Difference between Brands’ and
Charities’ perception on the French
eSport scene
Dissertation submitted in part fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of
[Master of Science (MSc) in Marketing]
at Dublin Business School
Thomas Leforestier
Msc Marketing
2019
2
DECLARATION
Declaration: I, Thomas Leforestier, declare that this research is my original work and that it
has never been presented to any institution or university for the award of Degree or
Diploma. In addition, I have referenced correctly all literature and sources used in this work
and this this work is fully compliant with the Dublin Business School’s academic honesty
policy.
Signed: _____________________________
Date: __04/01/2019___________________
3
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
First, the researcher would express his gratitude to his supervisor, David Kenny for his
advices and for being here as a support during this dissertation. Then, the researcher wants
to thank the Dublin Business School, for the total access to the DBS library and for the
quality of courses which allow to carry out this study. Thus, the researcher would express
acknowledgement to all the survey’s respondents, for their volunteer participation. Including
its own community and the community “Team LanEx” for sharing and publicize his survey
through eSport lovers.
Finally, I wish to express my gratitude to my family, who supports my studies in Ireland and
make this work possible.
4
ABSTRACT
The videogames industry has known an amazing growth over the last years. We have seen
the rise of the competitive gaming since the 1980’s. Supported by the brands, the
development of the eSport is mostly financed by the sponsorship.
Experts on this field think that the eSport will be more important than basketball and ice-
hockey soon; For the brands, it is a financial and marketing opportunity. Indeed, eSport
allows to reach a young generation of people, which are not particularly interested by the
traditional media.
The eSport and the gaming in general are becoming new experiences for the public. These
experiences can take several forms, including some partnerships between gaming and
charities.
Then, the purpose of this study is to highlight the perception of the eSport community
toward the experiences proposed by brands and charities on the competitive gaming scene.
Regarding the lack of academic resources concerning the eSport and the charities, to answer
and understand the degree of perception of the community and the difference between
brands and charities’ perceptions, the research methodology is based on a mono-method
research design composed by a survey. This method aims to provide new and relevant
information concerning the involvement of brands and charities on the eSport scene and the
difference of perception felt by the French eSport community.
The research provides that the community is supporting the investment of brands, and have
a clear preference concerning the type of brand involved. Then, the result show also that
there is a preference for the charities involvement. Thus, the research show to the charitable
organizations that the eSport is a good intermediary and should be more used by charities.
5
LIST OF TABLE AND FIGURES
Figure 1: Types of eSport game (SmartCast, 2018) …………………………………………………………. 15
Figure 2: The eSport ecosystem (Alford, H. 2017) ………………………………………………………….. 19
Figure 3: The pink Mercy Charity campaign skin (Blizzard, 2018)
……………………………………… 31
Figure 4: The research onion (Saunders et al. 2009)
……………………………………………………….. 33
Table 1: Impact of various factors on choice of non-probability sampling technique (Kervin,
1999; Patton, 2002) ……………………………………………………………………………………………………. 40
Figure 5: Constructing question for questionaires. (Foddy, 1994), cited in Saunders et al, 2009,
p 372)
……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….. 42
Figure 7: Gender of the respondents ……………………………………………………………………………. 47
Figure 6: Age of the respondents …………………………………………………………………………………. 47
Figure 8: Number of players in the sample ……………………………………………………………………. 47
Figure 9: Interest for eSport ………………………………………………………………………………………… 48
Figure 10: Game interest …………………………………………………………………………………………….. 49
Figure 11: Other games interest
…………………………………………………………………………………… 50
Figure 12: Start following eSport
………………………………………………………………………………….. 51
Table 2 : Proportion of recent and older viewers in the sample
……………………………………….. 51
Figure 13: Interest for eSport by gender ……………………………………………………………………….. 52
Figure 14: Regularity in watching eSport ………………………………………………………………………. 53
Table 3: Proportion of occasional and regular viewers in the sample ……………………………….. 53
Figure 15: Interest in eSport for regular viewers ……………………………………………………………. 54
Figure 16: Interest in eSport for occasional viewers ……………………………………………………….. 54
Figure 17: Attendance to an eSport event …………………………………………………………………….. 55
Figure 18: Brands’ perception evolution ……………………………………………………………………….. 56
Figure 19: Brands’ perception evolution for recent viewers…………………………………………….. 56
Figure 20: Brands’ perception evolution for older viewers………………………………………………. 57
Figure 21: Brands’ perception evolution for occasional viewers ………………………………………. 58
Figure 22: Brands’ perception evolution for regular viewers …………………………………………… 58
Figure 24: Support toward brand involvement for regular viewers ………………………………….. 59
