American Gamester: Gamifying the Launch of Jay-Z's "Decoded" - Demetri Detsaridis
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AMERICAN GAMESTER Gamifying the Launch of Jay-Z's Decoded
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Rapper Jay-Z’s recently-released memoir “Decoded” turns reading back into a game for adults with a new campaign sponsored by Bing and headed by New York ad agency Droga5. Not relying just on traditional marketing, pages from the book are printed in secret locations. This epic scavenger hunt takes place as much online as it does in the real world. For its part, Bing launched interactive 3D maps that allows users to search the streets of New York, L.A., New Orleans, Miami, London (all cities mentioned in the book) and more, letting users look for clues. The grand notion is to have players find, “decode” and assemble the book together online. Interactive design experts Area/Code designed the gamified elements of this monumental project. In this in-depth case study of how they went about gamifying a book online and in real-life, Area/Code GM and Executive Producer Demetri Detsaridis discusses this historical marketing campaign.
Transcript of American Gamester: Gamifying the Launch of Jay-Z's "Decoded" - Demetri Detsaridis
AMERICAN GAMESTERGamifying the Launch of Jay-Z's Decoded
BACKGROUND
JAY-Zis Hip-Hop’s biggest star and a $450M one man brand.
$63M in revenues in 2010
alone (recording sales,
tours, apparel, real
estate, nightclubs, and
sports teams)
Multiplatinum recording
artist and 10-time
Grammy Winner
DECODEDis Jay-Z’s memoirs, published by Random House
Expectations set at
record levels, with a
multimillion dollar
advance and a prestige
format release
Decoded would benefit
from a multimillion dollar
campaign aimed at
audience crossover
BACKGROUND
DROGA5is the advertising agency publicizing Decoded
Creators of breakthrough
viral ads like “Stay
Free”, “Bike Hero” and
“The Great Schlep”
The Guardian calls them
“the world’s most
exciting agency”
BACKGROUND
BINGis Microsoft’s “decision engine” and the project’s sponsor
Looking to broaden
awareness, especially in
the crucial 18-24 demo,
and amongst African-
Americans and Hip-Hop
fans, both of whom
consume more search
pages per month than
the average web surfer
BACKGROUND
BUILD A GAME
BACKGROUND
HOW TO DO IT?How to bring together product, audiences, and sponsor?
Nails the “game generation” demographic
Blows up engagement vs. traditional campaigns
The ads become a story and free marketing follows
Games, like Jay-Z, are cool. Cool is infectious.
PRODUCTION
AREA/CODEA game design and development studio founded in 2005
“Area/Code takes advantage of today’s environment of pervasive technologies and
overlapping media to create new kinds of entertainment.
Area/Code projects explore the new ways that games can connect with the real
world in order to produce powerful, engaging experiences.”CONQWEST
PRODUCTION
AREA/CODEMakes games and consults on game design
Clients have included brands as diverse as Nike, Electronic Arts, A&E Networks, the government of the United
Kingdom, Nokia, the Discovery Channel, Disney and many more.
Area/Code had worked with Droga5 before on a project
for Puma. Our approach and methodology were exactly what they were looking for on Jay-Z’s Decoded.
PRODUCTION
GAME DESIGNdrives the process at Area/Code
We start every project by figuring out whether a game
is really the right approach
If it is, we look first at the players – who do we want to
play this game? What kinds of games do they like?
What type of engagement are we trying to produce
in our players? Light, frequent? Deep, compulsive?
These choices have major, lasting consequences
One size does not fit all
PRODUCTION
DECODEDcame with a conceit (and a sponsor) already in place
Droga5 had Bing on board, and they knew that Jay-Z wanted to “give away” the book to his biggest fans
by hiding the pages around the world
But how does Bing work
into the game? And how do we make it relevant to a nationwide userbasethat may never even get close to one of the pages?
PRODUCTION
Our involvement was to last one month. By month’s end, we’d produce a document with a complete “production kit” for Bing
and third-party engineers to build the game in two months.
Our first drafts of the design were too complex, but we focused on solving key
problems before polishing user experience. This is the reverse of how game production often works in the industry.
Decoded is a collaborative scavenger hunt. It’s a puzzle and more “brittle” than our usual
work, but it produces the repetitive, highly-directed engagement that the project needed. There is no one perfect game type for every project – badges would not have worked here.
PRODUCTIONSo, how did we decide to do it?
Bing became the game’s platform.
We placed 160 page icons in a
customized version of Bing Mapson the Decoded site.
Clicking each icon gave a clueand prompted players to searchBing for the answers.
Correct answers brought players toBing Maps Streetside view, wherethe exact locations of real-worldpages were indicated.
The first player to find each page inStreetside got a shout-out on thesite – and so did the first player tofind it in real life (and enter a codeor upload a picture to prove it).
PRODUCTION
Unlike most of our games, Decoded was notcreated with replayability in mind. Players worktoward a goal: unlocking the whole book. Once
met, the game is over. This project requiredspectacle and replayability is the enemy ofspectacle. Whether a game needs to bereplayable determines much of its destiny.
For most players, especially those far from NewYork, where most of the pages were hidden, thefun of the game was in seeing the clever ways
in which we hid the pages.
PRODUCTION
By the time the promotion ended, all 320 pages of the book(placed as 2-page spreads) had been found both online andin the real world. Response was tremendous, and most of thehidden real-world pages were spotted within five minutes of
their virtual counterparts unlocking.
Creating custom content like this is difficult andcostly, but if your goal is to make a big splash(and your game only runs once), it can’t be beat
RECEPTION
HOW DID WE DO?Did the game accomplish its goals?
FORBES10 Most Creative Advertising Ideas
NEW YORK TIMESFeature Article on Decoded
CREATIVITY10 Campaigns Creativity Loved / 2010
ADVERTISING AGE10 Coolest Out-of-Home Ideas / 2010
FAST COMPANY”Inside Decoded” Feature
CREATIVITYBest of 2010: : #1 P/D
IT’S A HIT!
RECEPTION
HOW DID WE DO?Did the game accomplish its goals?
Bing’s most effective marketing program to date
“Intent to Use” is up 20% for young urban males
The buzz and editorial discussion was off the charts
Decoded itself debuted at #3 on the NYT Bestseller List
RECEPTION
HOW DID WE DO?Did the game accomplish its goals?
Regardless of any individual marketing milestones, the ultimate goal of the project was always to use a branded game to chip away at Google’s massive lead in search
By conditioning a group –
any group – of frequent search users to turn to Bing daily, for both text (clues) and geographical (map) searches, Microsoft
definitely achieved one of its goals.
Even ancillary third-party participants, largely paid in-kind, received tremendous value in media coverage, as well as
thousands of in-person visits driven solely by the campaign.
RECEPTION
HOW DID WE DO?Did the game accomplish its goals?
HAPPY PLAYERS
HAPPY
SPONSORS
HAPPY CLIENTS
ANY QUESTIONS?
I t h i n k w e ’ v e g o t a b o u t 8 m i n u t e s .THANK YOUI t h i n k w e ’ v e g o t t i m e f o r o n e m o r e .
CONTACT
DEMETRI DETSARIDISG e n e r a l M a n a g e r a n d E x e c u t i v e P r o d u c e r
d e m e t r i . d e t s a r i d i s @ a r e a c o d e i n c . c o m
f a c e b o o k . c o m / d e t s a r i d i s
@ d e t s a r i d i s
