GameFly and Kellogg turn cereal shoppers into serial game users

While many other retailers are pouring money into paid search advertising this holiday season, GameFly Inc. wants to wake up shoppers every morning with its message by using cereal boxes to market its products.

In its biggest marketing effort to date, GameFly, No. 255 in the Internet Retailer Top 500 Guide to Retail Web Sites, is working with Kellogg Co., offering a 30-day free membership trial by promoting the trial offer on 30 million cereal boxes.

The promotion, which runs from Oct. 1 through Dec. 30, offers customers who purchase boxes of Frosted Flakes, Apple Jack, Corn Pops, Frosted Mini-Wheats and Smorz the chance to clip two box-tops and mail them to GameFly, which will send the customer a redemption code. With the code, the customers can then log onto GameFly.com and activate the free trial.

“Kellogg is one of the most respected brands in the consumer packaged goods industry,” says GameFly senior vice president of business development and content Sean Spector. “The box top placement is a great way to communicate the benefits of our service since kids spend time at the breakfast table each morning.”

GameFly also is using a cereal box marketing campaign to promote holiday sales of the new Sony PlayStation 3 and Nintendo`s Wii platform for the manufacturer and the rental of compatible games on its site.

GameFly isn’t saying how many shoppers have signed up for the trial offer since the promotion began. But the company sees cereal boxes as a good way to capture the attention of young game users. “A banner ad is gone in a second and a TV or radio ad is over in 30 seconds, but we have their attention for four minutes each morning when they are eating their cereal,” says Spector. “We’re an online company, but we like to keep our feet in the physical world as well.”

GameFly has a history of working with various consumer brand manufacturers on promotional programs. In 2005 the company worked on a similar effort with Bic Corp. on a marketing program that inserted about 7 million coupons in boxes containing Bic pens; the coupons were good for a free trial membership.