Page 32 - AdNews May-June 2020
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 Investigation
for games such as Fortnite. Recognising the growth in the local region, Twitch recently appointed Unruly’s Ricky Chanana as its head of sales for Australia and New Zealand after establishing its first in-house sales team. The company also named Sunita Kaur as its first APAC managing director.
Chanana says he’s educating the “steady f low of newcomers” on the “young” esports scene, as more marketers take interest in the space. He says a key oppor- tunity in entering the space is that it allows brands to reach young audiences which have switched off from traditional media, with Twitch research showing that 39% of its audience are unreachable via traditional TV, and 9% don’t watch tradi- tional TV at all.
“Traditional media is very one-sided and with social media and user-generated content at their fingertips, such media is losing its appeal to young audi- ences,” Chanana says.
“Today’s young audiences grew up with social media and the ability to be not only close to media personalities, but control what content they watch and cre- ate themselves. This is why gam- ing appeals so much to this generation.
“On top of that, viewers see the benefit in connecting with like-minded people over content they love and creators see the benefit in real-time interactions around their content. That behaviour persisted before and should continue into the future.”
The biggest advertisers on Twitch are across entertainment, movie houses and gaming clients, but Chanana says there’s recently been a “big spike” across FMCG, electronics, beverages and broad- band. He expects that in a post-lockdown world local brands will tap into the channel to recon- nect with their community.
“As Twitch continues to gain awareness and grow outside of gaming, i.e. in music, food, and sports, we should continue to see increased interest from existing categories who have come on board,” he says.
“Where brands failed in the
past when going after the gaming audience is to
think that gamers are just one single humongous group.”
Fortress Esports head
of business development Luke McInne
“I also predict once things start to return to normal, we will see an influx of hyper local brands trying to reconnect and communicate with their audience. These brands can be anywhere from local fashion labels to events launches to even restaurants joints.”
Recognising the potential revenue in gaming and esports, other tech giants are also vying for its audience, and they’re making progress. For example, YouTube signed a deal with Activision Blizzard to exclusively stream the esport leagues for its biggest games Call of Duty, Overwatch and Hearthstone. The deal is reportedly worth US$160 million.
Meanwhile, Microsoft’s Mixer last year nabbed leading Twitch streamer and gaming influencer Ninja. While the value of the deal wasn’t revealed by Ninja or Microsoft, a talent management executive who previously worked with Ninja told US media he was paid more than US$20 million to make the switch, leaving behind his 15 million followers on Twitch.
Facebook is the latest entry with its dedicated gaming app Facebook Gaming, which was fast-tracked to capitalise on the spike in streaming during the pandemic.
As with many categories, such as fashion, food, travel, traditional sports and music, influencers are playing an increasing role in gaming and esports advertising.
Click Management, a Sydney-based talent management business which connects brands and gaming influencers, manages three of the top 10 influencers, all three of which are Australians.
   LEFT: Melbourne Esports Open 2019















































































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