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Forums - Gaming Discussion - Breaking: Nintendo sends direct message to Wii owners asking them to upgrade

 

Does Wii U have a marketing problem?

Yes 246 78.59%
 
Maybe 36 11.50%
 
No 30 9.58%
 
Total:312
Nem on 02 May 2013
naruball said:
Nem said:
naruball said:
Nem said:
Goatseye said:
Why are the Japanese game companies horrible at marketing? At least in the west. I see this as an act of desperation.

sorry but as someone who has a degree in marketing i am gonna have to step in and tell you this is not an act of desperation. This is an act of intelligent direct marketing. Its cheap and its highly effective because it hits the exact target. Actually this is a really good method that i am afraid it takes a turn to the worse if misued (sending you spam adds ala email).

Desperation is to buy adds for the superball commercial break if you ask me. Its the same as admiting you dont know anything about your consumers.

Who are you talking about? Also, I can't think of a single company which wouldn't benefit from a superbowl commercial break.


I'm sure you dont. There is such a thing as efficiency and hitting your target with the least cost possible.

Let me explain the difference: 

Using direct marketing, Nintendo has hit every one of their possible customers with each message sent, the ones that bought Wii's. Not everyone will get the message, but everyone that did is a potencial buyer of an Wii U. This action cost literally zero as it used the company's internal infrastructure and hit a large number of potencial buyers. The action delivers and insane profit to the company.

Using a super bowl advert, you spend a huge ammount of cost, and you may or may not hit your target audience of potencial buyers. One would assume that you will only hit the potencial consumers that would buy a Wii U and enjoy sports, and thus are watching the match. You only have estimates as to the target you hit, you wasted money hitting targets that will never buy a console. All in all the effectiveness of this methos is questionable, there is no garantee you hit your desired target and you wasted a huge ammount of money hitting targets that dont matter. The risk of this method is far greater and the returns more difficult to gauge.

Using such an advert is called in the business sometimes as using a cannon ball to swat a fly. It reveals imcompetence most often than not and its an unecessary drain on company resources.

 

So, yeah... hope you learned something with that. ;) Hitting more people doesnt mean hitting more of the right people.

Actually, no. I learned nothing I didn't know. A good superbowl commercial could help tremendously Sony, MS, and Ninty. They're big enough companies to afford it and have enough products to justify such a commercial.

I pointed out that it's a good stategy from Ninty, though because they have that much money in the bank, they need something more than that. This is  a start, but it won't make a considerable diffrerence, same if Sony sent a message to psp owners. No one knows effective this will be. Using numbers makes no sense. out of 100m sold, how many are still being used? Out of those, how many use the internet. Out of those, how many will check the message? Out of those, how many already bought a wiiu, have no plans to buy a console again, have no money to buy a console, were aware that wiiu is not a wii, or will be convinced to actually buy one. At the end of the day, even if they get 5.000 of them to buy it, it's successful, as it costs them nothing, but shouldn't they launch a big campaign and get some kind of momentum? A commercial is not just about the people who watch it and rush to buy a product, but more importantly, getting word of mouth, having people talk about it and becoming a hot item. 

Again: It cost them nothing. Yes, I get that. Is it enough? No. So, let's hope that that's a start of a great campaign.

Now, can you please answer the actual question I asked you?


I'm not talking about anyone in particular. I was giving an example.

We are gonna have to agree to disagree on the other subject. This action is a garanteed return on investment, the TV advert isnt.



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naruball on 02 May 2013
Nem said:
naruball said:
Nem said:
naruball said:
Nem said:
Goatseye said:
Why are the Japanese game companies horrible at marketing? At least in the west. I see this as an act of desperation.

sorry but as someone who has a degree in marketing i am gonna have to step in and tell you this is not an act of desperation. This is an act of intelligent direct marketing. Its cheap and its highly effective because it hits the exact target. Actually this is a really good method that i am afraid it takes a turn to the worse if misued (sending you spam adds ala email).

Desperation is to buy adds for the superball commercial break if you ask me. Its the same as admiting you dont know anything about your consumers.

Who are you talking about? Also, I can't think of a single company which wouldn't benefit from a superbowl commercial break.


I'm sure you dont. There is such a thing as efficiency and hitting your target with the least cost possible.

