BASICS IN THE MARKETING OF VIDEO GAMES – THE NATURE OF THE OFFERING, INTERNAL MARKETING OF PROJECTS, AND A PRODUCT MANAGER’S VIEW OF THE OVERALL PROCESS more

Paper prepared for 2009 NFF Conference, Turku, Finland. Please do not quote without permission of authors. BASICS IN THE MARKETING OF VIDEO GAMES – THE NATURE OF THE OFFERING, INTERNAL MARKETING OF PROJECTS, AND A PRODUCT MANAGER’S VIEW OF THE OVERALL PROCESS Peter Zackariasson, Gothenburg Research Institute, Peter@Zackariasson.com *Timothy L. Wilson, Umeå School of Business, tim.wilson@usbe.umu.se ABSTRACT This paper treats the marketing of video games from initiation to post sale evaluations. It is somewhat conceptual in capturing the nature of video games, but very much field oriented in their development and distribution. Three levels of marketing are treated – the “usual” interaction between marketer and user, the nature of the offering itself, and the internal marketing that is required to get projects initiated. It is thought that this paper, although specialized in its application, is very much within the framework of understanding “normal business” in this sector, which is the theme of this conference. INTRODUCTION The popularity of video games continues (cf. ESA, 2008; Snider, 2008). For a decade, total sales in the industry have rivaled similar figures from Hollywood box office revenues; presently, individual blockbuster introductions such as Grand Theft Auto IV in the first week, estimated $500 MM, now exceed box-office smashes such as SpiderMan 3 ($337 MM) and Pirates of the Caribbean ($309 MM). Beck and Wade (2004, 17) assert that the gamer generation (generation G) is larger than the “baby boomer” segment that has driven the European, Japanese, North American “triad” economy for years. Whereas baby boomers were associated with a time period, generation G is growing with each new generation. Basically, gaming is associated with culture development in this sector. Consequently, it is expected that not only will entertainment preferences be affected in coming years, but such things as personnel practices and management. The topic has also gained academic interest. Perhaps the work by Castronova (2005, 2001) in which he assessed the economy of a virtual world represented a watershed in that regard. Yee’s (2007, 2002, 2001) recent work on why people play games is frequently cited. Bartle (1996), however, preceded both these studies in assessing why, or how, people play games and also reflected on the nature of the environment in which the games take place (Bartle, 2003). Here in Scandinavia one of our conference organizers has shown his early interest in the topic (Dymek and Rehn, 2003). Amazon.com naturally has made the topic one of its interest areas and keeps current with publications (cf. Beck and Wade, 2006; Castronova, 2007; Dibbell, 2006; Meadows, 2008; Rymaszewski, et al, 2008; Taylor, 2005). Further, aspects surrounding games have developed regular reporting in the popular business press (cf. Snider, 2008, 2008b; Wingfield, 2009a, b, 2008 a, b, c, 2006) and the industry has developed its own industrial organization (cf. ESA, 2008). The topic certainly has been good to us. The 1 Paper prepared for 2009 NFF Conference, Turku, Finland. Please do not quote without permission of authors. lead author has partially fulfilled his requirements for both his licentiate degree (Zackariasson, 2003) and PhD degree (Zackariasson, 2007) by studying game development and the processes associated with it, and a number of academic papers have come from these studies (cf. Walfisz et al, 2006; Zackariasson et al, 2006 a, b). Rather interestingly, it has been a conference paper in this series, which has attracted some attention in comparison with the journal articles. This paper resulted from an interview of a project manager in the industry and was used to indicate the role this specialty has played in guiding product development and marketing management. In covering the marketing of games, he discussed three items in the interview – successful game development, promotion of these games, and their distribution (Zackariasson and Wilson, 2006a). Subsequently, it has been re-published twice as a book chapter (Zackariasson and Wilson, 2009, 2006b). This attention has been just a little embarrassing because we know in fact that marketing of games go beyond those items covered in that interview. We appreciate for instance that the nature of the offering is quite important in its acceptance by gamers. Further, it is known that a fair amount of internal marketing is involved in selling or “pitching” the concepts of specific development projects. These items should be included in the broader concept of video game development. The purpose of this paper is thus to incorporate these items into the concept of video game marketing. OBSERVATIONS The “Usual” Interaction between Marketer and User The present role of product management in marketing video games - The video game industry is not old, thus marketing in this industry is pretty young. So much money is required for development and commercialization, however, that