从业者分享关于手游广告创意的五个启发式问题

原作者：Natalie Suthons 译者：Willow Wu

如今，手游营销人员比以往任何时候都更需要出色的广告创意。

随着算法或多或少地取代了游戏营销中的竞价和目标投放环节，再加上最近行业中与用户隐私&行为跟踪相关的政策变化，广告创意现在成为了用户获取经理手中最有力的营销工具。

然而，为了提高下游指标、获得可观的投资回报率，游戏营销人员需要一种更精巧复杂的创意策略——即依赖于自适应广告创意，它们能够针对各种投放位置、情景和用户自动进行优化。

那么，这样一来关键问题就变成了这些创意点子从哪来？这个担子是落在了广告设计团队的肩膀上吗？还是UA经理？或者产品团队中某个最熟悉游戏特色和优势的人？

dragons watch bundles（from pocketgamer.biz）

事实是，优秀的游戏概念可以来自任何地方，而那些值得载入史册的概念往往得益于正确的协调与合作。

为了促进这种协作，设定一套关于创意概念产生的框架能够起到帮助作用。

当然，在头脑风暴阶段不要限制任何想法是很重要的，但同样重要的是你要列出广告营销的目标和要求，同时用正确的问题引导参与者来，激发出他们的创造力。

这里有五个启发式问题可以帮助到你和你的团队：

1.我们的主要受众是谁？我们的游戏是如何融入到他们的生活中的？

无论是普通的安装广告还是豪华的超级碗广告，任何创意都必须始于对目标用户的深入观察。

将定量和定性资源结合起来，对你的每个受众群体进行侧写，包括他们的群体特征、思维、数字行为等等。把他们变成虚构的人物，给予名字和样貌，这样会更真实一些。然后想想他们会在什么时候出于什么原因、如何玩游戏。

同一个游戏，不同的人会因为不同的原因下载。有些人可能是为了娱乐，想暂时躲避现实世界，有些人可能是为了社交或者刺激一下大脑。进行创意头脑风暴，应对这些动机，并向用户展示你的游戏是如何融入他们的日常生活。

2.他们看到我们的广告会有什么想法？

随着IDFA政策的出台，个性化广告将成为App营销者提高转化率、获取用户的关键途径之一。

因此，思考玩家遇到广告时的情景比以往任何时候都重要。你会把广告投放到哪些游戏中？会以什么样的方式？他们在玩游戏时会想什么？状态是快节奏神经紧绷的，还是平静放松的？体现出了这类玩家的哪些特征？这种艺术风格或基调是如何影响玩家的情感或心理的？

3.我们怎样才能让用户参与到叙事中？

很多范例级别的成功广告都是以剧情为核心的。讲故事是一种非常有效的广告手段，因为它能让观众感受到强烈的情感，有时甚至能在一个广告内传达出一系列的情感。

但如果你能让用户参与其中的话，这种广告的效果就能更上一层。应用剧情分支选择或用户自创内容等元素可以让用户参与到叙事中来，让他们感受到自己对结局的影响。

品牌广告商通常是将故事强加给用户，但游戏营销最好是让用户自己创造故事。

4.除了核心玩法，我们还能怎么展示自己独特的价值主张？

很多人会把广告的主角设定成游戏的核心玩法，这是个安全的做法。当然，你的一些广告确实应该突出游戏最受欢迎的特色或最优秀的玩法机制。

但是现在有很多广告商通过我们所说的“非典型”方式获得了成功——他们的广告表现的并不是核心玩法。在这种情况下你必须小心一些，不要误导用户，避免出现用户下载完启动后才发现App跟自己想象的不一样，令他们失望。

你可以参考Supercell和Machine Zone的做法，他们请了Liam Neeson和Kate Upton这些名人来推广《部落冲突》和Game of War，非典型创意和实际玩法片段相结合通常会对用户有更大的吸引力。

5.我们是否可以选择一个更独特的视角？

大多数游戏都有一个独特的主角，通常这就是玩家操控的角色。就比如《超级马里奥兄弟》中的马里奥，或者《刺猬索尼克》中的索尼克。

这类游戏的广告大多都聚焦于标题中的主角，这是理所当然的。但如果不是围绕着马里奥或索尼克，而是通过另一个角色的视角去创造广告呢？

要是你展示的是碧琪公主自己逃出了牢笼呢？而不是一直等待马里奥来救她？要是你展示的是蛋头博士的起源故事，告诉大家他为什么想要统治世界呢？

通过独特的角度呈现游戏会让玩家有一种耳目一新的感觉，特别是当他们已经很熟悉这个游戏的情况下。这样做还可以进一步释放的团队的创造力，促使他们迸发出之前从未想到的伟大创意。

总结

是时候让广告创意成为游戏营销人员的核心工具了。毕竟，多数时候玩家是先看到这些广告才知道你的游戏的。

广告奠定了用户对你品牌基本印象，让他们对游戏的整体体验有个大概的感觉。所以从一开始就找到正确方向非常非常重要。

本文由游戏邦编译，转载请注明来源，或咨询微信zhengjintiao

Mobile game marketers have more need for exceptional ad creative today than ever before.

