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World of Warcraft: Selling Cataclysm to the World
SBFord
Former Associate EditorMember LegendaryPosts: 33,129
Blizzard Entertainment has announced a pair of contests for World of Warcraft. The first is an ad contest to announced Cataclysm to the world via print media. The second allows creative types to create a YouTube video announcing Cataclysm. Both contests feature pretty sweet rewards for grand prize winners including new rigs, headphones and more.
How the message gets out is entirely up to you. You could do your civic duty and create a public service announcement to warn the populace of the dangerous times ahead. Perhaps you'd rather capitalize on the chaos and create a commercial based on a product or service one might peddle to the desperate citizens seeking comfort or safety in an Azeroth rent asunder by the Cataclysm. Whichever course you choose, all you need to do is create your masterpiece, make your own YouTube channel, and post your video there. Send us the link, and your entry is complete!
Read more about the video contest and/or the print ad contest.
Comments
Everyone rush out and do Blizzard's marketing for free. Afterall they are just an indy shop and don't have a big marketing budget.
WoW (no pun intended) you are ignorant.
This isn't the first time a big company has reached out to the public to try and get them involved. Personally I think that is pretty cool on their part, but I guess i'm one of the only non-haters on this game. For this forum anyways.
"Buy Cataclysm; or else Fluffy gets it!"
...what? to harsh?
Our greatest glory is not in never falling but in rising everytime we fall.
I think it's cool too. Blizzard is just keeping with it's tradition of staying ahead of the curve by announcing this endeavor. Not to long ago this type of advertisment was covered in the news because it was retailers capitalizing on teen girls that were making mini commercials on youtube showing off their new purchases. It started off as teen girls showing stuff they bought from these clothing outlets to their friends on youtube on a weekly bases. Marketing reps caught wind and started offering shopping sprees as rewards for girl's who came up with the most creative ways to show off their fashions.
The winners were then sponsored by retailers with cash and an official place on youtube to show off new lines. A very clever way to reach your target audience and capitalize on their taste and social networking skills in a win-win situation. Kudos to Blizzards for keeping an ear to the track and adapting to a already internet savy crowd a.k.a. online gamers.
"Small minds talk about people, average minds talk about events, great minds talk about ideas."
Let's see, Blizzard uses your bandwidth for massive patch downloads, has pretty much stopped creating those fantastic CG cinematics that made people drool, and is now shunting players into playing the same content over and over so they don't have to create as much. Now they're wanting their customer base to do their marketing for them. Sounds more like a money sponge than a development company. All they have to do is offer token shinies and rake in the cash that people throw at them.
"Soloists and those who prefer small groups should never have to feel like they''re the ones getting the proverbial table scraps, as it were." - Scott Hartsman, Senior Producer, Everquest II
"People love groups. Its a fallacy that people want to play solo all the time." - Scott Hartsman, Executive Producer, Rift
And yet....you'll be amazed at the response of brand loyalty and how many WILL do....just what you said.
President of The Marvelously Meowhead Fan Club
Not me....
Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there, wondering, fearing, doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before.
Edgar Allan Poe
Long live Blizzard! World of Warcraft is still fun and beautiful. Dont care about their ad campaigns. Wah wah stinky pants go back to Star Wars Online you must.
Fluffy noooooooooooo!!
I'll preorder! I'll preorder!!!
But yeah, it's a pretty cool idea to get the community involved, not like they really need to advertise the expansion. It just lets the community feel like they are helping the game grow, and if anything it will be fun for some people.
There are 3 types of people in the world.
1.) Those who make things happen
2.) Those who watch things happen
3.) And those who wonder "What the %#*& just happened?!"
It's working, and there's no one to blame but the players themselves for holding on so long and just going with it.
William Shatner and MrT are getting worried
Very 2010 of them. Organic marketing embraced by corporate.
They do know how to keep the masses involved.
Some business model, huh?
...and by doing it with a subscription system, they don't get the abuse that the F2P cash shop games take. At least they sell something useful like XP potions or mega-weapons.
I'll pass.
Archlinux ftw
William Shatner vs Darth Vader and throw in that fat light saber kid too... it does not have to make sense.
WoW probably has the biggest http://www.machinima.com/ base so I for one look forward to seeing what they can do.
Probably most of you are to young to even realize it but most companies got their jingles or their slogans by having contests for people to come up with them.
Its not something "new" that "big lazy companies are doing to be cheap and make a buck".
IT has been going on for decades.
The Stranger: It's what people know about themselves inside that makes 'em afraid.
The way I read his comment it looks like sarcasm to me but your comment looks ignorant.
거북이는 목을 내밀 때 안 움직입니다
This is pretty cool for fans of the game, figures this topic would fill up with negativity pretty quick.
funny thing is if the MMO they love playing put up the same idea these haters would be all over it thinking it was the best thing ever, but since its blizzard its the devil lol.
"The great thing about human language is that it prevents us from sticking to the matter at hand."
- Lewis Thomas
거북이는 목을 내밀 때 안 움직입니다
You, as a WoW hater, are so wrong about everything!
Who cares how much bandwidth is used for patch downloads?
Starcraft 2 has plenty of breathtaking CG cinematics.
Cataclysm IS NOT THE SAME CONTENT AGAIN. Look up some videos on youtube and you will see.
Marketing their game is a way to get their community involve and show off the community's creativity.
They only way to find out what people want is to ask them, this is just one way of doing it, community involvement has been successful since way before any of us were even eggs. why cant a corperation (gaming or not) ask people for their input?
And sweeting the deal with some nice prizes is a bonus, if they didnt do it involvement would still be there, just in lesser numbers.
Com'on WTF ? Bash Bash Bash...are you that so self centered you cant see the big picture? Or are you just one of those OMG "the world is against me" kind of people? Boo Hoo, when you see the final winning add, turn your head and look in the corner of the room. or is that closing in on you too?
ahhahahhahahhahaha
Once again Blizzard steals ideas from other gaming companies.
The definition of insanity: doing the same thing over and over expecting different results.