marketing is needed and has evolved to the state among larger publishers where product managers are used. Consequently, results of a knowledgeable person interview have been used to indicate the role management plays in guiding product development and market management in the video game industry (Zackariasson and Wilson, 2006a). In a classical sense, the product manager is responsible of seeing that a product is appropriate for the intended market and implementing a program that is suitable for its marketing. Also in a classical sense, he is an influence in that process. That is, the individual had the classic responsibility of project management without the authority to get things done. Put another way, he/she works through people as opposed to having people work for him/her. In the development process in particular that was studied here, it was the project manager who had authority, but the product manager had influence in bringing intermediate feedback from the marketplace – “What we are saying to developers is that we’re not inventing this observation; it is a ‘fact.’ That is why developers today accept what should be changed, what should be added.” On the other hand, he acknowledged that sometimes discussions were required – 2 Paper prepared for 2009 NFF Conference, Turku, Finland. Please do not quote without permission of authors. “Sometimes they (the developers) do not want to hear what marketing has to say, then we have to be convincing. Maybe we are wrong also, so we need to say the consumers were saying this. Is it really a good idea? Then there is a discussion between marketing and the developers.” And of course there are times when a product manager has difficulty in exercising any influence – “Additionally, marketing does not have as much influence over the developer that has had a few good games as they might have over a developer that is making his first game for us.” There were implications, however, that the responsibilities went beyond classical product management – carryover from other industries did not appear strong. He talked about individuals “coming in from food,” where a lot of product management practices have been developed. Instead, he saw a need to be a gamer in order to do an adequate job. That is a comment that we heard in development also. The firm that was featured in an earlier development paper (Zackariasson et al., 2006a) preferentially hired gamers. Evidently, at this point in time, an appreciation for games and gaming is still a major factor in success. One important factor for marketers in this area is the importance of working with the development group in this the product management function. If they are all gamers, then being a gamer would seem to be a definite asset. Game promotion - The respondent mentioned the importance of “buzz” in the marketing of video games. This observation reinforces an observation by Kent (2001, 459-460) on the importance of newsgroups and web communication in the marketing of Doom by id Software in 1993-1994. Essentially, companies face a trilogy of difficulties in marketing these products. First, as the case with many consumer non-durables, companies lack direct contact with their customers and must rely on some sort of mass communication to reach them. Secondly, the games tend to be one time purchases and have relatively short life cycle. Thus, demand must be built before the product is introduced. Third, they are virtual products; there is little tangibility to them. Under these circumstances, the product manager utilized early tests by journalists – hoping possibility of leaks as recorded in the Doom case, but surely appreciating a two-level communication effect – primary to the journalists and secondarily to gamers. The media was seen as a big part of a marketing plan. Depending on the type of game and asset availability, the company went to the press one year before release dates, sometimes two years before. That approach was seen as the only way one could create “buzz.” It also went online to give viewers assets with which to create buzz in their communities. Communities, the fans, were seen as really important in marketing. With (his) most recent success, he had exclusive responsibility of testing fans’ perceptions and opinions. That led to a lot of conversation worldwide because they were truly fond of the game. The company found that fans could be used both as a channel to get messages out, but also as feedback on features. That helped create and keep up a buzz around the game. 3 Paper prepared for 2009 NFF Conference, Turku, Finland. Please do not quote without permission of authors. Distribution - Additionally, the importance of a campaign to retailers was recognized, which is a classic responsibility of a product manager. The respondent called them partners. This recognition established the present dominant role of the retailer in game sales. Essentially, he suggested that retail partners needed to know the company’s objectives in advance, so that a foundation for gaining shelf space was established. “We are trying now to involve them more, for one thing, by informing