Researchers at Murdoch University Find Interactive Advertising is as Effective as Passive Advertising

• Advergames (short for advertisement-games) are as effective as passive ads despite their interactivity
• Most advergames are too shallow to allow for long-lasting player engagement
• Virtual reality and other new technologies could boost novelty of advergames

There's been a notion that, because video games are more interactive than a medium like TV, any message a game pushes on the player is somehow more effective than a message pushed onto the average television viewer. Media researchers at Murdoch University in Australia had the same idea, and set out to test their theory in the context of advertising. What they found was that TV advertisements were just as effective as interactive commercials that featured advergames (short for advertisement-games) or standalone advergames.

An M&M's advergame

Overview of the study

Participants in the study were split up into three groups, one that would watch TV advertisements, one that would play advergames, and one that would watch interactive advertisements that would prompt them to play an advergame. The researchers measured effectiveness through four qualifiers:

• "Brand attitude," which was how the participants felt about the product being advertised and how convinced they were about that perception
• "Product involvement," which measured how much the product stood out to participants in the advertisement
• "Telepresence," which measured how much the participant felt they had been transported to the world of the advertisement
• "Proven day-after recall," which measured whether participants remembered the advertisement the day after they had seen it. 

 While the type of advertisement (and the age of the participant, surprisingly) was found to not affect effectiveness, product involvement and brand attitude were.

Advergame vs. Game with in-game ads

In-game advertising in Shaun White Skateboarding

It's important to note the difference between an advergame and a video game with advertising in it. Advergames exist for the sole purpose of advertising a product or service. It might make  use of recognizable characters related to the product (like the fish from Goldfish ads or the Gecko from GEICO ads) to make a consumer check the game out. On the other hand, there are games that use brand-name products to make its world and characters more relatable. After all, what's a sports broadcast without advertising?

Advergames are interactive, so why aren't they more effective than TV ads?

It's tough to make any generalizations as to how effective video games' messages can be. I want to emphasize that not all games have the same effect on people. While games can be highly engaging because of their interactivity and the player is more likely to pay attention to any messages the game has to offer because of that, basic interactivity isn't necessarily enough to grab a player's attention. Many advergames, like the one shown above, are shallow board games or quizzes and don't immerse the player in the world of the ad. These types of games are cheap and easy to build and embed into browsers, and they load quickly. They certainly don't resemble the sort of addictive, immersive, story-driven games that some media outlets and the National Rifle Association point at to blame for the latest shooting in a public place. Would these games be more effective with a bigger budget and a more engaging world? Would the greater cost spent developing a more engaging game translate into more product sales? That remains to be seen. The researchers say that it's going to be a challenge for advertisers to develop a game simple enough to appeal to a large audience that's also deep enough to be engaging. Some more focus testing would be needed.

M&M's ad from Super Bowl 2014

Let's take a look at the M&M's Super Bowl 2014 TV spot to see how it was more effective than the advergame shown above. First of all, it had the advantage of being a Super Bowl commercial. Super Bowl commercials are watched by millions of people since the Super Bowl has a reputation for having memorable commercials accompanying it. Telepresence is bigger too, since the Super Bowl is often watched on a large screen, and according to the study, telepresence tends to increase with screen size. It has elements of humor and involves real people in the advertisement, making it more relatable to viewers, and tells them that M&M's are tasty on a bowl of ice cream. In contrast, the advergame above is the game reversi with an M&M's aesthetic. It relies on the consumer's previous knowledge of the brand to coerce them into play the game. It's not something likely to be remembered the next day. It doesn't help advertisers that ad blocking browser extensions exist, effectively preventing the consumer from ever seeing what the advertisers have to say. What are advertisers, desperate for innovation, to do?

Advergames moving forward

Just because advergames don't seem to do better than passive advertisements despite its interactivity doesn't mean the medium can't improve. Emerging technologies like virtual and augmented reality could do wonders for advergames. Journalists who tried Oculus Rift virtual reality headsets reported feeling much more immersed in the experience regardless of what was being shown to them. Maybe the depth perception virtual reality will bring to advergames will be enough to make them more interesting than the ads we see on the internet today.

Until technology allows advertisers to explore new ways to engage consumers, advergames will continue to only be as effective as a passive ad. With new, more immersive technologies on the horizon, the coming decade will be an interesting one for advertisers.