Sailing Games. Fun, Money and Sponsorship.

There was a time when the grumpy older generations saw video games as competition to sport. The stereotype of a child out in the fresh air and sunshine versus being engaged with action on a screen was a reworking of an old argument that no doubt was wheeled out when movies were invented or when books were first printed.

Unlike television, where the consumer does just stare at a screen, modern day games – on consoles like Playstation or Xbox, on PCs, the internet and social networks or mobile devices – require the player to engage, solve problems, make budgetry decisions and choices that affect the outcome.

This long term engagement is where advertisers now see an opportunity – and it is an opportunity that sailing sponsors have got a head-start on. Here are some of the topics that were covered during the question and answer part of the Digital session at the World Yacht Racing Forum.

To put the games (as opposed to gaming) industry into perspective, the revenues from the sales of games shot past Hollywood and films years ago and is poised to overtake music. The game industry is estimated at around $24 billion per year.

In 2010, ‘Call of Duty’ topped $650 million in sales in the first five days of sales and has gone on to make $1 billion in revenue. Compare this with the biggest film of the same period – Inception made $293 million box office receipts.

Games will transform how businesses communicate to a growing number of consumers.

Like many marketing opportunties, Red Bull has been on the cutting edge of this trend for years. I remember playing a flying race game on a Commodore 64 computer in the 80′s with Red Bull signage on the hoardings of the race-track, but through their sponsorship of a yacht in the 32nd America’s Cup, the brand is still in front of a large number of engaged sailing fans.

Because unlike a  film which lasts 2-hours or a television show that might make 30 weekly episodes, games can engage players for 1000s of hours.

So sponsors of the 32nd America’s Cup – like Prada and Emirates Airlines and BMW and Alice and Sicilia and 1&1 and UBS can still be recalled by fans 6 years later – some who continue to play the game.

But it is not just console or PC games with incredible gameplay engines and 3D acccelerated graphics that engage. Sailing has shown for many years now that there is a demand for real-time strategic games that appeal to hard-core navigators and first time players alike.

The latest figures for the Volvo Ocean Race game reveal that 105, 496 players had signed up to play, with an average of 14-16,000 online at any one time. On average, players make around four steering actions every day, playing for an average of 93 minutes each day!

These levels of engagement mean that advertising in games can result in favorable metrics across all major advertising criteria. Increases as high as 34% in brand recall, 49% in favorability and 46% in intent to purchase–are all common place results for in-game advertising campaigns over other media channels.

Game players are provided with an enthralling and fun ‘experience’ rather than being outwardly promoted to, and that’s one of In-Game Advertising’s secret weapons. By creating natural linkages between the game play and the advertisement itself, gamers consume and accept the advertising rather than feeling pestered, or intruded upon.

In the Volvo Ocean Race game, the advertising is fairly subtle, with Volvo Group taking up most of the real-estate, rotating ads for aeronautical services, big trucks, marine and cars.