Figure 25: Support toward brand involvement for occasional viewers ……………………………… 59
Figure 26: Support toward brand involvement for recent viewers …………………………………… 60
Figure 27: Support toward brand involvement for older viewers …………………………………….. 60
Figure 28: Support toward non-endemic brands involvement …………………………………………. 62
Figure 29: Support toward non-endemic brands involvement for recent and older viewers .. 63
6
Figure 30: Most appropriated brands …………………………………………………………………………… 64
Figure 31: Least appropriated brands …………………………………………………………………………… 65
Figure 32: Donation to a charity
…………………………………………………………………………………… 66
Table 4: Proportion of occasional and regular viewers in the sample updated ………………….. 66
Table 5: Proportion of recent and older viewers in the sample updated …………………………… 66
Figure 33: Support the Charities’ involvement ………………………………………………………………. 67
Figure 34: Regular viewers supporting the charities’ involvement
……………………………………. 67
Figure 35: Occasional viewers supporting the charities’ involvement
……………………………….. 67
Figure 36: Perception of gaming as a good intermediary for charities ………………………………. 69
Figure 37: Perception of recent and older viewers considering gaming as a good intermediary
for charities……………………………………………………………………………………………………………….. 69
Figure 38: The most appropriated charities …………………………………………………………………… 70
Figure 39: The least appropriated charities …………………………………………………………………… 70
Figure 40: Preference between brands and charities eSport event ………………………………….. 71
Figure 41: Z-Event audience ………………………………………………………………………………………… 72
Figure 42: Z-Event donation ………………………………………………………………………………………… 72
Figure 43: Amount of donation ……………………………………………………………………………………. 73
Figure 44: Kolb’s experimental learning cycle. Source: Kolb, D. A. (1984). Experiential learning:
Experience as the source of learning and development ………………………………………………….. 87
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TABLE OF CONTENT
1
INTRODUCTION ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………. 9
1.1
Background
……………………………………………………………………………………………………………… 9
1.1.1
Brand’s investment overview ……………………………………………………………………………… 9
1.1.2
Charities investments overview ………………………………………………………………………… 10
1.2
Research Question …………………………………………………………………………………………………. 10
1.3
Research objectives ………………………………………………………………………………………………… 11
1.4
Justification
……………………………………………………………………………………………………………. 11
1.4.1
Academic justification ……………………………………………………………………………………… 12
1.4.2
Personal Justification
……………………………………………………………………………………….. 12
1.4.3
Dissertation Roadmap ……………………………………………………………………………………… 13
1.4.4
Scope and limitation to the research …………………………………………………………………. 13
2
LITERATURE REVIEW ……………………………………………………………………………………………………… 14
2.1
Literature Introduction
……………………………………………………………………………………………. 14
2.2
Theme 1: Globalization of eSport
……………………………………………………………………………… 15
2.2.1
ESport story ……………………………………………………………………………………………………. 15
2.2.2
A new experience ……………………………………………………………………………………………. 17
2.2.3
ESport ecosystem ……………………………………………………………………………………………. 19
2.3
Theme 2: ESport marketing
……………………………………………………………………………………… 22
2.3.1
Modelling sport marketing ……………………………………………………………………………….. 22
2.3.2
Sponsorship ……………………………………………………………………………………………………. 23
2.3.3
Community brand’s perception…………………………………………………………………………. 25
2.4
Theme 3: ESport charities ……………………………………………………………………………………….. 27
2.4.1
Types of Benefits …………………………………………………………………………………………….. 27
2.4.2
Marketing charities
………………………………………………………………………………………….. 28
2.4.3
Involvement in eSport ……………………………………………………………………………………… 30
2.5
Literature conclusion
………………………………………………………………………………………………. 32
3
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
…………………………………………………………………………………………….. 33
3.1
Methodology introduction ………………………………………………………………………………………. 33
3.2
Research Philosophy……………………………………………………………………………………………….. 34
3.3
Research Approach
…………………………………………………………………………………………………. 36
3.4
Research Strategy
…………………………………………………………………………………………………… 37
3.5
Research choice
……………………………………………………………………………………………………… 37
3.6
Time horizon
………………………………………………………………………………………………………….. 38
3.7
Data collection
……………………………………………………………………………………………………….. 39
3.7.1
Secondary data collection ………………………………………………………………………………… 39
3.7.2
Primary Data Collection
……………………………………………………………………………………. 40
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3.8
Data analysis
………………………………………………………………………………………………………….. 43
3.9
Population and sample
……………………………………………………………………………………………. 44
3.10
Research ethics
………………………………………………………………………………………………………. 45
3.11
Limitation of the methodology…………………………………………………………………………………. 45
4
DATA ANALYSIS……………………………………………………………………………………………………………… 47
4.1
Quantitative findings ………………………………………………………………………………………………. 47
4.1.1
Participants demographics ……………………………………………………………………………….. 47
4.1.2
Relation between participant and videogames …………………………………………………… 49
4.1.3
Relation between eSport communities and involvement of brands ………………………. 56
4.1.4
Relation between eSport community and charity ……………………………………………….. 66
5
DISCUSSION ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….. 74
5.1
The representation of the community ………………………………………………………………………. 74
5.2
Brand’s perception of the community ………………………………………………………………………. 75
5.3
Charity’s perception of the community …………………………………………………………………….. 77