With algorithms having more or less taken over the bidding and targeting functions of game marketing, and given all the recent privacy-related and tracking changes to the industry, ad creative is now the single most important lever that a UA manager can pull to impact their campaigns.

To truly drive the kind of downstream metrics and ROI-positive results asked of them, however, game marketers need a sophisticated creative strategy, one that relies on adaptive ad creative that can be automatically optimized for a variety of placements, contexts and users.

The crucial question then becomes, where will the ideas come from to drive your creative strategy? Is it up to the team that designs the ad? The UA manager? Or maybe someone on the product team, who’s most familiar with the game’s features and benefits?

The truth is that great concepts can come from anywhere, and that usually the greatest concepts come from the right mix of coordination and collaboration.

To foster such collaboration, it helps to have a framework for how to come up with creative concepts.

It’s important to not put any restrictions on ideas during this brainstorming stage, of course, but it is equally important to lay out the goals and requirements of your campaign while prodding participants with the right questions to spark their creativity.

Here are five questions to ask that will help you and your team come up with hard-hitting creative concepts for your game’s next ad campaign.

1. Who is our primary audience, and how does our game fit into their life?

It doesn’t matter if it’s for an install ad or a Super Bowl commercial: the creative for any ad campaign must begin with a close examination of the intended audience.

Use a combination of quantitative and qualitative sources to build a detailed profile for each of your audience segments, covering their demographics, psychographics, digital behaviors and more. Turn them into fictional personas, giving them names and faces to make them real. Then think of how, when and why they play your game.

Don’t forget that different people can download the same game for completely different reasons. Some might look for entertainment or escape, while others for social connection or brain stimulation. Brainstorm ad concepts that address these motivations and show audiences how your game fits into their day-to-day lives.

2. What is the player’s mindset when they see our ad?

With the pending deprecation of IDFA, contextual ad relevancy will become one of the key ways for app marketers to increase conversions and acquire interested users.

Therefore it’s more important than ever to consider what the player is doing when they encounter your ad. What game or categories will your ad appear in, and where will the placement occur?

What frame of mind is the prospect in when they’re using the game? Is it fast-paced and adrenaline-fueling, or low-key and relaxing? What does that say about the type of person playing it? How does its art style or general tone affect their mood or psyche? Try to design ad creative that appeals to those same emotions.

3. How can we involve viewers in the storytelling?

Many of the most successful ads throughout history are, at their core, stories. Storytelling is a powerful advertising device because it causes audiences to feel strong emotions, sometimes even covering a range of emotions within a single unit.

But storytelling in ad creative becomes even more effective when you find a way to get the viewer involved in the process. Incorporating elements of choose-your-adventure or user-generated content can engage users with the narrative and make them feel invested in its outcome.

Brand advertisers generally aim to force their stories on audiences, but game marketers are better off letting audiences write their own narrative.

4. Outside of core gameplay, how else can we show our unique value proposition?

It’s easy to fall into the trap of designing ad creative that shows a game’s core mechanics. It’s what most games do, and it’s the safe approach. And certainly, some if not most of your ad creative should highlight your game’s most popular features or best gameplay mechanics.

But many advertisers are seeing success with ads that use what we call an “atypical” approach, in which the ad creative reflects something other than the core game experience.

Now, you must be careful in this case to not mislead users; you wouldn’t want to show something that looks like it could be the app, only to leave users disappointed when they actually download and start using it.

But in much the same way that Supercell and Machine Zone famously used actors like Liam Neeson and Kate Upton to promote Clash of Clans and Game of War, a combination of atypical creative and actual gameplay footage can often engage users more deeply with your ad content.

5. How can we flip the script to show a unique perspective?

Most games have a unique protagonist or main character. Usually this is the character who is controlled by the player. Think Mario in Super Mario Bros. or Sonic in Sonic the Hedgehog.

Most ads for games like these focus on the titular character, and rightfully so. But what if, instead of the ad revolving around Mario or Sonic, you flipped the script and created an ad from the point of view of a different character?

What if you showed Princess Peach, not simply waiting on Mario to save her but breaking out of jail all on her own? What if you showed Dr. Eggman’s origin story and what led him to want to conquer the world?

Seeing things from a unique point of view can give audiences a whole new perspective on your game, especially if it’s a title they’re already familiar with. It can also unleash your teams’ creativity and get them to come up with great creative ideas they might never have thought of before.

Get creative with your creative

It’s about time that ad creative became the central tool in the game marketer’s toolbox. After all, ad creative is often the first encounter a visitor has with your game.

It sets the tone for their impression of your brand and lays the foundation for their overall experience with your game. So it’s important to get it right, right from the beginning.

(source: pocketgamer)