Are there marketers amongst us?

[Thrrrpptt!]

I found this article (http://www.webpronews.com/ebusiness/ebusinesstactics/wpn-8-20040318BlogsANewCommunicationTooloraMarketingAven ue.html) a little disturbing. It's about how some companies are trying to force viral marketing to develop by having stealth spokesmen posing as bloggers or members of Internet messageboard communities. To quote:

I’ve just learned of a company that markets itself as an internet marketing company. It hires people who have expertise in a specific area – say, video games – and hires them out as net-based stealth marketers. Here is what they do: they insinuate themselves into a blogging or chat community. They hang out in the community until they become trusted contributors and likeable personalities with some expertise. And then they ‘mention’ a product they’ve just ‘tried’. They don’t pitch it – oh no, that would be too obvious – they just mention it kindly with a bit of excitement. Just a bit.

And, the deed is done! Now there is a whole community that is going to go out and buy or trial the new product. Yessirree. Viral marketing at its best. Get lots of people in a group to become your tipping point, and you’ve just go a whole lotta cheap marketing.

I hope this doesn't spread. Places like this are one of the few places you can get unfiltered opinions on things.

[DennyA]

Huh. Wonder where I'd apply for that gig? :-)

[John Reynolds]

Well, this explains Jonah Falcon's love affair with Invisible War.

[Derek Meister]

I have to wonder what the price to performance ratio on that kind of service is.

[balut]

Well, I guess this explains Tyjenks. :P

[Jason McMaster]

THIS IS A WITCH HUNT

[Jakub]

Yeah, that's been going on for years. I remember it happening on the Interplay Baldur's Gate boards.

You kinda get inocculated to it, but I think it's a good and fair strategy. It gets people to try things, mostly.

[Ephraim]

Funny.

This is an evolution of a concept in William Gibson's last book "Pattern Recognition".

In the book Gibson describes a young, attractive Russian woman living in the UK who is paid by a marketing firm to basically go and hang out in bars and engage in conversation with men who try to chat her up. During these conversations she makes a casual reference to the coolness of a certain product/movie/etc... being promoted by the marketing agency. Invariably the young man would agree that the product was cool (wanting to impress the hot girl) and then later go on to mention the 'cool thing' to others in order to seem hip to his peers. The funny twist is that usually the product/movie/etc... had not yet been released, so the guy was lying to seem cool, but the net effect was that this started a groundswell that resulted in a successful product/movie/etc... launch.

What's described here is just taking that into the virtual world. I'm not sure blogs have the same impact as a face to face with a hottie, though.

/Eph

[Ephraim]

Oh, and quatoria, I know you work for Capcom, you bastard!

STOP MAKING ME WANT STEEL BATTALION!

[Tyjenks]

Well, I guess this explains Tyjenks. :P

Yep, I really think I put Mayhem Studios into the black for 2003. I don't get my $50.00 check until ShadowVault sells 10,000 copies, however.

I don't see that "A kind mention with a bit of excitement" is all that offensive. I guess there are some of goofs that will purchase a game by one mere mention on the internet, but don't most of us check multiple sources and make an informed purchase (Most of the time). Drumming up interest for a game in people who can then go out and research the title further just does not seem that dark and dishonest to me.

[Case]

Funny.

This is an evolution of a concept in William Gibson's last book "Pattern Recognition".

In the book Gibson describes a young, attractive Russian woman living in the UK who is paid by a marketing firm to basically go and hang out in bars and engage in conversation with men who try to chat her up. During these conversations she makes a casual reference to the coolness of a certain product/movie/etc... being promoted by the marketing agency. Invariably the young man would agree that the product was cool (wanting to impress the hot girl) and then later go on to mention the 'cool thing' to others in order to seem hip to his peers. The funny twist is that usually the product/movie/etc... had not yet been released, so the guy was lying to seem cool, but thew net effect is that this started a groundswell that resulted in a successful product/movie/etc... launch.

What's described here is just taking that into the virtual world. I'm not sure blogs have the same impact as a face to face with a hottie, though.

