Blizzard's Advertising budget?

[jokr2thief]

I'm going to ask a question that occurred to me last night when I was watching TV and saw an ad for the new WoW expansion. Why does Blizzard have to spend retarded amounts of money securing time on TV, ads in magazines and on web sites?

One would think that everyone who wanted or needed to know about the Kung-Fu Pandaland expansion, in fact a lot of us who didn't want to, were painfully aware of it well in advance of it's release. So what's the point? Why are they funneling money into advertising when their target audience (I.E. The people who are already hooked on their digital crack) is already aware of the product and it's release date? Are they hoping to get 1 player out of every 10,000 who see the ads to say "There's another WoW expansion out? I may have to dust off my armor and give it a shot."

You would think that money would be better spent on a project that isn't 8 years old and nearing the end of it's life cycle.

 

[Epona]

I'm going to ask a question that occurred to me last night when I was watching TV and saw an ad for the new WoW expansion. Why does Blizzard have to spend retarded amounts of money securing time on TV, ads in magazines and on web sites?

One would think that everyone who wanted or needed to know about the Kung-Fu Pandaland expansion, in fact a lot of us who didn't want to, were painfully aware of it well in advance of it's release. So what's the point? Why are they funneling money into advertising when their target audience (I.E. The people who are already hooked on their digital crack) is already aware of the product and it's release date? Are they hoping to get 1 player out of every 10,000 who see the ads to say "There's another WoW expansion out? I may have to dust off my armor and give it a shot."

You would think that money would be better spent on a project that isn't 8 years old and nearing the end of it's life cycle.

Probably trying to WOW people who left.

 

[krazykidd]

I used to think that too . Then i met my girlfriend . Apparently people are easily influenced and seeing a product on a television will actuall entice them to buy it even though they don't want it . I thought people were smarter than that , especially in 2012 , but i was wrong , my girlfriend bought MoP after seeing the commercial after telling me she wasn't going to buy it because of school . Then she said she wasn't going to resubscribe again because of school and lo and behold she did . She makes me facepalm so hard sometimes

 

[StBishop]

Because Advertising works.

They will make money off of this advertising campaign.

People buy shit as a gift all of the time, most people are happy to buy their grandchild a $50 expansion or however much it is (I honestly don't even know). Stacks of people quit WoW, they want everyone to come back, this will help them achieve that goal.

Surely it can't be that hard to understand?

 

[Dragoon]

They want to get more new players or try to entice back some of the older ones who left.

 

[veloper]

WOW caters to a relatively casual audience as well as core gamers. I've known housewives to play WOW.
So yes, advertising reaches a big potential audience for the game.

 

[KoudelkaMorgan]

Advertising only works if you get people who are actually interested in your product type to see it. If you make great beef tacos, but the person that sees your ad 17 times a day is a vegan then your ad isn't doing any good.

You are trusting that when you toss your ads out there that there is some percentage of people that would even want to use your product or service, and haven't already done so and found it lacking.

I cannot think of ONE example of seeing something advertised that I didn't already know about, and that I was genuinely interested in aside from various movie trailers because that is HOW you learn about new movies if you aren't like a producer or something.

However I can name dozens of examples of ads that are totally wasted on me. The Doritos taco, I will never buy one because I think its a stupid unhealthy marketing gimmick that needs to die, and also because 100% of the people I know that have tried it hated it. Seeing constant ads that pretty much seem to say "you know you can't help yourself, we don't need to advertise this, but hey we are gonna keep shoving this taco in your face until we run out of ad money" have actually turned me off of going there for stuff I DO like.

Seeing the terrible Jack in the Box ads EVERY time I watch The Daily Show online, over and over, takes a restaurant I already don't eat at and makes me dislike it even more.

Ads for Dishonored? They are everywhere, and honestly every time I see that stupid mask I want to kill something fluffy.

I have zero interest in WoW. I didn't get on board all those years ago, back before I even had money of my own, and I'm sure as hell not gonna dip my toe into that pool literally this late in the game when I'm in no position to waste my remaining money on something so frivolous.

Not that I would even if it were free. Yet there ads don't irritate me. I see them as much or more than the aforementioned, but they are brief at least.

Even so I agree that advertising an aging MMO's latest expansion, when you are pretty much the only game in town and have been since time immemorial is silly. Though its not like they don't have the cash to throw around what with all those subscriptions.

 

[jokr2thief]

The real question here is what does it cost a new player to get into WoW? I am admittedly ignorant on the subject, as I haven't touched it since the release of Burning Crusade and I'm not interested enough in it to put the effort into researching it.