5.4
Differences in community’s perception between brands and charities involvement ………. 79
6
CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS …………………………………………………………………………. 81
6.1
Conclusion …………………………………………………………………………………………………………….. 81
6.2
Recommendations………………………………………………………………………………………………….. 84
6.2.1
Recommendation for brands ……………………………………………………………………………. 84
6.2.2
Recommendations for charities ………………………………………………………………………… 85
6.2.3
Recommendation for further researches
……………………………………………………………. 86
7
SELF-REFLECTION
…………………………………………………………………………………………………………… 87
7.1
Introduction
…………………………………………………………………………………………………………… 87
7.2
Learning style theory ………………………………………………………………………………………………. 87
7.3
Skill improved ………………………………………………………………………………………………………… 89
7.3.1
Adaptation skill ……………………………………………………………………………………………….. 89
7.3.2
Research skill ………………………………………………………………………………………………….. 90
7.3.3
Interpersonal skills…………………………………………………………………………………………… 90
7.3.4
Self-management skill ……………………………………………………………………………………… 91
7.3.5
Marketing and communication skills …………………………………………………………………. 91
7.4
Future application of learning ………………………………………………………………………………….. 92
8
BIBLIOGRAPHY
………………………………………………………………………………………………………………. 93
9
APPENDICES
………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….. 98
9.1
Appendix 1 : Gantt chart …………………………………………………………………………………………. 98
9.2
Appendix 2 : Cost
……………………………………………………………………………………………………. 99
9.3
Appendix 3 : Questionnaire
……………………………………………………………………………………. 100
9
1 INTRODUCTION 1.1
Background
The World Cyber Games (WCG) is a popular international competitive computer gaming
competition that has been running since 2000 and continues to grow in size and popularity
each year (Hutchins, 2008). Since the 1980’s to our days, the eSport as a discipline is
becoming the new cultural star (Meunier, 2017) of the century. Moreover, this industry has
known the best growth of the XX century and probably of the XXI century. (Lebailly, 2015)
Indeed, some professionals (André Fläckel, 2016), of the sector expect that in 2020 eSport
could have more relevance than ice-hockey or basketball. Then, eSport and videogames are
not anymore considered as services, they are proposing some experiences to the public.
Moreover, sponsorship in eSport exist since the 1980’s, even if the partnership’s form was
different, it evolves with time. (Borrowy, 2012). Kotler (2016) call to mind that creating
experience and evoke feeling to the public is one of the principal objectives of a successful
event.
1.1.1
Brand’s investment overview
Hence, brands are more and more interested by the ESport, even brands without direct link
with the sector, we call those types of brands the “non-endemic” brands (Dal Re, Garzon,
Vongehr, 2018). Endemics and non-endemics brands both have seen the growth of the
ESport market (Statista, 2016; Nielsen, 2017) and all the financial opportunities related to it.
Indeed, investment in sponsorship on the ESport scene has known a boom since 2016 with
more than 600 sponsorship contracts (Nielsen, 2017). In fact, eSport is more interesting for
brands comparing to traditional sport because the amount of the investment needed is
anecdotic comparing to a Football or a Basketball event for example (Borrowy, 2012).
However, the gaming audience is one of the most difficult to reach through the traditional
media for brands and the eSport as an intermediary allow that. (Webedia, 2016) In fact, the
eSport community is mostly composed at 86 % by young male people, aged between 16 and
30 years old (Hamari, Sjöblom, 2016). Indeed, the gaming audience represents 1,5 billion
people and the eSport audience of 365 million people according to an IPSO’s survey (2017);
10
and the French eSport audience gathers 7,5 million people (Webedia, 2016). Then, inside the
ESport audience, we have some subsets of groups with different motivations and
behaviours. Mostly divided by the videogames genre they are playing (GlobalWebIndex,
2018). We have a different gaming audience on a Role-playing Game (RPG) than a Sports
game or a First-person shooter (FPS) game (Dal Re et al. 2018).
1.1.2
Charities investments overview
Besides, the eSport communities have the will to change the image of the videogames.
Moreover, companies like Blizzard Entertainment are proposing different types of experience
to their players. The company organize some event and tournament, like a classic videogames
company, but in May 2017, Blizzard Entertainment, and the Overwatch game team
particularly, launch an operation “Pink Mercy”, Mercy is an Overwatch female character
(figure 3). The principle was simple, player had the possibility to buy a skin (character
appearance) reversed to a charity for the breast Cancer (Blizzard entertainment, 2018).
There are different ways to use marketing for a charity (White and Peloza, 2009), eSport is an
option in development. There are many different examples of gamers and videogames
company involved in helping charities. However, there is a lack of information in academic
research concerning the perception of charities involved in ESport and gaming by gamers and
competitive players. 1.2
Research Question
That’s why, facing these new trends of investments, the present dissertation aims to
understand:
“How, or to what extent the perception of the eSport community differ from a brand to a
charity involved on the scene?