them of where we are going with each product. There are so many products on the market today that they have to make their choices. If we don’t convince them that we are aiming for an AAA title, for instance, then we are going to have less of a chance of being on their shelves.” In the absence of shelf space, gamers could not purchase product under present distribution practices. In the longer term, this situation could change for publishers. In general, a lot of software is distributed over the web; this trend appears to be developing in the more sophisticated games. In contrast to earlier offerings, the primary distribution of MMOGs has become web oriented. Funcom, for example, says that at this point it is 15% in boxes and 85% online, and rising (Private communication, 2005). The Nature of the Offering Background - For all its success, the industry’s approach to marketing video games still remains pretty basic. Put simply, these offerings have traditionally been conceptualized as products to be offered to customers in basic, one-time sales. In a previous paper it was argued that this might not be the best way to view these transactions at least when it comes to a specific genre, Massive Multiplayer Online Games (Zackariasson and Wilson, 2004); this argument paralleled observations made by both Mulligan and Patrovsky (2003) and Bartle (2003) that the offerings were something more than products – products with significant augmented services on the one hand and an environment on the other. Our suggestion was, with the recent development of games being played over the Internet, these offerings would especially appear to be conceptualized as “pure” services as defined by Shostack’s (1977) classical model of products and services. This argument has support. Not only have video games been categorized as services, but in a metaphorical sense, they have been compared with, for example, tourism (Book, 2003; Zackariasson and Wilson, 2005). This approach leaves us with a rather blunt instrument to envision these transactions. Consequently, we have further reflected upon their nature. Do we really live in an either-or world of goods and services? Clearly Shostack (1977) did not think so; she, in fact, developed the diagram that has become standard in marketing texts, which showed offerings as a combination of physical goods and intangible services. Kotler (2000, 3-6) also leaves room for reflection. In the opening chapter of the millennium issue of his text, 10 entities are listed in which marketing people market – goods, services, experiences, events, persons, places, properties, organizations, information and ideas. Games and Playing Games - As an extension of earlier work, we have looked at the recent version of video games in general and MMOGs in particular, which feature persistent virtual worlds. In general terms, games and playing games have been 4 Paper prepared for 2009 NFF Conference, Turku, Finland. Please do not quote without permission of authors. conceptualized in a few classical studies. According to Huizinga (1950/1938), playing is a fundamental part of human existence; in his terminology, we are the homo ludens. But playing is a process that serves no logic but its own. When playing acquires meaning it stops being pure play, because there is always relevance in the greater scheme of things. Nothing can be a play if it has moral consequences outside of what has been defined as play-space, a.k.a. the “magic circle.” Caillois (2001/1958) argued that there is a multiplicity of kinds of games and thus classified games in four different categories: 1) agôn (competition), 2) alea (chance), 3) mimicry (simulation), and 4) ilinx (vertigo). These categories are all in the domain of play, but they serve different object to be reached within each category. Caillois work is a continuation on what Huizinga argued in the lectures that built the foundations for his Homo Ludens. It is also in discussion as these, what a game is and what does it mean to play them that video games take on some defining superstructure. Various descriptions have been extended to conceptualize games. As a rather new medium it can be understood in a number of different ways, but the pure experience of interacting with a game is harder to theorize. Juul (2003) in a rather clinical approach describes a classical game model as consisting of six features; these features are also working on three different levels: the game itself as rules, the gamer’s relation to the game, and the relation between the activity of gaming and the rest of the world. “A game is 1) a rule-based formal system with 2) variable and quantifiable outcome, where 3) different outcomes are assigned different values, 4) the player exerts effort in order to influence the outcome, 5) the player feels attached to the outcome, and 6) the consequences of the activity are optional and negotiable” (pp 3-4). Games have been discussed as narratives or simulations (cf. Wolf and Perron 2003). Frasca (2003) has further indicated that we have more to learn about games and gaming through applying concepts of simulations, but he also