[arg_discuss] Value of ARGs to clients

[Dan Hon]

Yes. What Evan said :)

Dan

On 11/12/07, Evan Jones <evan at mysteryjones.com> wrote:

> Hey Marc,

>

> I'd have to agree with Dan - the costs are really a product of the

> project's scope (how many staff, how many exploding cars, etc) instead

> of its reach (really a product of its creative).

>

> I just wanted to jump in on your last point.  I'm not sure if Dan's

> point was that large companies 'don't really care' about impact - its

> just that they understand that there are other ways to measure success.

> Since you referenced Coca-Cola directly, I wanted to point you to Sergio

> Zyman's book 'The End of Marketing As We Know It" (links below).  He was

> the Chief Marketing Officer as Coca-Cola for years (including the

> dreaded New Coke era) and has one basic message in his book: you can

> measure everything.

>

> Dan's point may be correct - there isn't a direct method of tracking an

> ARG's impact to sales (unless you do something crazy like put unique ID

> codes on puzzle cards or something).  But in the marketing industry

> there is a direct correlation to end sales from each part of the

> campaign.  Rest asssured - Microsoft knows approximately how many sales

> will be driven by each part of their HALO release.  They've done

> billboards and tv ads before and seen their effects and are getting

> close to an equation - one ad during the Superbowl equals this many

> millions of end sales.  Since an ARG is new for them, they need to take

> a bit of a leap of faith at first but there is a way to measure it - add

> up the predicted effect of all other media.  If the end result is higher

> than the prediction, then the ARG must be the marketing iniative driving

> this.  It may sound like a little hocus pocus at first but if the CMO of

> Coke is preaching it... :)

>

> Just a little something to stir up the discussion,

> Evan Jones

> Stitch Media

>

> http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0887309836

> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sergio_Zyman

>

> marc at thedigitaldemons.com wrote:

> > Thanks for that information Dan!

> >

> > I guess you're right. I was referring more to trying to figure out the

> > cost of a project from the stats about the game (reach, impressions

> > etc.) but of course from a production point of view, it'd be silly to

> > base the cost upon the intended impact of a game.

> >

> > What I've noticed from my work in web development is that a lot of

> > projects are priced by first calculating the production cost (mainly

> > the cost of staff per day), working out how many days the project will

> > take to complete, and whacking a figure on top for profit (based upon

> > the client, how important the project is to them, project scale etc.)

> > This definitely compares to what you were saying about deciding on cost.

> >

> > I'm particularly interested in your point about companies such as

> > Coca-Cola who don't really care about the impact campaigns have,

> > they're at the stage where they can just experiment.

> >

> > Thanks again,

> >

> > Marc McGinley

> >

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> >

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Dan Hon {dan at sixtostart.com}
CEO, Six to Start