To help us to understand the videogames and eSport global market, we will rely on several
relevant academics. Then, we will also see some statistics speaking about the past, the actual
and the future position of the gaming and eSport. Thus, we will observe how brands integrate
videogames and eSport into their strategies and why. Furthermore, we will observe the
behavior of the gaming community toward charity association. Finally, we will ask the
11
communities and professionals of the sector with survey to have a better understanding of
the look the communities have on brands and charity association actually involved in eSport
and their feeling toward these investments.
1.3
Research objectives
This dissertation and the research around it aim to meets the following objectives:
Objective 1: Highlight the perception of the French eSport community toward brands
around eSport and gaming experiences
Objective 2: Highlight the perception of the French eSport community toward charity
association around eSport and gaming experiences
Objective 3: Highlight the difference in French community’s perceptions between brands
and charity association in an eSport context
1.4
Justification
The first objective of this dissertation is to highlight the perception of the French eSport
community toward brands around eSport and gaming experiences. Indeed, some academics
researchers like Dal Re et al (2016) and also some statistics companies (Webedia 2016;
Nielsen, 2017) interest themselves to the brands’ perception of the ESport community toward
brand investment and particularly in terms of sponsorship. However, an update of this report
in 2018 could be a confirmation of analysis leads by the Nielsen company in France. The
researcher wants to disclose how the French community feels this growth and if they are
favorable or not to these involvements of brands. More than that, the researcher sought
which type of brand are the more and the least susceptible, for the French community, to
support the development of the gaming and ESport scenes.
The second objective of this dissertation is to highlight the perception the gaming and eSport
communities have about charity association. Indeed, several actors, more or less famous, of
the gaming scene engaged themselves and their communities into gaming charity experiences
and tends to show how gamers could be philanthropist. The survey leads into this dissertation
12
allows the researcher to highlight if respondents are favorable toward an involvement of
charities on the gaming and ESport scenes.
The third objective of this dissertation is to highlight the difference of communities’
perception between brands and charities into the eSport context. There is a lack of academic
reference in the gaming and ESport coupled to charities. Even if events are taking place, only
few researchers sought to understand the potential philanthropism of the gaming community.
Despites a high number of charity events supported by gaming and videogames companies.
(Blizzard Entertainment, 2018; Z’event, 2018). We can imagine communities could feel a
positive or negative perception of a specific brand involvement. Indeed, this feeling is also
possible toward a specific type charity and maybe all charities cannot involve themselves in
the eSport in a same way. The survey allows to see these differences by analyzing answers of
the respondents. 1.4.1
Academic justification
Several academic authors interested themselves to the evolution of videogames and eSport,
the freshness of this dissertation is based on the implementation of charities campaign in
gaming and eSport over the last years. The lack of academic researches concerning those
involvement by charities in eSport justify a deeper interest for the researcher. Moreover, this
dissertation aims to bring a new regard on the result of the Nielsen company, which is not an
academic source, and to allow the researcher to confirm or infirm their result. We will
highlight how the perception of the community differs from a private company to a charitable
organization on the French eSport scene. To support the present work on this dissertation,
the researcher mostly relies on the thesis of Michael Borrowy (2012). 1.4.2
Personal Justification
Passionate of videogames since the childhood, the researcher supports the development of
the eSport industry for several years. He works in parallel of his studies on a YouTube channel,
which is axis on gaming and very soon on eSport. He also watches often eSport competition
and when he was younger, he was semi-professional as League of Legends player. To him, this
industry will go very far, and it is the time to create things around this market. He also wants
to work in this industry after this year. And have many knowledges about it. That is why he
chose that specific topic.
13 1.4.3
Dissertation Roadmap
The following dissertation is built like that: Chapter two will examine the background in-depth
of the eSport scene, regarding the community’s perception toward involvement of brands and
charities into the discipline. Chapter three aims to build-up a reliable methodology to catch
the degree of perception of the community. Chapter four aims to analyses the results of the
survey and to identify trends into the community’s perception through brands and charitable
organizations. Furthermore, chapter five will be a discussion about the result identify in the
previous part. Thus, recommendations for charities, brands and futures researchers will
compose the chapter six, in addition to the conclusion. Finally, the chapter seven will be a self-
examination of the present work by the researcher. 1.4.4
Scope and limitationto the research
The research is focused on the perception of the French eSport community toward brands and
charities and aims to understand if a differentiation between them exist in the mind of the
people who composed this community. Considering a lack of time and financial resource, the
researcher limits the population to the French people interested by the eSport.
14
2 LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1
LiteratureIntroduction
“Reviewing the literature critically will provide the foundation on which the research is built”
(Saunders et al. 2012), it aims will be to ensure a good understanding of the topic and the
general knowledge important for further research in this theme. It will explore several areas
of the topic and make understandable videogames and eSport for a person who discover it.
