Analyzing Social Media Gamification and Brand Marketing Strategies

This report explores the use of gamification and other social entertainment strategies in social media marketing. It identifies Honda's use of social gaming in Car Town to market its CR-Z model, assessing the value and fit within Honda's overall social media strategy. The report evaluates various branding options within social games, including advertising, product placement, and branded advergames, from the perspective of target audiences. It also investigates alternative forms of social entertainment, such as social art experiences, social storytelling, social television, and social music, hypothesizing their future role in social media marketing. Furthermore, the report addresses FTC guidelines for social media influencers and brand sponsorships, emphasizing the importance of transparency and ethical endorsements. Finally, it reflects on the credibility of influencer endorsements from a customer's perspective, highlighting the potential positive impacts of brands working with social media influencers to leverage trust and influence purchasing trends.

Running head: SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING
Social media marketing
Name of the student
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Question: 1
One of the recent brands that are using the concept of using social media games in their
branding strategy is Honda. This is due to the reason that in the recent time, Honda has branded
their CR-Z in the Car Town social game. It is identified that the banner of Honda CR-Z is
coming up during the game. Moreover, in order to increase the engagement of the users in the
game along with enhancing their brand recall ability, the particular can be bought virtually in the
game. This denotes that the users can virtually drive the car in the game. This is helping Honda
in getting effectively aligned with the preferences of the customers along with relating to their
objectives of playing the social games (Juhola et al., 2013). On the other hand, this gamification
strategy is also providing value for Honda as well due to the reason that with the help of their
involvement in Car Town game, the average of engagement level of the customers in the social
media marketing of Honda is getting significantly increased. The CR-Z brand of hybrid car is
new in the market introduced by Honda and it is also not having gained enough brand exposure
till now. Thus, with the help of the highly engaging social media strategy, Honda is being able to
enhance the branding abilities of this brand among the potential customers.
It should also be noted that this gaming strategy of Honda is getting effectively fit with
their overall social media strategy due to the reason that the major objective of their social media
strategy is to gain high level of engagement from the users. Moreover, they also aim to relate
their products with the certain types of customers. For example, the users playing the game Car
Town are probably car fanatics and having interest in cars (Effing and Spil, 2016). Thus, co-
branding their new car brand with a automobile game is helping Honda is getting the access to
exact type of potential customers for their long term viability. Thus, it can be concluded that as
per their social objective of Honda, the gamification strategy of Honda is helping in increasing

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the engagement level of social media users and getting them exposed to the branding activities of
them.
Question: 2
In initiating the social gaming strategy, there are number of options that can be used by
the entities in getting connected with their target audiences. One of the major options is the basic
promotion through any games. In the current scenario of popular apps and online games, opening
it will expose the customers to wide array of promotions by different brands. This option is the
most basic, cost effective and less penetrated among the target audience due to the reason that
satisfaction level of the customers gets affected with the constant process of promotion through
the games (Kim, Yoo & Kauffman, 2013). However, still this option is being widely used due to
the reason that less cost is involved in the process with fewer complexities. On the other hand,
this can also be concluded that recall value of the customers is also low in this option. This is due
to the reason that huge numbers if promotions are being popping out currently with the current
bands of social games, which is further creating difficulties for the customers in recalling a
particular brand.
Another option of social gamification is the strategic placement of the brand within the
game. This refers to the concept of the using the in-game structures in promoting the particular
brand. For example, in the Car Town game, the branding of Honda CR-Z is being put up in the
virtual roadside banner. Thus, it is enabling Honda to marketing their brands without causing the
inconveniences to the customers as in the above option (Oliveira et al., 2014). On the other hand,
this is also adding value for the customers due to the reason that they can easily relate with the
branding as they are playing an automobile game and branding of original brands are showing

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within. This will also ensure more recall value from the perspective of the customer. This is also
adding to the entertainment value of the customer due to the reason that sense of authenticity will
get increased with the branding of original car brands during the game. The last option is having
social games on the basis of the particular brand of products of services such as Transformers.
Majority of the franchisee movies are having their own game titles for further engagement with
their target audience. For example, the movie of transformers gets released once in every 5 to 10
years but the recall value of this movie is huge and this entirely owes to the popularity of the
game of them (Chen, 2013). Thus, it can be concluded that with the help of this option, the
engagement and entertainment value for the target audience will be maximum. However, the cost
involved in it is also the highest for the brand due to the reason that research and development
process in entirely involved in developing the new game.
Question: 3
With the time, new forms of social engagement are being introduced in the market. Social
game is one of the popular forms but not the only one with other forms is leading in attracting
the target customers. Social art experiences are one such option for engagement of social media
users. For example, Intel processors has initiated their social media activity named “Museum of
Me”, which focused on creating awareness the larger social media users about how the
technology of Intel is changing their lives and the advantages. This is being communicated in the
form of a featured movie (Evan, 2016). Thus, feature film is having added entertainment value to
the users and communicating the advantages of Intel through it actually helping in engaging with
the target audiences. Thus, in the future course of social media strategy, more companies and
brands will come up with the same content in communicating their utility in the market through
highly entertaining content. Another form of social media marketing is social televisions. Twitter

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is one of the most popular social media platforms it is becoming the primary medium of
engaging with target audiences. This is majorly relevant in the case of movie where the
audiences are fast sharing their reviews after the watching the particular movie with other in the
social media. Thus, gaining of positive word of mouth will add more value for the entities and
vice versa. There are number of brands, which are also using the twitter in communicating with
the potential customers such as Tesla. Elon Musk, the CEO and founder of Tesla motors is active
in twitter is he is personally engaging with the social media users about the latest update or any
other news. This is helping him in getting involved with others and creating a positive vibe for
the brand. Recently, online music streaming platforms such as Spotify and Pandora are getting
popular in the market and branding through these mediums is also having limited yet effective
utility (Chen & Haley, 2014). This is due to the reason that branding of the entertainment labels
mainly in these mediums will have more alignment with the taste of the users but the recall value
is temporary due to the high amount of brands being promoted through these mediums.
However, these are potential alternatives to the available existing social media platforms.
Question: 4
There few guidelines being set by FTC in regards to the sponsorships being gained by the
social media influencers. Some of the elements of this guideline are maintaining the prominence
of the disclosure about receiving the sponsors, presenting it in the most suitable and user friendly
manner along disclosing the products specifically which are sponsored over others. Thus, it can
be concluded that the major objective of the FTC guidelines is to ensure the transparency in the
endorsement process of the social media influencers and ensuring that customers are not getting
the biased endorsements (Khamis, Ang & Welling, 2017). It is recommended that the brand
endorser should ensure that even after receiving the sponsorships, they are not communicating

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vague and irrelevant comments about the particular brand. Thus, the audience should not be
misguided in any way. Moreover, it is also important for brand endorsers to ensure that the
particular brand is not hazardous or unethical for anyone involved.
Question: 5
As a customer, I will only believe to the endorsement done by the influencers by
matching it with my real world experiences. This will further get enhanced after getting the idea
that particular content is promoted or sponsored. This is due to the reason that I will have the
perception that getting paid will obviously bound the influencer in communicating positive
elements. In major cases, the implications of the brand in working with the social media
influencers are positive due to the reason that these influencers are having huge penetration
among the target segment and they can determine the purchasing trend of the particular segment.
Due to their extensive presence in the social media, target audiences also relate more with them
and a sense of trustworthiness get created between the two. Thus, working with these social
media influencers is actually helping the brands in leveraging on this trust factor.

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