Advertisers casting wider net with online games

By Jeff Green
Bloomberg News Service

Greg Pert of Topeka, Kan., was one of 85 customers to buy a Jeep Rubicon after only a "virtual test-drive" on a free computer game. Many companies are using advergames as part of their marketing strategies. Bloomberg News Service

Pert was sold. The climb led the stay-at-home dad in Topeka, Kan., to buy a $25,000 Wrangler Rubicon, even though the ledge and vehicle existed only in a computer game he played while sitting at home in his bathrobe. He was one of 85 customers to buy a Rubicon after playing the free game he found on a Web site for DaimlerChrysler AG's Chrysler unit.

"My only real test-drive came after I'd signed the papers," said Pert, 29, one of about 48,000 potential buyers to try the game in the first six months of 2002. "That was a lot of confidence in a computer game but I was pretty familiar with the Jeep technology."

Companies including DaimlerChrysler, Kraft Foods Inc., Nokia Oyj's U.S. phone unit and Miller Brewing are using so-called advergames to give 145 million U.S. computer-game players a closer connection to products than traditional television or magazine advertising allows.

The companies say it works.

"It's another way to connect to people, and it's a more positive message than just an advertisement," said Charlene Li, a marketing, media and gaming analyst at Forrester Research Inc.

"I expect more and more marketers to use it," Li said.

Advergames could be a $1 billion industry by 2005, said Wyeth Ridgway, president of Seattle-based Leviathan Games, whose clients for games include Hyundai Motor Co., Sony Corp. and Visa International Inc.

Leviathan expects its first-quarter sales to exceed full-year 2002 revenue as advergaming business increases, he said, declining to give figures.

Development costs for the games are as little as 99 cents for each time a product appears on the screen, less than the $15 per time a consumer sees a product in a television ad, said Joel Schlader, the executive in charge of Auburn Hills, Michigan-based Chrysler's computer-game effort.

Unlike print or television ads, the games have glitches.

The Jeep game's detailed graphics, for example, were too complex for some older computers to run, Schlader said.

Companies say the games are only intended to be a minor part of their marketing, and won't compete with television or print advertisements for audience appeal.

The games, offered free through the Internet, can still reach millions of potential customers. Software design company Blockdot, the developer of games for Nokia phones and AT&T Corp., created a game for Mars Inc. last year in which players had to line up similar colors of M&M candies. It was played about 7 million times, said Jack Dearnbarger, director of business development.

Miller Brewing is preparing for a third season of a Virtual Racing League, which lets players create a team of driver and chief mechanic, said Gina Shaffer, the beer company's senior digital marketing manager. Players who plug in codes from actual Nascar races broadcast on television or from cans of beer sold in stores have a better chance of winning.

"We definitely found that playing the game improved players' impression of our brand," Shaffer said. "These games are part of a bigger marketing picture."

Kraft's advergame Web site candystand.com is among the most-visited game sites, analyst Li said. Kraft, which collects voluntary information from players, uses logos from Life Savers and other candy in games such as billiards and puzzles. Sites vary on how much personal data like names or ages are required for users to play, and some use so-called cookies, codes sent to personal computers to track sites players visit, analysts say.

For less than $1 million, computer-game maker Terminal Reality adapted the Jeep game from an earlier incarnation that the company created involving off-road vehicles, said Brendan Goss, who produced the game at the Lewisville, Texas-based company.

A full computer game can cost $2 million to $5 million to develop and take as long as three years to complete, he said.