360DigitalInfluence

Last week was chock full of announcements that changed the landscape in the ever-evolving partnership between brands, social networks, and game developers.
A few of the more intriguing story lines were:

Green Giant partnering with Farmville: This campaign is a somewhat ground-breaking, but completely logical, as consumers are now able to earn Farmville Cash when they shop for vegetables in their local grocery store.

Blur connects a traditional console game to Facebook: One could argue that the integration of console games with social networks has been unusually slow up to this point.  However, a new game coming out for the XBOX 360, Playstation 3, and PC will be the first to allow status updates and multimedia content sharing through Facebook Connect.  Similar to television and movies, console games have included product placement since their inception.  With the addition of sharing capabilities across social networks, these partnerships can now reach beyond the living room.

Zynga acquires XPD: Two weeks ago, social gaming giant, Zynga, didn’t have a presence on any Chinese social network and this move now swings the door open for brands looking for global campaign opportunities in the world’s largest market.

ESPN partners with Playdom: Continuing the growing trend of big brands jumping onto the social gaming bandwagon, ESPN announced it partnered with Playdom to develop sports-themed games to be released this Fall.  Traditionally, sports games feature plenty of sponsorship opportunities, so it will be interesting to see how ESPN and Playdom plan to integrate brands in games built for cell phones and social networks.  It’s a little disappointing that their first “sports” game is reportedly very similar to Zynga’s Farmville and unoriginally titled “ESPNUville.”

MySpace launches Games Lab: For better or worse, it’s entertaining to follow what MySpace is doing.  Perpetually trying to catch up to Facebook, their initiatives remind me of “Hail Mary” plays in football: desperate, but in case it works, you can’t look away.  This past week, MySpace kicked off its Games Lab program and invited the first wave of developers to join them in their offices for four to six weeks and spend 20% - 30% of their time working specifically on customizing MySpace for social games.  Hopefully in the coming months, this collaboration will yield innovative user interaction and new opportunities for brands.

Facebook and Zynga sign a 5-year agreement

The biggest news this past week came when Facebook and Zynga finally worked out their differences and signed a 5-year “strategic partnership.”  The initial arguments, which nearly led to a permanent split, covered a variety of topics from viral messaging to developer support; however, the real issue at hand was the newly-introduced Facebook Credits system.

Essentially, Facebook is now requiring all social games and applications to use its own branded currency and taking a 30% cut.  Facebook and Zynga do have a complex relationship (don’t we all?) and there are always two sides to every story.  But when Zynga accounts for 20% of Facebook’s advertising revenue, one has to wonder why Facebook feels the need to also take 30% of Zynga’s estimated $50 million monthly revenue for facilitating a transaction which uses a required currency.

But what does this mean for your brand?

1.    This introduces and solidifies new methods of interaction and analysis for your campaigns.  Buying, selling, and rewarding on Facebook are now standardized into one unit of measurement, Facebook Credits.

2.    Facebook Credits are now more valuable than any virtual currency.  Instead of offering game-specific currency like Farmville Cash, brands can offer Facebook Credits, which can be spent on virtual goods and real-life products across the world’s largest social network.

3.    You may be more inclined to use Facebook Credits in your campaign over other e-commerce companies such as PayPal, Google Checkout, and Kwedit.  Though we’re not at this point yet, Facebook Credits could become the default method of online payment simply due to the enormous size of the social network.

4.    As more and more consumers connect their mobile phone to Facebook, users will be able to carry around another form of currency that can be used anywhere in the world.  Consumers may be able to purchase your brand’s products in physical locations using these special credits. Online and offline interactions are continuing to be ever more intertwined.

Right now, we’re still at a “wait and see” moment with Facebook Credits, but getting Zynga to agree to this is a big step for Facebook in legitimizing its virtual currency and immediately getting millions of members to start using it.  However there are a few questions left to be answered:

With many of the same games also available outside of the Facebook network, how will Facebook Credits play a role?

As privacy issues remain in the mainstream media spotlight, how will Facebook use the data gathered on the millions of transactions happening each day?

And of course, how will Google respond?