Surely they can't a expect a player picking up the game for the first time to have to buy Vanilla WoW, Burning Crusade, Wrath of the Lich King, Cataclysm, and Mists of Pandaria. That would seem to me to negate their advertising budget right there.

I can envision the dialogue a player would have with themselves at this point. "Let me get this straight. I need to buy the game and 4 expansions if I want the full experience? Even at $20 a pop US, I would spend $100, then STILL have to pay $15 a month on top. I'll just go spend $60 on Call Of Duty and I'll be set until the next one comes out."

Like I said, I could be wrong on the pricing model, but I can see how this would put off new players.

 

[elvor0]

The real question here is what does it cost a new player to get into WoW? I am admittedly ignorant on the subject, as I haven't touched it since the release of Burning Crusade and I'm not interested enough in it to put the effort into researching it.

Surely they can't a expect a player picking up the game for the first time to have to buy Vanilla WoW, Burning Crusade, Wrath of the Lich King, Cataclysm, and Mists of Pandaria. That would seem to me to negate their advertising budget right there.

I can envision the dialogue a player would have with themselves at this point. "Let me get this straight. I need to buy the game and 4 expansions if I want the full experience? Even at $20 a pop US, I would spend $100, then STILL have to pay $15 a month on top. I'll just go spend $60 on Call Of Duty and I'll be set until the next one comes out."

Like I said, I could be wrong on the pricing model, but I can see how this would put off new players.

Well these days you get Burning Crusade completely free with WoW which can be picked up for a tenner, and you're bound to know someone who plays WoW, in which case they can do recruit a friend, which upgrades you to Cataclysm for free, then all you have to do is buy Mists, so it's not much more expensive than buying any latest AAA game, which is all part of Blizzards master plan.

Of course if you don't know ANYONE that plays WoW you're out in the cold a bit, but then I guess Blizzard would think "Well if you're not playing WoW at this point, and you don't know anyone who does, you're unlikely to get into it" so the few people who would have to buy WoW and Wrath/Cata/Mists are fairly expendable customers in their eyes.

 

[Ickorus]

Well, to be fair, I was having so much fun with GW2, Borderlands 2, and a bunch of other games that I didn't even realise the new WoW expansion was releasing so soon.

Not that I'll be buying it, I'd get bored way too fast to make it worth my while.

 

[Baldr]

The real question here is what does it cost a new player to get into WoW? I am admittedly ignorant on the subject, as I haven't touched it since the release of Burning Crusade and I'm not interested enough in it to put the effort into researching it.

Surely they can't a expect a player picking up the game for the first time to have to buy Vanilla WoW, Burning Crusade, Wrath of the Lich King, Cataclysm, and Mists of Pandaria. That would seem to me to negate their advertising budget right there.

I can envision the dialogue a player would have with themselves at this point. "Let me get this straight. I need to buy the game and 4 expansions if I want the full experience? Even at $20 a pop US, I would spend $100, then STILL have to pay $15 a month on top. I'll just go spend $60 on Call Of Duty and I'll be set until the next one comes out."

Like I said, I could be wrong on the pricing model, but I can see how this would put off new players.

Well these days you get Burning Crusade completely free with WoW which can be picked up for a tenner, and you're bound to know someone who plays WoW, in which case they can do recruit a friend, which upgrades you to Cataclysm for free, then all you have to do is buy Mists, so it's not much more expensive than buying any latest AAA game, which is all part of Blizzards master plan.

Of course if you don't know ANYONE that plays WoW you're out in the cold a bit, but then I guess Blizzard would think "Well if you're not playing WoW at this point, and you don't know anyone who does, you're unlikely to get into it" so the few people who would have to buy WoW and Wrath/Cata/Mists are fairly expendable customers in their eyes.

WoW start is the first 20 levels(free). WoW battlechest(basic WoW) now consists of Vanilla/BC/Wrath. That $20, plus the free month. Then Cata is $30, and Mists is $40, but they been giving out specials every couple weeks. Players get a free upgrade to Cata if they played anytime in the past(but not in the last 8 months) and group up with a current player, using the scroll of resurrection.

 

[Zantos]

I'd imagine that Blizzard have a sizeable team of marketing analysts and experts who are paid to do nothing more than look at the optimum amount of advertising to do and the best places to do it in order to get greatest returns, and that they have thought about this exact problem and decided that they can attract enough new customers and resubscribers to make it worthwhile.

Then again, I'd imagine the same thing about EA, yet by this point I think they've fired anyone who might be sensible and done whatever the fuck they wanted.

 

[jokr2thief]

Of course if you don't know ANYONE that plays WoW you're out in the cold a bit, but then I guess Blizzard would think "Well if you're not playing WoW at this point, and you don't know anyone who does, you're unlikely to get into it" so the few people who would have to buy WoW and Wrath/Cata/Mists are fairly expendable customers in their eyes.