suggests that there is something very personal and experience-based when interacting with video games, “Whoever slowly walked back home after buying a long-awaited video game knows exactly the kind of excitement that I am talking about” (p 234). Finally, gamers themselves of course have expressed their experiences with gaming. Nicholas Yee in ‘the daedalus project’1 gathered an extensive database on MMOG gamers’ response in an online survey. One aspect of this survey was to collect gamers’ motivations for playing MMOG. In an upcoming book section Yee (2006, 12-13) has published some responses: “After many weeks of watching I found myself interested in the interactions between people in the game, it was totally absorbing!!!! The fact that I was able to immerse myself in the game and relate to other people or just listen in to the ‘chatter’ was appealing. [female, 34] I play MMORPGs with my husband as a source of entertainment. Overall it can be a cheaper form of entertainment where you can spend quite a bit of time with a significant other. To play well you end up developing more ways of communicating. [female, 31] 1 http://www.nickyee.com/daedalus/ accessed 5 October 2005. 5 Paper prepared for 2009 NFF Conference, Turku, Finland. Please do not quote without permission of authors. I like the whole progression, advancement thing ... gradually getting better and better as a player, being able to handle situations that previously I wouldn’t have been able to. [male, 48] No one complains about jobs or other meaningless things. It's a great stress reducer. I like that I can be someone else for a couple hours. [female, 28] Currently, I am trying to establish a working corporation within the economic boundaries of the virtual world. Primarily, to learn more about how real world social theories play out in a virtual economy. [male, 30]” Reflections - In their most recent offerings, game developers have come as close as currently possible to creating a dream world for us. “Dream,” however, may not have the proper connotation. It is an environment in which participants speak of not only immersing themselves, but learning, growing, and theorizing (Yee, 2006, 12-13). This development is fascinating when one reflects not only on where we are, but where we might go with the evolving technology. It is a development that also challenges us to think about what is presented in terms of marketing. If we now turn to the situation at hand and the meeting with video game developers, it was argued that they were not developing and selling products, but rather services (Zackariasson and Wilson, 2004). Essentially, the argument was along the lines of “either-or.” These offerings clearly were not products (most everyone agreed to that), so they had to be services. So the discussions went on to reflect on analogies with tourism or entertainment – the development and marketing opportunities that could be envisioned by extension of those concepts to video games. One has to wonder about this classification and therefore one returns to Kotler (2000, 36) and that opening chapter of his text – 10 entities listed in which marketers ply their skills – goods, services, experiences, events, persons, places, properties, organizations, information and ideas. We wonder now if that listing is not prescient. Do we really live in that either-or world of goods and services? In his preface to Christian Grönroos’ (1990, xiii) text on service management and marketing, Professor Kotler related his conversion to the idea that services were indeed different and required their own marketing paradigms – “New concepts are necessary if service marketing is to succeed. … Merely adopting product marketing’s labels does not resolve the question of whether product marketing can be overlaid on service businesses” (Shostack, 1977). In this article that Kotler thought so important, Shostack asserted that service marketers were in urgent need of concepts and priorities that were relevant to their actual experience and needs, and that marketing had failed in evolving to meet that demand. The field has gone from consideration of goods to be marketed, to goods and services. Might we again be a situation where marketing had failed in evolving to meet marketers’ demands? Is the need urgent enough to consider development of concepts and priorities relevant to actual experiences and needs of people involved in the marketing of a third class of offerings as it was when Shostack published her 1977 paper? We wonder therefore if there are not other individuals who have similar 6 Paper prepared for 2009 NFF Conference, Turku, Finland. Please do not quote without permission of authors. demands in marketing their offerings. It certainly would suit our needs much better to discuss the marketing of video games as experiences. That is, might it be time to consider the marketing of goods, services and experiences with separate paradigms? One might reasonably ask a question in response to the goods, services and experiences’ question, must we have a separate paradigm for each of Kotler’s ten offerings to include also