The old video game advertising model is “broken,” says Ninja Metrics CEO
The video game industry is expected to pass over $100 billion in worldwide value by 2017, and as the industry has grown, so has the advertising market surrounding it. Earlier this year, for example, a few mobile game developers forked out several million dollars for high-profile Super Bowl ads. But it is incredibly difficult for marketers to tell whether or not such ads are successful, and Ninja Metrics Inc co-founder and CEO Dmitri Williams says this demonstrates an ongoing problem with the way game creators approach advertising.
“It’s important to understand that the way everyone is bidding on ads — including game developers — is broken,” Williams wrote in a blog post on Gamasutra. “There’s a good chance that you’re overbidding on some of your ads, and you don’t even know it; or, on the flipside, are getting a great deal and have no way of showing it in your reports on ad spend ROI.”
“Why aren’t more people using data-driven models?”
According to Williams, the industry is slowly making progress, but it still has not quite caught up with the technology when it comes to analyzing the effectiveness of different forms of advertising.
“So if it’s so straightforward, why aren’t more people using data-driven models?” Williams wrote. “Well, they’re fairly new, and only recently advanced enough to justify the spend.”
Williams also pointed out that publishers are not supportive of ad analytics. “It’s easier for them to make a profit when you don’t really know how much the ad is worth, so you’re blanketing the web or overspending,” Williams wrote.
Of course, as the head of an ad analytics company, Williams has a clear stake in getting more companies to use data metrics to track ad effectiveness. Ninja Metrics’ Katana Social Analytics Engine promises to make ad spending more efficient for game developers by finding the channels most likely bring in valuable users.
In a statement announcing the launch of Ninja Metrics’ True Ad Value feature in March, Williams said, “We operate under the principle that sunlight is the best disinfectant, and there’s no hiding from the truth of data.”
Image credit: Ninja Metrics
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