/Eph

In fact, this goes on today, especially in youth-oriented markets where the lifespan of a hot product is pretty short. Marketing companies will pay teenagers a pittance -- or often, just in product. They'll talk up the products to their friends, who will then talk to others, or buy it. It goes on every day.

It's no surprise that they would do this to some extent with games -- but you'd think the marginal return from seeding chatrooms and message boards would be pretty small.

[Luke M]

You kinda get inocculated to it, but I think it's a good and fair strategy. It gets people to try things, mostly.

...where the issue is that a trusted member of an online community starts promoting a game as "quite good" that, in fact, isn't, and people in that community end up wasting their money.

Seems manipulative on the part of the companies hiring these people.

I could also see companies hiring someone stealth like this to subtley bash another company's product that is actually good. Also manipulative.

[Jakub]

In fact, this goes on today, especially in youth-oriented markets where the lifespan of a hot product is pretty short. Marketing companies will pay teenagers a pittance -- or often, just in product. They'll talk up the products to their friends, who will then talk to others, or buy it. It goes on every day.

It's no surprise that they would do this to some extent with games -- but you'd think the marginal return from seeding chatrooms and message boards would be pretty small.
Actually it's quite a big effect. If you get someone really genuinely excited, he'll tell ten others and maybe one of them will get as excited as he was.

Battlefield 1942 had no marketing campaign worth mentioning. But they released the demo during QuakeCon and blew everyone away. Granted, it's a good product, but even a good product won't sell unless people know about it. That's what viral marketing is about, and the internet is perfect for it.

[Dave Markell]

They hang out in the community until they become trusted contributors and likeable personalities with some expertise.

That's where we're safe. Everyone here hates everyone else. :)

[chet]

Was this all the rage after Blair Witch project? Because we all know that really propelled BW2 into the stratosphere. All these people trying to catch lightening in a bottle.

Chet

[scharmers]

Viral marketing. Gosh, what a concept. What an old concept. Like, so 90's and all.

:roll:

--scharmers

[Tyjenks]

They hang out in the community until they become trusted contributors and likeable personalities with some expertise.

That's where we're safe. Everyone here hates everyone else. :)

Hehe, also, everyone's default reaction to positive remarks about a game here is overanalysis followed by tedious dissection of every fault.

[z0diac]

I worked at a big web consulting firm during the dot com boom, and we had a marketing person who's entire job was to post on newsgroups and message boards stuff about our clients or our company. This was about 5 years ago, so the practice is not that new.

[Peter Olafson]

I recall allegations of this kind of marketing-by-mole in the early days of UseNet, and blogging and message boards would seem a natural extension.

I suspect it's too stealthy to be genuinely effective. (Though I'm unsure how would you measure its effectiveness, anyway.)

Peter

[Lake]

I Thief 3 sure Thief 3 hope Thief 3 that Thief 3 no Thief 3 one Thief 3 would Thief 3 do Thief 3 that Thief 3 here.

[MauxFaux]

Well, this explains Jonah Falcon's love affair with Invisible War.

Even with Invisible War's gaping holes, I don't think it could handle Jonah.

[Bill]

Funny.

This is an evolution of a concept in William Gibson's last book "Pattern Recognition".

snip


I think it was even mentioned in the wildly popular The Tipping Point, which predates Pattern by a few years.

[Alan Au]

I seem to remember reading about this somewhere (another Qt3 thread?) including some anecdote where a bunch fo folks were banned after the host dev. found out that some portion of comments were coming from a competitor's IP address (hence the need for independent shills).

There's also the dreaded "GoneGold forum effect" which is the bane of all budget-conscious gamers over there. Of course, none of this is new. Back in the old days (circa Renaissance) composers would hire claqueurs to attend performances; they were essentially audience plants to applaud at the appropriate times, etc. They charged different rates for various levels of service, e.g. starting a standing ovation or crying out "Bravo!" would cost extra.

- Alan

[Gladguy]

We've actually got a thread about this very thing over at the GIMMPS website. (www.gimmps.com)

This stuff concerns me because: a) I'm kinda guilty of doing this myself. We used the services of a company called Hype Council (www.hypecouncil.com) for one of our games (it was Hegemonia, and no, it didn't seem to translate into massive sales), and b) I have in my possession marketing plans from another game publisher that speaks of using "shills" as a cornerstone of their online marketing program.