events, persons, places, properties, organizations, information and ideas? The response to that question may lay with Shostack’s observations that services were an important portion of the economy, and services were sufficiently different from products to deserve their own marketing approach. One is left with necessary and sufficiency conditions. Each of the offerings undoubtedly has their conditions of sufficiency – they are different or they would not be on the list, but they do not rise to the level of economic necessity – yet. Experiences, on the other hand, do. If one were to examine the service classification of Fisk and Tansuhaj (1985) based on organizations, an argument could be made that one quarter to one half of them are totally experience based, or dominantly so. And so how might these offerings be marketed? In the Shostack treatment of services, their tangible clues were the subject of focus – food and drink differentiation, for instance, were stressed for airlines. Clearly, this approach will not work with experiences; experiences have virtually no tangibility associated with them, which returns us to the problem presently faced by MMOG marketers. At one time, video games had album covers to assist in game marketing, a tangible clue – “better” packaging is regarded as one asset that led to establishing Electronic Arts leadership in the industry (Kent, 2001, 263). In contrast to earlier offerings, however, the primary distribution of MMOGs has become web oriented. Funcom, for example, says that at this point it distributes 15% of its offering in boxes and 85% online, and online sales are rising (Private communication, 2005). So one might go on, how can games in particular and experiences in general be marketed? It seems as if experiences tend to be related to other experiences – either actual, or imagined. Game producers have found two approaches that seem to be useful in marketing virtual products such as MMOGs. The first is they create “buzz” by sending out early versions of their offerings – alpha and beta tests are fairly standard in the industry. Observations and discussions of these games in these forms tend to take place, largely in chat rooms on the web. Secondly, they permit trial in some cases. If the potential customer likes the trial, then he or she can purchase the rest of the game – either from a distributor or, more recently, on-line. We are not sure about the general case. Buzz would always seem to be a useful first approach in marketing. Trial, on the other hand, is not always an easy thing to provide. Perhaps marketers will need to find a way to provide trial as game marketers now do – on the web. Whatever the case, an effective approach could provide the next Shostack type breakthrough in marketing – and we would suspect that it would affect more than video games. Further, we think it likely that a product-service-experience mixture would be found for most offerings, particularly those ones at the upper level of Maslow (1943). 7 Paper prepared for 2009 NFF Conference, Turku, Finland. Please do not quote without permission of authors. Those thoughts, however, must be developed. Before ending here, we would like to comment on two observations concerning the present status of video games. First, is their possible future. Frequently, science fiction precedes reality. If that is the case, there are already examples of literature that has dwelt on the possibility of graphically persistent worlds accessible through the worldwide web. Gibson (1984), in Neuromancer, might have been the first to suggest such a possibility – and then at a time when the existing web was in its infancy. One of the more striking and mindboggling descriptions of such a world, however, is Neil Stephenson’s (1992) Metaverse in his novel Snow Crash in which a digital world co-exists with the physical world. The idea here is this kind of literature many times provides the bases of what creative individuals see themselves developing (Kushner, 2003). They apparently exist now. This quite homogenous group of (almost exclusively) young men do not see themselves producing products or services, but places to go, things to do, and then return home. The second observation that might be made deals with the downside of video games. On the one hand, correlation studies have suggested that playful individuals tend to be creative (Dansky, 1994). If that is the case, we may be looking at a generation of heretofore unseen creativity because of the focus a generation has had on game playing. On the other hand, the violent nature of some games has been recognized and criticized at the national level in US congressional hearings (cf. Kent, 2001, 261-180). Further, some worlds apparently offer significantly differences from every day’s boredom, which provides escapism to the degree of developing gaming addiction. The forum EverQuest widows was started specifically for the purpose of supporting friends and families of those people who were gaming excessively, with adverse consequences to family, work, finances and social life. 2 Project Marketing of Game Developers Background - This topic was covered