Analyzing the Effectiveness of Product Placement in Video Games Using an Experimental Design

Abstract

This case study focuses on explaining how to design an experiment (2 × 2 factorial design) to analyze the effectiveness of product placement in video games. Brand familiarity and brand repetition were used as independent variables while brand recall and brand recognition were used as dependent variables to measure the effectiveness of product placement. Four versions of a real online car racing video game were developed to test the four experimental conditions: 1 = high repetition and familiar brand; 2 = low repetition and familiar brand; 3 = high repetition and unfamiliar brand; and 4 = low repetition and unfamiliar brand. This experiment allowed to find out that consumers recall better familiar than unfamiliar brands placed in a video game. Familiar brands also performed better in a brand recognition measure than unfamiliar brands while no interaction effect of repetition was found for both familiar and unfamiliar brands. This project resulted in the following publication: Martí-Parreño, J., Bermejo-Berros, J., & Aldás-Manzano, J. (2017). Product placement in video games: The effect of brand familiarity and repetition on consumers’ memory. Journal of Interactive Marketing, 38, 55–63. Retrieved from https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1094996816300779

locked icon

Sign in to access this content

Get a 30 day FREE TRIAL

  • Watch videos from a variety of sources bringing classroom topics to life
  • Read modern, diverse business cases
  • Explore hundreds of books and reference titles