After the good conduct of this literature review, the researcher will not reproduce previous
academic works on this topic.
The researcher divided this review into 3 areas: Firstly, the globalization of eSport, in this part
the researcher interest himself mostly to the general acknowledgement of this industry,
including the history of the eSport, its integration into the experience economy and then he
scopes the ecosystem of the eSport scene. Secondly, the researcher interest himself to the
implication of brands into this industry, in fact brands are present on the eSport scene since
the very beginning of this discipline by modeling sport event marketing, by making several
partnerships with different types of brands and the community’s perception toward those
involvements. Thirdly, the researcher interest himself to the charity in general, by analyzing
the two major type of motivation to support a charitable organization, but also by describing
how charities have to market their offer to being competitive and then, by showing several
examples of charities involved in eSport and the result produced by the gaming and eSport
communities.
15 2.2
Theme 1: Globalization of eSport2.2.1
ESport story
Several academics has treated the eSport subject and tried to understand, by different studies,
how this phenomenon has become the new rising cultural star (Meunier, 2017). The first idea
is the model of eSport as we know it today is born in the 90’s in the West, with Doom (1993),
Warcraft (1994), Quake (1996) StarCraft (1998) and the different Counter-Strikes games; and
most of them being still competitive today (Wagner, 2006), like Warcraft with Heroes of The
Storm, Hearthstone or Counter-Strikes: Global Offensive (2012). However, the eSport was
born before that. Indeed, in this thesis, Borrowy (2012) shows several examples of eSport
public contests which had been done in the 1980’s. He proofs the rise of the video games since
the 1980’s and break a global misunderstanding about videogames and the born of
competitive play. Then, in his thesis, he shows how, through the technology, the media and
the sport event marketing model, eSport became popular. Thus, he takes the example of the
first publication of video games’ high scores in Guinness Sport Record and other fanzines or
newspapers in 1985. By the way, those publications help the democratization and the rise of
different eSport competitions since 1985. Furthermore, several eSport games appears over
the past years (Figure 1).
Figure 1: Types of eSport game (SmartCast, 2018)
Even Kennedy (1983) gives us a particular momentum of his eSport life when a sixteen years
old named Ben Gold complete a video games challenge, he was recorded by ABC studio in
16
front of hundreds of people. For Kennedy (1983), this event was not so far from our current
eSport event, even the television was interested by it and diffused it (Kennedy, 1983).
However, the democratization of the discipline comes during the 2000’s, the public gaming
events are multiplicated, we see the apparition of the Championship Gaming Series (CGS). and
some others professional leagues (Borrowy, 2012).
There are several definitions of eSport, for example Lash (2002), cited by Hutchins (2008),
define eSport in 2002 as a sport as media, meaning that eSport is the product of the logic of
media, communication and information flows (Hutchins, 2008). Then, in 2008, Hutchins
propose a definition of the World Cyber Games (WCG) as “a popular international competitive
computer gaming competition that has been running since 2000 and continues to grow in size
and popularity each year”. Thus, in 2017, Wohn and Freeman situate eSport at the intersection
combining recreation, interaction, collaboration, task and competition which happens in a
fictional and virtual environment where a fast decision making, and response rate are
primordial. It is also played by novice players who play for fun and challenge.
We also see big companies involve themselves in eSport. For example, Nintendo in 1990, come
to the US to organize the “Powerfest”, a World Championship gaming tour (Borrowy, 2012).
For this event, Nintendo hosted this competition in 30 cities over 8 months. Giving the
opportunity to the top regional and then top national gamer to face each other (Sheff, 1999,
p191, cited by Borrowy, 2012).
More recently, the eSport begin to be very popular and democratize, Miller says in 2010 than
2011 will be the year of eSport, today we seen we are still into the decade of eSport, because
it’s development never stop since the 2010’s and growing faster and faster every year.
Nevertheless, the eSport industry has a two-speed development. Indeed, while eSport being
forgot in the West during the 1990, the South Korea was already beginning to democratize
videogames as its own sport. Moreover, this development in the East allows the apparition of
official league, official professional players and official sponsors (Borrowy, 2012).
Despites its old reputation of violence catalyzer (Meunier, 2017), videogames and eSport
begin to become very popular in Europe with the apparition of the game League of Legends
(2009). Toffler, in 1970, predicted a new consumer based on the digital industry was on the
horizon. Indeed, the game League of legends is a big change into the video games and eSport
17
stories. This game became one of the widest online multiplayer games and use a massive
eSport scene wider than some traditional sports like Basketball or Baseball. (Agha, 2015). Even
some literatures are attributing the all success of eSport to the game League of Legends
(Bornemark, 2013). However, other games contribute to that rise like StarCraft 2 (1998) or
more recently Overwatch (2016), played by roughly 25 million of players over the World with
a professional league named the Overwatch league (Curley, Nausha, Slocum, Lombardi, 2016).
