The predictions for in-game advertising get higher and higher, but we still don’t think they are high enough. Gaming is on the increase and network consoles are on the increase, as are the number of in-game advertising enabled games. We think the total will be measured in $billions in the next few years, but haven’t had time to do a full report on it yet ourselves.
ABI Research said this week that its estimates have got up to $852 million by 2011, which is the highest estimate that we have seen, rising from today’s levels of around $80 million.
We still don’t think it is high enough, and while we realize that the market has to build an eco-system and gain the confidence of customers that it is a genuinely effective medium, overcoming gamer resistance on the way, we would bet that it will beat those numbers. You only have to multiply the amount of time people spend on gaming consoles and work out how many ad impressions can be delivered in that time, and multiply up by a cost per thousand, and the potential is surely multiple $billions.
‘In many ways, console vendors and game publishers view gaming services as an ever-more attractive ‘channel’ to reach an active demographic,’ says ABI research director Michael Wolf. ‘In the past, static advertising meant that publishers and their ad partners could not create real-time marketing messages. With the incorporation of ad clients directly into game engines ‘ and through connections to ad servers ‘ advertisers will be able to deliver advertising that reaches audiences in-game and through the walled garden game network.’
Still if you are looking for data to back an investment into the area, this one seems as good as any other.