That's kinda my point. It's been 8 years now. If you're gonna be that late to the party, why bother showing up at all? If you know someone who plays WoW and you don't, chances are they've tried to talk you into joining/returning to the game. If you haven't bitten by now, you're likely not going to.

If you don't know anyone who plays WoW, then it's likely you're not going to get into it. Even on a free trial, a lone player with no pre-existing friends in Azeroth would be scared and running for the hills after an hour of listening to the player base cry, be rude, make thinly veiled sexual innuendos, insult each other's lineage and crack an endless stream of not-funny Chuck Norris jokes.

(I suppose it is of note that the reason I quit I WoW in the first place was because of the player base. It's actually been the reason I have quit every MMO I've ever played with the exception of City Of Heroes... Because in a game based on social interaction, part of the fun is enjoying hanging out with the people you are playing the game with.)

 

[Charli]

Of course if you don't know ANYONE that plays WoW you're out in the cold a bit, but then I guess Blizzard would think "Well if you're not playing WoW at this point, and you don't know anyone who does, you're unlikely to get into it" so the few people who would have to buy WoW and Wrath/Cata/Mists are fairly expendable customers in their eyes.

That's kinda my point. It's been 8 years now. If you're gonna be that late to the party, why bother showing up at all? If you know someone who plays WoW and you don't, chances are they've tried to talk you into joining/returning to the game. If you haven't bitten by now, you're likely not going to.

If you don't know anyone who plays WoW, then it's likely you're not going to get into it. Even on a free trial, a lone player with no pre-existing friends in Azeroth would be scared and running for the hills after an hour of listening to the player base cry, be rude, make thinly veiled sexual innuendos, insult each other's lineage and crack an endless stream of not-funny Chuck Norris jokes.

I don't think you could be more wrong. There are people who've gotten to a slow point in their lives all the time and are suddenly open to possibilities they haven't considered filling their time with before. Such as... Por Example; a socialite who has no more ability to do so and has decided to fill their time with something else. WoW might be right up their alley and they won't even think about it until some big flashy ad shows up on television and reminds them of the existence of the product. Advertisement for all it annoys us, works. It may work a small percentage of the time for us individually but over a WIDE WIDE spread audience it can make a huge impact.

Just because you don't understand doesn't mean there's some logic to it.

I would argue that I was a lone player who had no one around me who played WoW and ... well I saw an advert. I was in a very problematic spot, no friends, no way to make friends (language barriers) and a heap of spare time outside of the work I was doing. How to keep some social interactivity? I saw the ad and went; "Well, why not?" I already had the first two expansions because of a birthday but I had never considered it before because the time in my life wasn't open to me playing such games. Things change all the time for people.

Look this smacks a little of "I don't like WoW anymore and don't understand why it won't die", and I'm telling you now, person to person, just, ignore it. If you don't like something but it's not doing you personally any harm, just go about your life. It's just an ad, they rake in more than what the ad's worth, and the latest expansion feels like a labour of love, you can't really ask for more than that. All big game companies do it.

Also my real life friends tell worse jokes than the people I've met in WoW. People's experiences WILL differ.

I'm sorry I was 'late to the party' but frankly I don't give a toss, I showed up late and the snack table was still fresh and tasty.

 

[RJ 17]

I'd say "To bring in new players" but then I remembered this was an expansion which means you'd need to buy the core game first. So yeah, I'll go with "To win back players who have quit the game for whatever reason." Same thing could be said about Cataclysm.

 

[jokr2thief]

Look this smacks a little of "I don't like WoW anymore and don't understand why it won't die", and I'm telling you now, person to person, just, ignore it. If you don't like something but it's not doing you personally any harm, just go about your life. It's just an ad, they rake in more than what the ad's worth, and the latest expansion feels like a labour of love, you can't really ask for more than that. All big game companies do it.

What this smacks of is not that I don't like WoW, It's that I don't like the people who play it. People like you, who will defend it as the pinnacle of what gaming has to offer. The people who will still continue to support Blizzard's cash cow, and not encourage them to innovate or encourage them to branch out and do anything new aside from sequels and expansions for franchises that have already been driven into the ground. They are a long-standing gaming company, and they keep handing us the same tired old shit. There was nothing groundbreaking about Starcraft 2. Diablo 3 is a joke, and now we have a WoW expansion with Kung-Fu Pandas. They're scraping the bottom of the barrel so they all still have jobs in the morning, and people are still eating it up.

My original question is why they're not using the money they spent on advertising to make a new game?