Electronic Arts, the popular maker of interactive sports games like Madden NFL and EA Sports FC, wants to participate in a different kind of contest: winning prizes from sports-focused advertisers.
The video game giant has launched EA Advertising. It’s a new platform that hopes to attract advertisers who are increasingly pouring marketing dollars into traditional sports programming.
“The most passionate sports fans are gamers. And when they play games, and when they play our games, it fuels their sports fandom. That builds new fans of sports and really creates this ecosystem,” Alex Dao, EA’s vice president of advertising and sponsorships, said in a recent interview. “So we saw this as a huge opportunity to start bringing more brands that are commonly seen in sports environments back into the game.”
EA’s new offering allows marketers to insert specialized pitches directly into gameplay, whether in the form of signage inside stadiums that serve as contest environments, or through deeper partnerships. For example, both Lowe’s and Visa have recently helped create in-game experiences such as EA Sports FC and EA Sports College Football. PepsiCo’s Mountain Dew is part of DEW University, a fully playable team experience in EA Sports College Football 26.
EA is launching a new effort to garner more interest from Madison Avenue at a time when TV networks are attracting billions of dollars as part of the industry’s annual “upfront” market. During this annual haggling, U.S. media companies try to attract advertising deals related to the next programming cycle.
However, three media buyers say initial budgets are shrinking. To maintain revenue, many of their TV and streaming competitors rely heavily on sports, counting on big games and championship spectacles to bring in revenue as scripted favorites struggle. For example, Disney originally asked for $10 million for a 30-second slot on next year’s Super Bowl telecast, but made several deals for $8 million. Both numbers show that big game inventory is higher than expected.
Games offer “another opportunity for brands to get in front of the most passionate sports fans, but to do it in a way that’s not passive,” Dao said. TV viewers are often “on their phones at the same time,” he says. But EA’s games are “highly interactive entertainment experiences that give brands an opportunity to participate in that interactivity.”
EA hopes the new focus will make the process of embedding ads in games less cumbersome, Dao said. He admits that the long time it took to build the “custom” partnership “made it more difficult than it used to be.” The new interface will allow advertisers to run ads inside and outside of EA’s games while planning for the impact of audience measurement. “Our aim is to make it as frictionless as possible,” the executive added.