Those games carried the democratization of the eSport in the World and in Europe
particularly. One thing is remaining, gaming is now considered as a large part of many people’s
lives (Taylor, 2012). Indeed, according to some estimates, it is approximately 71.5 million
people who watched competitive public gaming contests in 2013 (Warr, 2014).
Finally, in 2016, the global market of eSport was valued approximately at 493 million US
Dollars and the perspective for the future are hopeful (Dal Re, Garzon and Vongehr, 2018).
2.2.2
A new experience
Indeed, we are actually in a post-service economy (Toffler,1970) where customisation and
personalization are omnipresent, and this era is called the “experience economy” and which
take foundations on the service economy. In fact, according to some academics, after the
World War II the marketing on consumer goods is placing increasing emphasis on value-added
aspects of commercial experiences (McLuhan (1964). Jin and Borrowy (2013) define the
experience economy as “psychological extras” added on products/services. Moreover, they
highlight the parallel between the experiential perspectives of eSport and the model of the
experience economy proposed by Pine and Gilmore (1998). Toffler (1970) claims the
“revolutionary expansion” of some industries who’s sold to their customer not ordinary
manufactured good or classic service, but “pre-programed experiences”.
He speaks about two types of experience, firstly, the “Simulated environments”, that are
associated with computers, robotics, historical reenactment or museums for example.
Secondly, the “Live environments”, that one can be represented by experiential geographical
hubs and in many ways are functionally like sports, travel or gaming events for example
(Toffler, 1970, pp. 230–231).
18
In this new era, experiences are becoming the newest commodities the market can offer to
customers (O’Dell, 2005). He claims that public gaming events are representing several “of the
more radical ways in which experience have gone from simply. The concept of selling
experience is simple, it is represented by adding an aspect beyond the classic product or
service to help to value commodities in and of themselves. (Borrowy, 2012). In marketing, the
experience economy appeals for the consumer both a rationality and emotions. That is allow
us to highlight the customer retention, the quality of the service or good and the
customization or individualization of good and service (Chang, Yuan, and Hsu, 2010; Coles,
2008, p. 240; Musico, 2009).
With the rise of Internet and online sales, the marketing of experiential commodities has been
accelerated and has quickly evolved in this way, allowing more and more personalization and
customization from the customers (Chang et al, 2010).
To highlight the experiential perspective of eSports, the researcher relies on the work of Jin
and Borrowy (2013) which conceptually make a parallel between the Pine and Gilmore’s
(1998) model of the experience economy and the different action field of the eSport industry.
Experience the game is usually free, there is different business model, for the case of League
of Legends, it is totally free-to-play, the payable part is not compulsory and give no advantage.
For the case of Overwatch, the game has a buying cost and allow to play to the game
definitively, with no additional content or features which has to be paid. And the experiential
marketing starts at this point for these companies (Borrowy, 2012).
For example, Blizzard Entertainment, the company designer of Warcraft, StarCraft, Heroes of
the Storm, Hearthstone and Overwatch, propose a new type of experience to their fan
community. Indeed, the company allow people who can’t attend to the BlizzCon, the Blizzard
annual convention, to purchase on online virtual tickets (Blizzcon, 2018). That’s permit to
those people unable to be at the right place for the event to follow it, to watch the complete
experience, to see the new branded experience and to earn reward into the different games
of Blizzard Entertainment. However, all the content is not payable; indeed, Blizzard
Entertainment allow everyone to watch for free the different eSport contests held during the
event. By this way, online streams are becoming adjuncts to a product or a service, and allow,
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in addition of a free shows on Twitch TV, to gain reward too. This model is called “virtual meet
and greet” (Borrowy, 2012).
2.2.3
ESport ecosystem
In this part, the researcher aims to make the eSport ecosystem understandable for a person,
player or not, who doesn’t know the different stakeholders presents in this industry and how
they interact each other’s.
Figure 2: The eSport ecosystem (Alford, H. 2017)
As we see in a previous part, media are an important part of the eSport ecosystem. Indeed,
this activity has known its success thanks to some media, fanzine or webzine, and this since
the beginning of the public gaming contest in the 1980’s (Borrowy, 2012). Moreover, media
allowed the “starification” process of the professional cyberathlete in this ecosystem, and
Korean people was the first (Jin, 2010).
Another important stakeholder is the diffusion platform, even if some TV channel try to create
content around gaming and eSport (especially in the US and Asia), the best diffusion platforms
for gaming are online. Indeed, in the 2000’s, YouTube became very popular, and more recently
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we saw the born of the streaming live video, with the Twitch TV platform (Borrowy, 2012).
Nowadays Twitch Tv is the leader in term of gaming audience and content shared around
eSport and gaming. For example, Twitch has bought the exclusive diffusion of the two first
years of the Overwatch League for a deal of 90 Million dollars. (Fisher, 2018) Those new online
communication and diffusion channels have drove the growth of the eSport and its
democratization (Curley, Nausha, Slocum, Lombardi, 2016).
