Effects of in-game advertising on brand awareness in virtual reality game interactions

Sammanfattning: Advertisers keep seeking new ways to target a wider audience while game developers are trying to monetize their game. This study investigates how Virtual Reality (VR) interactions influence user's sense of presence and brand awareness; specifically brand recall and brand recognition. A 2 (familiar/unfamiliar brands) x 2 (high/low game interactions) between subject design user study was created where 40 participants were recruited to participate in a self-made Virtual Reality game built in Unity. The game objective was to walk through a virtual city and locate the stadium while passing by billboards with static advertisements which the users were not informed about. The data have been collected through post and pre-experiment surveys in addition to two memory tests; brand recall and brand recognition. The results show that users that have the option to interact more with the VR environment can have a slight increase in their sense of presence as well as their recognition to both familiar and unfamiliar brands. Virtual reality in-game advertising can make advertisers unlock new audiences who can not target with traditional media while developers can unlock new revenue streams through entire gaming sessions without disrupting the user experience.