Persuasive content : Understanding in-game advertising retention in players and onlookers

The continued interest in advertising and entertainment brings about important questions about the effectiveness of advertising when it is competing for attention with entertainment content. This research provides the results of an efficacy analysis of ingame advertising within the controlled environment of a race game, an environment in which advertising blends in naturally. The experiment was designed to understand the effectiveness of in-game advertising for both players and onlookers. It takes into account both the player’s retention and the onlooker’s attention as an inroads to understanding how in-game advertising works on those who participate in electronic entertainment and those who watch it. The results indicate that such advertising is more effective for onlookers than for players.