Let me explain the difference: 

Using direct marketing, Nintendo has hit every one of their possible customers with each message sent, the ones that bought Wii's. Not everyone will get the message, but everyone that did is a potencial buyer of an Wii U. This action cost literally zero as it used the company's internal infrastructure and hit a large number of potencial buyers. The action delivers and insane profit to the company.

Using a super bowl advert, you spend a huge ammount of cost, and you may or may not hit your target audience of potencial buyers. One would assume that you will only hit the potencial consumers that would buy a Wii U and enjoy sports, and thus are watching the match. You only have estimates as to the target you hit, you wasted money hitting targets that will never buy a console. All in all the effectiveness of this methos is questionable, there is no garantee you hit your desired target and you wasted a huge ammount of money hitting targets that dont matter. The risk of this method is far greater and the returns more difficult to gauge.

Using such an advert is called in the business sometimes as using a cannon ball to swat a fly. It reveals imcompetence most often than not and its an unecessary drain on company resources.

 

So, yeah... hope you learned something with that. ;) Hitting more people doesnt mean hitting more of the right people.

Actually, no. I learned nothing I didn't know. A good superbowl commercial could help tremendously Sony, MS, and Ninty. They're big enough companies to afford it and have enough products to justify such a commercial.

I pointed out that it's a good stategy from Ninty, though because they have that much money in the bank, they need something more than that. This is  a start, but it won't make a considerable diffrerence, same if Sony sent a message to psp owners. No one knows effective this will be. Using numbers makes no sense. out of 100m sold, how many are still being used? Out of those, how many use the internet. Out of those, how many will check the message? Out of those, how many already bought a wiiu, have no plans to buy a console again, have no money to buy a console, were aware that wiiu is not a wii, or will be convinced to actually buy one. At the end of the day, even if they get 5.000 of them to buy it, it's successful, as it costs them nothing, but shouldn't they launch a big campaign and get some kind of momentum? A commercial is not just about the people who watch it and rush to buy a product, but more importantly, getting word of mouth, having people talk about it and becoming a hot item. 

Again: It cost them nothing. Yes, I get that. Is it enough? No. So, let's hope that that's a start of a great campaign.

Now, can you please answer the actual question I asked you?


I'm not talking about anyone in particular. I was giving an example.

We are gonna have to agree to disagree on the other subject. This action is a garanteed return on investment, the TV advert isnt.

We can at least agree on that!



Dodece on 04 May 2013

This thread was highly illuminating, but for all of the wrong reasons. Sometimes this community gets so caught up in its own little proxy wars. That incredibly salient points get overlooked entirely in the rush to deploy standard attack arguments, and to assume all too common defensive positions. The direct marketing itself isn't the issue, and fixating on it was missing the point entirely. It isn't that something is being said, but how that something is being said.

It isn't even a matter of it couldn't hurt, or it costs so little to do, or even how many people it will reach. The message that is being sent matters more then the message being sent in the first place. That message does indeed come across as desperate. Anyone saying otherwise has their blinders on so tight that they are cutting off the blood supply to their brain. That isn't any kind of a strong pitch. It is a insecure plea from a company that sounds confused about what is going on.

Insecure sounding pleas, make consumers insecure about the product. Nintendo may very well end up accomplishing the exact opposite of what they intended. It might actually scare away potential customers, and worse it advertises their own weakness. Which as we know brings the sniping predators out in force. Direct marketing could help Nintendo out, but this kind of marketing isn't what they need. They need a more self confident message extolling the virtues of their product.

Rather then coming off as being insecure about the fact that people might not know about their new product. Yes it is a form of cheap advertising, but that doesn't make it good advertising. I am going to be honest about something though I honestly don't know what Nintendo could say to drive up sales of the Wii U. It just isn't a well designed, conceived, or even supported machine. It isn't just that the advertising is bad. So much as there really isn't anything positive to say. Nothing the machine offers really resonates with potential consumers. Outside of the people who will spend whatever it takes to get their hands on the hundredth game with Mario in the title.

Yes it actually sounds desperate. You don't have to be a lover or hater to see that. Would you honestly be comfortable buying any product that presented itself like that. Especially a product that costs hundreds of dollars. If Microsoft or Sony sent out that kind of message I would say the same of them. Most impartial observers would as well.



http://live.xbox.com/member/Dodece