BTW, HypeCouncil is credited for much of the initial success of Avril Lavigne. They literally created the groundswell of support in anticipation of her first CD. This sort of thing is widespread, folks. Trust no one.

[Lee Johnson]

"A kind mention with a bit of excitement"
Man. I first read this as, "A kind mention with a bit of excrement". I need more coffee.

[Alan Dunkin]

Definitely not new; studio plants have been well known to post at AICN concerning movies. Phone companies regularly send secret marketers on the street in the last year to promote picture phones - they'd ask a random person to take their picture with the phone at a bar or on the street, and thereby explaining how it works and why it's cool.

--- Alan

[Mark Asher]

Viral marketing. Gosh, what a concept. What an old concept. Like, so 90's and all.

:roll:

--scharmers

No kidding. Every now and then on Usenet someone would get accused of being a stealth marketeer. I think there was some reason to suspect some of the posts. It was always a bit odd when a new name popped up with a message of effusive praise for a game no one else was really excited about.

[tromik]

This is like the Thing, Any one of us could be it. Would we even know ourselves?

[Sean Tudor]

IL2 Sturmovik is a really fantastic flight simulation with cool graphics and sound. Everyone should buy it !

[LarryLard]

http://www.ntkmart.co.uk/images/viralmarketing.jpg

[Wholly Schmidt]

Isn't this brought up somewhere in hour 34 of comsat communications between Raiden and Rose? Somewhere between everything you know being a lie and DO YOU KNOW WHAT DAY IT IS?

[mtkafka]

Biggest Viral Marketer... the one who influenced Hitler... Mussolini.

etc

[Rorschach]

Oh, and quatoria, I know you work for Capcom, you bastard!

STOP MAKING ME WANT STEEL BATTALION!

I am shocked by this accusation. To think that someone would call quatoria a shill must have not noticed the number of posts I've made about Steel Battalion signing it's praises.

Also considering my comments on Treasure Planet http://www.quartertothree.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=1125 before general release, combined with my relatively low post count for the long time I've been here I think I deserve to be accused as a viral marketer.

[_Fury_]

I'll shill for ye olde battalion as well!

Er, carry on, no need for another SB thread here, move along...

[Luke M]

So I guess Tom Chick (or was it Mark?) was shilling for Flying Heroes when he named it 1st or 2nd game of the year a few years back.

Come clean Tom.

[Dave Long]

I really like Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes on GAMECUBE NINTENDO. Have you guys played it?

--Dave

[wisefool]

That T-Shirt is awesome, where can I get one?

I get a gut reaction against marketing. This is horrible, forums and usenet are the places I do my research on buying products. I don't trust www pages. Some posts in usenet sound *too good* and therefore I distrust them. "tech site reviews" are suspect, there's some funny stuff going there.

Giving teenagers sample product in exchange for buzz seems okay. Same product in exchange for a tainted "review" is lower on the scale. This type of marketing is the worst, they pretend to be someone with no commercial interest in the product.

I probably see one TV ad in its entirety a year. ReplayTV may have a clunky interface compared to the Tivo, but commercial skip works well enough. I think the solution is to stop buying things.

Products I was suckered into buying:

Exos external water cooling kit: Reviews mentioned it was quiet. Hell no, it's loud as hell.

Everglide game pad: Actually I am not sure if this should be in the list. Placebo effect or no, I think I get better frags.

OCZ premium ram: The sticks wouldn't even run at default (non-overclocked) speeds on two boards I tested. Generic samsung was fine.

Thankfully, no Amway stuff on this list.

[Mark Asher]

So I guess Tom Chick (or was it Mark?) was shilling for Flying Heroes when he named it 1st or 2nd game of the year a few years back.

Come clean Tom.

It was me, but they could only afford to pay me in copies of Flying Heroes.

[balut]

So I guess Tom Chick (or was it Mark?) was shilling for Flying Heroes when he named it 1st or 2nd game of the year a few years back.

Come clean Tom.

It was me, but they could only afford to pay me in copies of Flying Heroes.

