Drugi jezik na kojem je dostupan ovaj članak: Bosnian
By: Ekrem Dupanović
Over the last couple of days social networks are flooded with millions of posts about the new Pokemon Go mobile game. The number of players has quickly surpassed server capacities, and everyone online, from Wiz Khalifa to the New York City transit system had something to say about the game.
Davor Runje, co-founder of the Zagreb agency Drap is probably one of the most competent people in the region to tell us something practical about the Pokémon Go phenomenon, because Drap on Friday made the activation for the Croatian Postal Bank (HPB). Davor is a particularly interesting interviewee on the topic of digital campaigns, because Drap was among the first who made the Animal Kingdom, a globally award-winning campaign and a pioneering project that with its innovation and results eight years ago eclipsed all other digital campaigns.
Media Marketing: Why has Pokémon GO caused such a frenzy in just a couple of days, and without any big marketing?
Davor Runje: Pokémon GO is a game changer. Such viral spread is unseen before. I’ll try to put it in context of other extremely viral apps in order to illustrate the feel of how much Pokémon GO is something completely new. For example, Facebook spread very rapidly, and it took it 10 months for the first million users, and then conquered the world. This has created the infrastructure for the viral spread that was used by Instagram to gain one million users in just two and a half months. How long it took Pokemon GO to gather one million users we probably won’t find out because it was way too fast. The third day it already had more than 20 million users only in the US, and had become the most popular game of all time, and its explosive growth has only just started. In the next couple of days, it has surpassed the popular dating app Tinder, and then Twitter in terms of active daily users. Facebook is of course still more popular in terms of number of users, but Pokémon GO has surpassed it in terms of average time spent on the app. When we look at these numbers, it’s clear that this is something unprecedented.
There’s usually a deeper truth that hides behind the numbers. I remember in 2000 I was looking at the graph of number of Napster users, and that’s what really convinced me to spend a year there. Today it’s clear how revolutionary Napster’s idea was and how it changed the music industry and our lives. The idea for the Animal Kingdom was created in 2008 after seeing the exponential growth of the Friend for Sale game on Facebook to a million users in a month. It turned out that Facebook is an exceptional platform that has changed the way we communicate, and thus our lives. Over this last week I’ve been watching Pokémon GO, and wondering what kind of future it brings. A winning combination of different technologies has resulted in a massive socializing of people, walking around town and collecting virtual items. Exciting times are ahead of us, that’s for sure.
Media Marketing: The game offers huge marketing opportunities that have been recognized in Croatia. Konzum has opened a Pokestop, Croatian Mountain Rescue Service has made an action with Pokémon, and on Friday DRAP did an activation for Croatian Postal Bank. What exactly did you do?
Davor Runje: From the moment we were convinced we had a good idea, in 2008 it took us nine months to launch the Animal Kingdom, and we were the first on the market, far before everyone else. Pokémon GO came out on Saturday, and already by Friday we already had three activations which took advantage of this opportunity. This just shows how much the world has sped up and how short time window you have to react. DRAP is an innovative agency and we are constantly looking for new ways to help our customers. Already on Saturday, the Pokémon app appeared on our Slack, and a channel for players was immediately opened. On Monday, half an agency was already collecting Pokémon and exchanging information. On Tuesday, we already knew the mechanics of attracting players to Pokéstops and we started the search the map to see if we can use it for any of our clients. It turned out that right in front of the Croatian Postal Bank there is Pokéstop that we could use for an activation. The idea was presented on Thursday, and realized on Friday. It’s absolutely incredible how fast things come out today, especially if we consider that this is a traditionally conservative financial sector.
Media Marketing: HPB has launched the campaign wanting to get closer to the younger users of new online services. How are the results?
Davor Runje: It’s hard to talk about the concrete results of this activation. The aim was to bring HPB closer to the younger population. HPB invests heavily in new technologies and media in order to achieve that. Recently they released a new mobile app, and before that we had a very successful digital campaign that has more than doubled the number of online loan applications. In any case, I think that the bank’s image is changing, and it is becoming more attractive to younger users.
Media Marketing: Which companies stand to benefit the most from this marketing activity, and what would you advise them?
Davor Runje: I believe that Pokémon themselves are not so important in this story. It’s important to monitor what is happening and respond quickly when such an opportunity arises. In this case it was clear that Konzum and HPB follow trends and respond quickly to them. This is extremely important for their image, and we all know how much image means in this business.
Media Marketing: Can we make a Pokestop on the portal for the readers to have fun during the summer?
Davor Runje: You don’t need Pokemon, everyone reads you anyway :)