Those diffusion platforms, accessing from free and viewers centric allow the development of
the community around eSport competition. In fact, for example, the viewership has more than
doubled between 2000 and 2003, from 3 million to 6,5 (Fong, 2004). Ten years after, in 2013,
this number reach approximately 71,5 million of unique visitor who simply watched the public
contests (Warr 2014).
Teams and professional players are the most visible part of the eSport ecosystem. Their
conditions were not always very clear. Nowadays, with the apparition of the official leagues,
players are bounded by contract to their team. That’s permit a financial security for players
and for teams that is the insurance that their players will stay at least until the end of their
contracts (Borrowy, 2012).
Official leagues are also a stakeholder of the eSport ecosystem, they allow a regularity in
eSport diffusion and become an appointment for every fans of the game played. The first
professional gaming league is founded in June 1997 in Dallas, Texas. This league is a gathering
of individual entrepreneur and interested corporation and has for name the Cyberathlete
Professional League, also called the CPL (Borrowy, 2012). Then that is followed by the creation
of many other leagues like for example the North American Star league or the ING Pro League,
also known as IPL (Borrowy, 2012).
The fan base of eSport is the major actor of the ecosystem, the community and people
involved in video games allowed the development and the rise of the eSport. (Borrowy, 2012;
Taylor, 2012). Furthermore, without the community to support and watched eSport and
gaming contests, the growth of this phenomenon would have been stopped.
Brands are the last but not the least part of the eSport ecosystem. Indeed, the money engaged
by brands in gaming and eSport represent more than 80% of the global eSport revenue (Dal
Re, Garzon and Vongehr, 2018) For example, and according to the Nielsen report (2017),
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between 2016 and today, more than 600 sponsorships contracts have been signed. That’s
allow structure to create their own event, and to propose a cash prize very interesting for
teams and players. Even if we don’t saw them particularly, brands are helping the
development of eSport since the 1980’s (Borrowy, 2012).
In the next part the researcher shows the involvement of brands into the eSport scene and
aims to highlight how the community perceive their contributions for the eSport ecosystem.
22 2.3
Theme 2: ESport marketing2.3.1
Modellingsport marketing
As we see in the previous part, eSport has now its own ecosystem, with a model of official
professional leagues, official teams which compete against each other, composed by
professional players under contract. But how all this ecosystem takes place?
While these transitions began in the U.S. with PC eSport leagues beginning in 1997 (Borrowy,
2012). Basically, eSport take example on professional sporting league, like MLB with MLG, or
the CPL modeled on the tennis league (Borrowy, 2012). Researchers are agreeing to say that
sport marketing was a real inspiration for modeling eSport leagues, teams and players (Jin,
2010; Hutchins, 2008). For promoters, it was easier to adopt an existing model for this new
growing industry. In fact, the sport has served as an example for eSport as successful event
marketing based on entertainment (Borrowy, 2012; Llorens, 2017).
Then, Borrowy (2012) notes that, interestingly, the logo of the “Major League Gaming” as
known as MLG was an adaption for gamers of the “Major League Baseball”, also called the
MLB. Even the different logos of corporation involved into eSport are modeling existing sport
marketing, it is the obvious case for the MLG’s logo. Classic officials’ sports leagues like for
example the NFL, the NBA or the NHL are all North American leagues. While the eSport leagues
are international and allow to teams from all around the World to compete with the others
(Borrowy, 2012).
Featuring stylized and region-specific team names like the “Chicago Chimera,” “Mexico City
Furia,” “Singapore Sword,” and “Dubai Mirage,” the league took an unmistakable cue from
professional sport (Borrowy, 2012). Another good example is the Overwatch league, where
the team names are similar to the professional sport, with team name like “Los Angeles
Valiant”, “Dallas Fuel”, “London Spitfire”; that make us think to the NBA official teams
(Blizzard, 2018).
Moreover, the eSport could be present to the next Olympic games 2024 at Paris (Dal Re et al.
2018), one more time, we can see the way followed by the eSport, in the shadow of traditional
sport. For marketers, it was the best choice to make traditional sport and eSport close in term
of marketing event they can propose to the public. Indeed, for market the eSport industry and
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create event around it, marketers just had to copy, to use to classic and well-known model of
sport event marketing (Borrowy, 2012). 2.3.2
Sponsorship
The sponsorship is one of the features of a good branding (Kotler et al. 2017). For brands and
companies, it is a way to associate their brand name to the industry ecosystem and to reach
the eSport communities (Borrowy, 2012). According to Kotler et al. (2017), there is four
options with the sponsoring tool, companies can launch a national brand with a direct link
with the topic of sponsoring, they can sell to resellers who use private brands, they can market
a licensed brand, and then, they can use the co-branding to join force with another company.
Sponsorship in eSport is not a recent phenomenon, we can see through several example of
brands which are carrying the development of the discipline (Borrowy, 2012). The sponsorship
represents 80% of the revenues generated by the eSport industry, while also being a powerful
tool for companies to manipulate their brand image (Dal Re, Garzon and Vongehr, 2018).
