Study: Branded Virtual Goods Significantly Help Awareness, Purchase Intent

Social media marketing firm appssavvy published a case study claiming that virtual goods campaigns significantly helped increase brand awareness, ad awareness, and purchase intent with users. The new study found that branded virtual goods increased brand awareness by 44.5 percent to 69.8 percent compared to typical mobile ads, boosted ad awareness by 60.1 percent to 74.2 percent, and grew purchase intent by 31.5 percent to 62.8 percent. Appssavvy conducted its study with digital marketing research firm InsightExpress, which surveyed 2,894 participants while examining the effectiveness of an iPhone app campaign that appssavvy conducted for Powermat wireless charging accessories in Booyah's location-based app MyTown. The Powermat campaign included a sweepstakes promotion allowing users to enter to win prizes by physically interacting with Powermat products at stores, as well as branded virtual goods rewards given to MyTown users when they checked in at a Powermat retailers like Best Buy, Target, and Bed Bath and Beyond. Appssavvy points out that the virtual goods marketing outperformed InsightExpress' mobile and online norms, as the campaign saw a nearly 3x lift in purchase intent over mobile internet norms, a 5x lift in aided awareness over mobile video norms, and a 10x lift in ad awareness over online tech norms. "There is a tremendous amount of buzz in the advertising community around virtual goods. Today's research should significantly raise that as the results of delivering branded items proved to drive metrics through the roof," claimed appssavvy co-founder and CEO Chris Cunningham.