in a paper written to provide an example of the internal marketing of projects (Zackariasson et al., 2006c). An occasion was captured in which an international publisher of video games had purchased two producers. This situation permitted the publisher to “make” as well as “buy” games. Although a publishing firm may have some idea for a game based on a license it holds, ideas tend to come from development groups through “pitches.” Idea pitching goes on throughout the year for publishers, so order formality is conditional and “pitching” is the norm. Nevertheless, there is some formality in specifying output even with inside producers. With the particular development firm interviewed, there was a contract of sorts that exists with the parent that specifies deliverables. Projects of this type, however, tend to be judged on the basis of output – both in terms of gamer enjoyment and revenue. Thus, deliverables such as demo tapes at a certain time can be met, but the quality of the game may suffer. Consequently, concern of both the parent and developer firm is getting quality under the agreed upon conditions. There thus is some flexibility in this regard, but it does not work to the advantage to either party – both would prefer to have quality games produced within the framework of agreed upon conditions. The forum EverQuest widows was started specifically for the purpose of supporting friends and families to those people that were gaming too much, with consequences on family, work, economy and social life. 2 8 Paper prepared for 2009 NFF Conference, Turku, Finland. Please do not quote without permission of authors. The process – We were told that publishers do not make decisions to commit large amounts of money on few pieces of paper. They would most times want to see a ready, playable product, i.e. a demo, but in this situation, most times the process starts with a project idea presented in a power point presentation (around 30 slides), graphics and “mock-up” screenshots. After a presentation, a decision is made on whether to create a prototype of the idea. After making the prototype (1-6 month), a long-term decision is made on whether to “green light” the project. In the firm in question, a dedicated committee evaluated all proposals and makes these decisions. Further, the publisher made an assessment of ROI for all projects, not the developer. The developer focused on what they were good at, game development, the marketing potentials were judged by the publisher. In many respects, the internal producers were governed by the same protocol as external producers. Of this observation one can be relatively sure because the individual interviewed in this case represented his firm when it previously was an external producer – so same producer, same publisher, two different corporate affiliations. In each instance, producers were required to pitch their ideas, which were evaluated by the publisher’s special committee. Put simply, there was no difference in this aspect of project marketing between internal and external producers – internal producers do not get free grants for game development, they must earn them through a common proposal system. Nor was there any indication given that differences existed when the publishing parent had ideas of their own that they thought might be pursued. External, as well as internal, candidates were given an opportunity to suggest some use of licensed, proprietary materials. Of course there were differences between internal and external producers as they made proposals. At the onset, one might think that internal sources had an advantage because their offerings were modified rebuys for the parent (cf. Robinson et al., 1967). That advantage might be less than one might expect. Kent (2001), in his review of the history of video games, indicates that long-term relationships are rather the norm between producers and publishers and thus modified rebuys are rather common. Unless a producer “screws up,” its offerings tend to be welcomed by publishers – this industry has grown from zero to ~$30 billion (surpassing Hollywood box office) since 1975 and so availability of new material has been a sought after commodity. Instead, any advantage the internal produce has is subtler and the difference is seen primarily in the area of relationships. Internal participants have the edge of sustaining relationships rather continuously. One might recall that Cova and Salle (2000, 671) adapted the conceptualization of “sleeping” relationships to describe time period between projects for the same buyer, which of course works to some disadvantage to external firms. DISCUSSION The purpose of this paper was to incorporate some items into the concept of video game marketing that characterize “business as usual,” in the video game industry and reflect the nature of activities in the sector. Although specialized in its application, it is within the framework of understanding “normal business” in the field of this specialized 9 Paper prepared for 2009 NFF Conference, Turku, Finland. Please do not quote without permission of authors. consumer oriented marketing