Hence, the proportion of brands involved in this sector tends to increase years-on-years.
Indeed, and according to the Nielsen market intelligence company (2017), between 2016 and
today, more than 600 sponsorships contracts have been signed. Sponsorship in eSport takes
several forms. In fact, we can see brands which choose to be associated with an eSport team
or a specific player, and some others prefers to support the global event or the tournament.
Then, there is also brands which use the broadcasting service to diffuse classic advertisement
and to make their brands perceptible (Borrowy, 2012).
We can classify involved brands in eSport in two distinct categories. Firstly, we have the
“endemic brands”. Endemic brands are brands which are already involve in the gaming and
eSport ecosystem (Dal Re, Garzon and Vongehr, 2018), such as Roccat or LDLC (Borrowy,
2012). These brands are in adequacy with the eSport even before being a sponsor. Secondly,
we have the “non-endemic brands”, which have no direct link with the gaming and eSport
sphere, like Food or beverage brands such as Coca-Cola or an insurance service (Dal Re, Garzon
and Vongehr, 2018).
Despites the preference of the gaming communities toward endemic brands, it seems like
non-endemic brands was already here at the beginning of the eSport. Indeed, an arcade
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gamer, as known as Roy Shildt who had received sponsorship from various companies,
including Nike and Taco Bell (Millar, 1983).
According to the study’s results of Dal Re et al. (2018), it seems like sponsorship has more
impact on consumers when they are able to see a logical connection between the team/event
and the sponsoring brand (Dal Re, Garzon and Vongehr, 2018). Indeed, gamers tend to have a
better recall of brands related to the gaming industry, results show it is even better for brands
clearly engaged with professional teams or players, such as Roccat and LDLC (Dal Re, Garzon
and Vongehr, 2018). And controversy, being the sponsor of an eSport event as a non-endemic
brand is not enough to catch the interest and increase the favors of the eSport community
towards the brand (Dal Re, Garzon and Vongehr, 2018).
The sponsorship is one of the strongest marketing tools today, we can see an increase in the
number of sponsorships, for the traditional sport like eSport. Indeed, this communication tool
is largely more successful than traditional advertising (Ukman, 2015).
Brands, endemic or not, are now trying to create their own experience by including eSport
event to their communication, it is the case for Red Bull, the famous beverage brand, known
to be involved in extreme sport, which has created its own eSport brand tournament. For Red
Bull, it is a way to develop the brand’s culture around video games and eSport (Red Bull Esport,
2018).
Finally, we also have another example of a non-endemic brand which is actually involved in
eSport. Indeed, Toyota has chosen to become the official sponsor of the Overwatch League,
even if the brand has basically no direct link with the gaming and the eSport. (Blizzard, 2018).
Those examples allow us to see the pluralism of the involved brands in eSport, we will see how
the community feels these investments.
25 2.3.3
Community brand’s perception
In fact, Aaker (2003) argues that brand identity is a supporting factor in building relationship
between the brand and consumers. Another author, Štensová (2006, p. 21) characterizes the
brand identity as a “set of associations, ideas in the mind of the consumer and these
associations represent what the brand represents, and they envision some promises of a
producer or trader to the consumers”. It is a way to understand how consumers perceive the
brand in the context of a rational and emotional benefits (Ihnátová, Bečková, 2016).
As we see in a previous part, eSports appeals the young generation, and public gaming
represent a way to reach this specific audience especially fascinates (Hamari and Sjöblom,
2017). Then, communities are today very important for brands, as a matter of fact, “A brand
community as a specialized community of consumers and employees whose identification and
activities focus around the brand” (Kotler, 2016). With the ascension of the Internet uses and
users, companies are more and more interested in collaborating with consumers and create
value around communities and brands (Kotler, 2016).
The perception differs from a person to another. For the same product or object, people and
communities’ members will emerge with different perspectives and perceptions. Indeed, each
target segment has its own prior brand associations and attitudes towards each brand,
experiences or event (Novais and Arcodia, 2013). This perceptual shift can be explained by
three processes: Attention, distortion and retention (Kotler, 2016). The selective attention
summarizes the things which capture our attention, the selection distortion is about the
different interpretation all people have about the same message, thus, the selective retention
is the fact to remember only one good feature of the product or service and to forget the
global product (Kotler, 2016).
Thus, as we see in the previous part, there are different types of brands involved in eSport, as
known as endemic brands and non-endemic brands. The community brand’s perception
differs from one category to another. According to the studies of Dal re et al (2018) and the
report of the Nielsen company (2017), community seems like resistant to non-endemic
brands. May this behavior be unconscious from their part. Because gamer and eSport fans
does not compulsory consume these non-endemic brands or never seen them over the last
years. Inversely, The Nielsen company report (2017) shows community prefer endemic brand.
