Consumer-First Advertising: Making a Branded Sidequest
Late last year, eko launched Wizard School Dropout, an original choice-driven series following a wizard struggling to make it in the human world. As Creative Director, I led the team tasked with integrating “Sparks,” eko’s branded video advertising, into the series. For traditional “linear” entertainment this might be simple: just add ad breaks! But for the highly interactive content eko makes, we needed something more personalized — and totally new.
We set out to create a “branded sidequest” that seamlessly nested within the show itself. By expanding Wizard School Dropout’s narrative world with a brand story that tonally matched the original series (right down to the user interface), we believed we could engage audiences more deeply than a standard mid-roll. It turns out, that was an understatement: in the end, the integrated brand experience was engaged with and completed at the same rate as the series itself.
Background
I’ve been a gamer my whole life, and my fascination with nonlinear narratives is a big reason I work at eko. My favorite games have always been those with expansive worlds and empowering player agency, where you can explore stories and challenges on your own terms, opting into (or-out of) content based on your interests. In gamer jargon, we call these optional (but deeply satisfying) experiences “sidequests.” It dawned on me we could adapt this gaming mechanic with eko’s technology, using Wizard School Dropout’s narrative world to integrate brand messaging in a way that, to put it bluntly, didn’t suck.
Goals and Challenges
Our goal for The Sidequests of Gwendolyn Griffin was deceptively simple: make a branded story set in the universe of Wizard School Dropout that audiences would love and engage with while they played the show. But of course, weaving a separate, immersive, and interactive story into an equally-interactive show is easier said than done. We also knew that dynamically guiding players back and forth between the two stories without missing a beat in either — even when players paused the show and returned to it later — was going to be a significant technical hurdle for our developers, both at eko and Blue Cadet. Needless to say, the sidequest was going to be a major departure from traditional advertising.
The magic that brought audiences into Wizard School Dropout needed to be present throughout the series, and not vanish as soon as a brand message appeared. Since our goal was to always put the user experience first, we knew this sidequest had to be produced by the same team who made Wizard School Dropout — EffinFunny Productions. Their expertise ensured the sidequest was seamlessly integrated within Wizard School Dropout, making the branded content feel like a true extension of their series’ narrative world.
Lessons Learned
It doesn’t take a marketing wizard to know ads need to be as engaging and consumer-friendly as possible. This is even more true in an interactive series, where ads that play without you opting-in are contrary to the very spirit of a choice-driven experience.
In a complex process like this, with competing goals and technical obstacles, it’s easy to lose sight of the audience. We had to hold ourselves accountable to making the best possible user experience, even when it seemed to put their needs above the brand client. Staying connected to this north star resulted in a branded experience that viewers engaged with at the same rates as the series itself — an unprecedented outcome we attribute to letting players co-create their sidequest in the same way they played the series itself.
Tips for Marketers
While eko Sparks and sidequests aren’t a death-knell for traditional branded content by any means, these new techniques are only increasing in relevance and impact. The success of interactive shows like Black Mirror: Bandersnatch and the recent finale of Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt demonstrate that consumer appetite for this type of content is real and growing. Although there are as many approaches to advertising as there are contexts, marketers ignore these trends at their peril.
If you’re looking to engage audiences over an extended period of time, in an emotionally meaningful way that yields consumer insights and drives results, consider making an interactive video. Video has the unique ability to combine complex narratives with brand messaging. When done right, interactivity ensures audiences lean in, engage with, and pay quality attention to your brand.
This engagement also means they are much more likely to click through and convert more than any other form of advertising. After personalizing and completing the sidequest, users have the option to shop the specific choices they made. This “purchase” choice moment yielded over 3X the industry average for video linkout conversions, a standard point of excellence for eko’s clickthrough rates.
The Future of Advertising
Everyone in the industry knows our standard metrics of impressions and views are broken, rife with fraud, and provide only a tiny window into consumer behaviors and desires. Anyone who’s ever been jolted out of their favorite show by dissonant brand messaging knows how disruptive ads can be (anyone else still recovering from being laser-focused on a devastating Handmaid’s Tale moment only to get slapped in the face with a bright, happy pregnancy test commercial? 🙋🏻♂). In a way, our strong reactions to tone-deaf or intrusive ads only underscore the power of video to move us to action.
Interactive entertainment transforms viewers into participants. The more contextually-aware your ad is to the consumer’s journey and state of mind, the less it’ll feel like the kind of ad audiences go to extraordinary lengths to avoid, and the better your results will be.
If you define advertising as content that drives consumers towards action, then from a brand marketer’s perspective, “purchase” or “subscribe” are the most valuable choices on the internet. It’s because of our success in driving these lower-funnel consumer actions that I believe the future of e-commerce to be interactive video, and why eko is the best-positioned platform to lead the way in defining that shoppable experience.
In a post-COVID world, the long decline of brick-and-mortar retail has turned into a free fall, and the trend shows no signs of slowing. As more and more brands compete for attention online, interactive video is a unique opportunity to set brands apart while simultaneously transitioning e-commerce away from overwhelming webpages of products to guided video walkthroughs. In other words, interactive video elevates content to be more than just an ad for a product, but a service for users to test out and try selections in a world where in-person shopping is a thing of the past.
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So, what’s next for eko? On the commerce side, you can expect us to continue creating new-to-market, customizable, interactive ads. But we also know that sidequests are just one way to inject our kind of immersive entertainment into the world of advertising. As we continue connecting brands to leaned-in, ready-to-interact audiences, you can be sure of one thing: this is only the beginning of eko reimagining what an “ad” can be.
