Entertaining online games can be successful marketing tools for e-retailers

Online games can be effective marketing tools for e-retailers but only if they are entertaining enough to appeal to potential customers, Dave Williams, chief marketing officer and general manager of Shockwave.com, tells InternetRetailer.com. Shockwave, an online game network, develops customized games for retailers, including Radio Shack.

“It’s really important that the games be focused first and foremost on good game play,” he says. “These are great branding and marketing vehicles but they’re not like a TV commercial where the entire purpose of it is one big brand message.”

A series of automobile race games developed by Shockwave to market Radio Shack’s ZipZaps model cars succeeded because they started out as a “great, really fun driving game and then we integrated the product within that experience,” Williams says.

Consumers played the ZipZaps games more than 30 million times, according to Shockwave.com, with more than half of them saying they were more likely to buy the model cars after playing the game.