become more viable and effective in reaching out to the market. Promotions, discounts, membership privileges, and freebies are among the many strategies that can be incorporated into a brand’s own HTML5 game.

Game-based Marketing for Customer Loyalty

Game-based competitions are great examples of how HTML5 games can be utilized to develop customer loyalty and at the same time build interest in a brand. Here are some of the reasons why you should try gamification.

• Boost popularity with your target market - Potential customers will be able to know and remember your brand during the holiday season with game-based marketing. With prizes at stake, you can surely find a high rate of engagement from your target market.

• Reach out to new customers - Popularity of game-based competitions also attracts customers from other market segments that are interested in earning a prize for their efforts. Luxury brands such as Hermes have been able to tap over 10,000 players in just a week through gamification.

• Effective lead generator - Game events and contests let your business know where your brand stands among your competitors. Through in-game metrics, you can collect important data and generate more effective strategies for identifying leads and opportunities to larger markets.

• Develop a stronger online identity - A stronger online identity comes with the rising popularity of your game-based marketing. Seasonal events could become annual challenges that customers will anticipate.

• Create a fun and enjoyable experience - Brand image becomes more tangible when customers begin to correlate the game experience with your brand. In turn, these branded games will give you a massive edge over your competitors.

Conclusion

Luxury brands are well associated with their personalized branding strategies. With the help of HTML5 games, brands can stand out during seasonal events and holidays and implement their own creative marketing strategies in a more interactive and engaging approach.

Ready to create your own branded game? Contact us to get started.