Guitar Hero 2

MindShare went beyond the role of the traditional ‘media’ agency, creating a unique promotion on MTV and in the absence of a creative agency, created a number of viral films, from concept to production that engaged consumers and drove traffic to the promotion.

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Destination

Guitar Hero 2, the sequel to the successful Guitar Hero, was launching in November 2006, exclusively on PS2. Sony, in association with Activision, asked MindShare to promote the up coming launch across Europe.

We wanted to do this by generating awareness and excitement among entertainment enthusiasts (16-24 year olds) and convey the irreverent and fun aspect of the game.

Platform

With a limited budget and targeting a highly media literate audience we needed to create huge buzz around this new product launch that went beyond the traditional 30" spot campaign normally associated with the games industry.

Design and Delivery

We knew that guitars and guitar bands had become in vogue again. This type of audience love entertainment and irreverent humour as well as staying in constant contact with their friends.

We developed a promotion with MTV across Europe where people had the chance to win a trip to the Gibson studios to win a signed Gibson Guitar from Gene Simmons (of KISS fame).

To maximise the reach of the campaign beyond MTV's reach, we created 5 viral films of varying length (20"- 2mins). These films were uploaded to a number of free user generated sites such as youtube and google video, as well as specific gamer PR sites that were placed on a number of blogs and gamer web sites. The viral films where clickable and drove people straight to the competition online.

MindShare created and bought the entire campaign working with production company CCLabs to produce the virals.

Evaluation

  • The campaign delivered 26,620,000 impacts on air ( 10m saw the ad across Europe).
  • 37,722 competition entrants were received within 3 weeks.
  • The viral piece proved to be the most popular destination from the MTV/Guitar Hero 2 micro site.
  • Local MTV regions supported the competition for free by providing additional editorial promotion as well as game reviews.

 

Context

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Sector : Entertainment

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