and thus very much within the framework of materials to be considered in this NFF 2009 conference. To some extent, we are extending previous notions of game development and promotion and might put these notions in some perspective. One of the fundamental ideas of “good marketing,” indeed good business, is the understanding of the value or benefit a consumer is obtaining from a product or service. With regard to video games, a product-service dichotomy appears inadequate to describe these offerings, as well as other offerings of similar characteristics. A preliminary argument has thus been made that these offerings are experiences, and this argument is examined from a Shostack (1977) perspective. If that argument is generalized, then a breakthrough may be a consequence. We think it likely that a product-service-experience mixture would be found for most offerings, particularly those ones at the upper level of Maslow (1943). The observations made on project marketing were also intriguing. Previously, we had studied project management in video game development (cf. Walfitz et al., 2006), and that was rather special. In general, project marketing considerations have not received attention until much more recently. Pinto and Covin (1992) in an early, conceptual article left no doubt as to where they saw the responsibility for marketing projects. They asserted that it is a responsibility that project managers must assume if projects are to be successful. Consequently, they offered a framework to help project managers develop and focus their efforts toward selling their projects. The framework consisted of three components – client analysis, marketing strategy, and evaluation-control of this plan. They suggested that a key requirement for an adequate client analysis is open and ongoing interaction with the client. With regard to marketing tactics, they asserted that “the key to successful marketing is having the right product at the right price at the right place (time) with the right promotion and … the rightness is determined by the customer.” More recently, Cova and Salle in a series of articles have suggested that project organizations need to go beyond customer’s needs to understand customer’s business (cf. Cova and Salle, 2005; Cova and Salle, 2000; Cova et al., 2000). Consequently, marketing is considered to be part of the essential functions of project organizations and summarily, project management (Cova and Salle, 2005). In particular, project marketing is advanced as a long-term, business (not project) orientation. It is seen through the eye of the marketer (not project manager), portfolio (not single project) biased and helps foster comparative, if not competitive, advantage. It has a customer focus that requires management both prior to, and after, goal-oriented project work. The concept has a network appreciation and emphasizes the importance of relationships in the marketing approach. Finally, it is prudent to reflect on the nature of the information presented in this paper. The studies in general represent single interviews in many cases from a single individuals in single firms. It thus is truly exploratory. As Cox (1979, 22) asserted, however, information from single individuals can be quite useful. Nevertheless, we appreciate and distinguish market research from marketing research. The first implies understanding of a situation well enough to implement action, the second implies 10 Paper prepared for 2009 NFF Conference, Turku, Finland. Please do not quote without permission of authors. understanding. We have no doubt that respondents were quite capable of describing their situations and on the basis of past performance were doing a good job. To paraphrase Spender (1987, 76) managers can be relied upon for their observations because they tend to be good communicators, and product managers in particular must be excellent communicators – they have very little else with which to work. The respondents might also be relied upon with respect to industry observations because it is to his advantage to understand the competitive nature of the industry. To generalize from any case study is a stretch, and so we would not go that far. The work is exploratory and interesting; it is not descriptive, although it may provide the framework for description as cases can do (cf. Bonoma, 1985; Green et al., 1988). CONCLUSIONS The academic study of video games has developed some popularity. In this paper, an attempt to add to the successful game development, promotion of these games, and their distribution that struck some as interesting has been pursued. In particular, we feel that some interesting observations have been made on firms who pitch their ideas to publishers who have make or buy opportunities. It is suggested that internal and external sources tend to be handled similarly, although internal groups have the opportunity to develop relationships that external source do not. In general, it is felt that a product-service typology is too restrictive to describe the need fulfillment of games and gaming. 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