An integrated marketing campaign for Smart Communications, Inc. GameX

• Main Author: Ildefonso, Mary Caroline R.
• Format: text
• Language: English
• Published: Animo Repository 2015
• Online Access: https://animorepository.dlsu.edu.ph/etd_masteral/4894
• Institution: De La Salle University

Smart Communications, Inc. (Smart) had its soft launch last 2013 for GameX and they saw the growing opportunity to be the first telecommunications company to penetrate personal computer (PC) online games or eSports industry. Hence, they officially launched GameX last March 2014 as the first in the industry to introduce the most convenient way to buy game credits through ePins and text message for Smart, Sun and Talk N Text subscribers. The main target market of GameX are their prepaid subscribers who can easily acquire game credits and ePins through their loads which are very much accessible through the loading retailers throughout the country. Besides being widely available to gamers, prepaid load is an affordable way of purchasing game credits as the users can control how much they will reload to enjoy their gaming experience as they can buy ePins for as low as twenty pesos. Thus, GameX was developed to continuously empower the hardcore gamers in the country by providing the first, most convenient and inexpensive way of buying game credits and upgrades with addition of promotional marketing. Since its launch, GameX portal now offers gaming PINs for a vast range of games such as Dota 2, League of Legends, Heroes of Newerth, Mecenary Online, Dragon Nest, Elsworld, Garena, Yulgang2, Drakensang, Blade 9 and recently, Smarts has officially launched their partnership with Disney games as well. Nevertheless, the growth of the subscribers of GameX is evidently growing since its launch two years ago, Smart is still aiming to increase its brand awareness and perceptibility amongst their customer as they are mainly focused on marketing the brand digitally since online gamers are basically, always in the digital platform. In addition to their digital marketing efforts, they only did print advertisements when they campaign the launch of GameX roughly two years ago. Though currently, there are a few branding posters present at selected computer shops and internet cafes but other than that they mostly attract customers through their online promotions and event partnerships with gaming brands such as Garena, Dota and intenet cafes chains like Mineski. Therefore, their visibility to the public particularly to their target market is not that strong and the brand does not have a recall from the consumers. GameXs marketing is minimal and more focused on attracting the gamers through their promotions as they are the only gaming credits and ePins provider that offers freebies and raffles through the digital platform. On the contrary, their budget for their marketing is reasonable considering that they provide promotions such as free load for SMS and calls, game upgrades and even a personal computer package for their customers despite the fact that they only a portion of the sales from the ePins purchase from gaming providers. Therefore, GameX has the need to further strengthen their brand awareness and create more brand recall through more mainstream marketing efforts that will tap their target market. Considering that they are already present online, they can be more proactive on catching their consumers attention by adding more digital advertisements to the websites where their target market are present such as social networking and search engine websites. Moreover, the company can take advantage of the rapid growth of convenience stores in the country that offers mobile phone reloads that their consumers are using to purchase game credits or ePins by promoting the brand through point of purchase collaterals (POPs) that can increase their brand visibility. To further establish their brand recall, the company should leverage on their online promotions that will further attract more subscribers as not all gamers knew that GameX provides more value to their money as they can get freebies, raffle entries and other promotions when they purchase gaming credits from the portal the first and only among their competitors in the industry.