Interactive Marketing & Creation of Non-Gaming Company in Fortnite

Introduction

I have been involved in marketing for ten years and have primarily worked with traditional advertising formats targeting various audiences. However, users usually almost don't react to traditional static content. That is why I started using interactive content.

Four years ago, I opened an agency called Trend Surfers. We create projects at the intersection of creativity and IT. We actively use Telegram for marketing because it is popular among many brands. We make games and bots, implement third-party APIs, and create projects with AI.

Interactive Marketing

We are in the era of interactive marketing when the user becomes a co-author of a brand advertising. In this case, I like games because they allow us to receive unique results. For instance, when a user takes a quiz, his answers will be very specific. With the help of interactive marketing, we have an opportunity to see actions that reflect the character of each unique user.

Web3 and Metaverse are the next stages for Trend Surfers' marketing campaigns. Brands strive to create not only advertising with which users can interact but also a space in which they can take action. There, people can create avatars that demonstrate their image and interests. In the future, many brands will develop such spaces to maintain community. But now, these spaces aren't significantly developed.

Trend Surfers usually works with Fortnite and Roblox. As for Minecraft, I think it is more about products. It's a great space for educational organizations because you can make classrooms relevant for the Alpha generation. Teenagers understand the flow and feel safe themselves due to avatars.

Brands prefer to use Roblox for marketing because this platform has a huge base of Z-generation users. The key idea is to build close relationships with users now so that in 10-20 years, they will become the brand's main ambassadors and buyers. This is an investment in the brand's future because this concept does not pay off in most cases.

Fortnite looks more expensive, and millennials play Fortnite, which means it has a financially capable audience. Games are always a great tool that allows us to create positive emotions that are associated with the brand. We created a project for a non-gaming company in Fortnite. The project was successful, as it had 2 million users and over 500 mentions in the media, which were purely organic.

Communication Channels

It is impossible to track where users came from on the map. Fortnite does not provide any statistical data. For one of our projects, we had Discord, Telegram, and a landing page. We measured who passed through them, what was happening, and who clicked on the code. We also looked at what was happening in the media field in the comments under the seeds.

Discord can be important for building a community of gamers around the brand, and streamers, including top Twitch streamers, might pick up on this and start playing it. Discord can serve as an additional communication channel where you can provide information on updates, address errors, and add a UGC section where people can share their screenshots and videos. It can be more for community management.

Media mentions worked well, although media coverage doesn't always pick up. Sometimes, it's untimely, and it gets lost. February was super quiet, and nothing happened for a week. We carefully stepped in and attracted a lot of attention. The metaverse is one of the cool tools. We have a lot of organic growth because one person would discover it and bring friends. One person would bring in 5-10 people.

The brand channels also worked well. They immediately created a thematic selection of banners and assets from the game on other platforms. Then, there were transitions to the landing page. This is a unique creative approach that stands out among others.

Playtests

There was a case for one of our clients where we conducted playtests with a group of 40 people representing our target audience. We divided them into two groups: those with experience playing Fortnite and those without. We observed how clear it was for them to understand how to download and find the map. We played with them and made some changes to certain features. When we launched the project, in the first week, we received numerous suggestions, and we practically reassembled the mechanics, added microelements, etc. We needed a group that would intentionally break the game to find vulnerabilities.

Other Cases

Zoomers, Alphas, and Millennials devalue money and cashbacks. Creating an experience here and now is important. We are moving towards metaverses. We created a case in Roblox with a rating that shows which maps are at the top, providing an adequate metric of effectiveness. Also, there are points that can be earned and used to purchase digital items.

Work Team

All production and expertise are within the company, with a marketing proposal and everything else, because we are highly interested in this. We are building a team of individuals who want to develop in game design or game development.

Future Trends

Roblox and Fortnite are trying to be transferred to the web, but they load very slowly. The issue is that if I encounter an advertisement with a branded game and it doesn't load quickly, I will close it. Therefore, there are currently technical limitations.

When we entered the market four years ago, there was nothing at all. There were simple bots and text-based quests, and we started to develop these. For the past three years, I have been going to brands and telling them about games on Telegram and the web. I believe that in 3-5 years, this will become a standard practice.

Budget

The average check for a metaverse project varies from $27,000 to $55,000 USD, including promotions, which typically make up half of the project cost. The highest check I have seen is $219,000.

Budgets for promotions on projects in Telegram or on the web, such as mini apps and chatbots, typically range from $11,000 to $16,000.

Multiple Markets Worldwide

Other markets differ significantly from the CIS market. There are a large number of small and medium-sized businesses abroad that have the financial resources to purchase ready-made solutions. We tested the hypothesis: if we create ready-made games, will they be purchased? This already exists abroad. In the CIS market, large brands typically invest in it, and they seek unique solutions.

Metaverses, AR, and VR are actively developing abroad, and native and gaming applications are growing. Their smartphones' average performance is higher, but they face problems with internet availability and speed. Therefore, web projects are at the same level as in CIS.

Interactive projects with messengers are not as popular in other regions compared to the CIS. Only this year, bots appeared on WhatsApp, and they started creating text-based games or bot games.

CIS users are more mobile-oriented, while they still have a strong emphasis on the web. The coolest projects I have seen from them are web tours of museums and some web-based games.