SCORE! :D

[nutsak]

They hang out in the community until they become trusted contributors and likeable personalities with some expertise.

That's where we're safe. Everyone here hates everyone else. :)

So are you saying To Anyone that tries this Lame Kind of thing hERe ... "we are immune"?

[Ephraim]

Rorschach:

I'd have given you the nod for Steel Battalion Viral Marketer of the Year, but quatoria was on IRC passing out sweet, sweet videos when last I was on there. Like little bags of video game heroin.

Just the sound alone in those AVIs he was hawking made me swoon. If, in the end, I cave and buy SB, LoC, and an XBox Live subscription it'll be because I can still hear the sound of that game in my head when I sleep.

The only thing that seems to drive the cravings away is my time spent playing Ratchet & Clank: Going Commando. If I wasn't committed to finishing R&C:GC before buying any new games, I'd already be playing SB.

Hm. Perhaps I'm the viral marketer. I'm more subtle than the rest of you, pretending I don't even own a copy of SB: LoC and talking about my cravings for it...

/Eph

[Hoochie]

So I guess Tom Chick (or was it Mark?) was shilling for Flying Heroes when he named it 1st or 2nd game of the year a few years back.

Come clean Tom.

It was me, but they could only afford to pay me in copies of Flying Heroes.

And Tom Chick is big on Vietcong... cha-ching!

Anyone got any examples of forum posts that have been bought? It's obvious when some marketing shill turns up and starts spruiking straight away, the more patient ones and long term members who have been selling their virtual arse would be interesting tho.

[DennyA]

Well, I was supposed to start surreptitiously pimping They Came from Hollywood, but when I received my advance it seems that Sparky and Lars were planning to pay me in used Smurf erasers, so I think my editorial integrity shall remain intact.

Anyone need some Smurf erasers? I have 23,000 sitting here.

{edit: Messed up the game name. Sorry, Sparky! I'll send back 4,700 erasers as penance.}

[balut]

Well, I was supposed to start surreptitiously pimping It Came from Hollywood, but when I received my advance it seems that Sparky and Lars were planning to pay me in used Smurf erasers, so I think my editorial integrity shall remain intact.

Anyone need some Smurf erasers? I have 23,000 sitting here.

Hmm . . . what's the exchange rate between Smurf erasers and copies of Flying Heroes?

[Alan Au]

Well, I was supposed to start surreptitiously pimping It Came from Hollywood, but when I received my advance it seems that Sparky and Lars were planning to pay me in used Smurf erasers, so I think my editorial integrity shall remain intact.

Anyone need some Smurf erasers? I have 23,000 sitting here.
'It' => 'They'; no wonder they paid you in Smurf erasers. I suppose you could try to turn them into gold. Well, gold erasers anyway.

- Alan

[DaveC]

Funny.

This is an evolution of a concept in William Gibson's last book "Pattern Recognition".

In the book Gibson describes a young, attractive Russian woman living in the UK who is paid by a marketing firm to basically go and hang out in bars and engage in conversation with men who try to chat her up. During these conversations she makes a casual reference to the coolness of a certain product/movie/etc... being promoted by the marketing agency. Invariably the young man would agree that the product was cool (wanting to impress the hot girl) and then later go on to mention the 'cool thing' to others in order to seem hip to his peers. The funny twist is that usually the product/movie/etc... had not yet been released, so the guy was lying to seem cool, but the net effect was that this started a groundswell that resulted in a successful product/movie/etc... launch.

What's described here is just taking that into the virtual world. I'm not sure blogs have the same impact as a face to face with a hottie, though.

/Eph

Wife and I both loved that book. In fact she used a character in it as her Xbox Live tag.

[LarryLard]

That T-Shirt is awesome, where can I get one?


http://www.ntkmart.com

[JessicaM]

This has been around for a long time; it is usually called a "whisper campaign." Companies have been hiring people to do this at least since the end WWII, when it became a popular form of stealth marketing. Probably happened long before that, though.

As an example: if you're ever in a crowded elevator and two people you don't know start talking at length about the virtues of a particular product or service, you may well be witnessing a whisper campaign in action.

[BobJustBob]

They did that in The Muppets Take Manhattan.