In-game - Out-of-game

Brand engagement with Wii

It seems that every day we read about the declining effectiveness of advertising. How viewers skip through the adverts, can switch off to the marketing noise, no longer respond to our messages.

Thus i was highly interested when i read an article in e-consultancy about how brands should be using the Wii to interact with consumers. Brands are increasingly looking at more diverse ways to engage consumers in their products, and the Wii could be a great way to do this!

The Wii, for those who haven’t become addicted to this little white box, is a games console but one that is very different to what we have seen before.Instead of sitting fixated to screen with a confusing 76-buttoned controller, the Wii detects your body movement to control an on-screen character in a variety of scenarios.

The number of games that can be played on the Wii is now huge! And it has taken the country by storm! With such huge popularity and powerful technology, there is great potential for brands. Allowing the user to test products in a virtual world would certainly be a highly engaging experience.

You could do this with hundreds of brands -

Center Parcs could build a virtual experience of its holiday park. You could choose a room, take a dip in the pool, explore the restaurants and entertainment.
Diesel could showcase its new season range. The Wii could measure your dimensions and weight, building a virtual model of yourself onscreen.

Smirnoff could enable users to mix cocktails and play bartender cocktail style

The list could go on! And due to its link to the internet all of these applications could be downloadable! I wonder who will be the first to get their hands on this cool idea!??!