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This paper aims to explain the effect of flow, game repetition and brand familiarity on players’ brand attitude and purchase intention in the context of mobile advergaming.

Data from 227 participants who played a mobile advergame were analysed. Structural equation modelling with partial least squares was used to test the research model.

The results reveal that the independent variables (i.e. game repetition and brand familiarity) significantly influence the dependent variables explored in this study (i.e. brand attitude and purchase intentions of players). Results also show that brand familiarity influences players’ flow experience, which in turn significantly affects players’ purchase intentions.

The findings of this study are important for advertising practitioners and advergames’ developers as understanding the determinants of mobile advergaming effectiveness is crucial for designing successful advergames that persuade players the most.

This study contributes to the literature in two ways. First, it provides new insights into the effectiveness of mobile advergames, which is an under-researched area. Second, it offers empirical evidence of the effects of game repetition, flow and brand familiarity on mobile advergaming effectiveness.

The purpose of this paper is to explore advergaming to identify how users respond to characters in terms of forming brand trust and purchase intentions. The study shows that users will tend to trust brands when characters are congruent with product type and trust propensity.

In a 2×2×2 factorial design, the character presence/absence condition and product type (high vs low involvement) are between-subject, manipulated and dichotomous variables. Trust propensity is a measured, continuous variable.

Findings indicate that character presence contributes to brand trust, leading to higher purchase intentions. Character presence is more effective for promoting products of low involvement; character absence is more effective for promoting products of high involvement. Moreover, in the low-involvement product condition, consumers who have low-trust propensity are more persuaded by characters. In the high-involvement product condition, consumers who have high or low-trust propensity respond similarly to both character presence and absence.

Although characters potentially affect how gamers react to online gaming, surprisingly few studies have attempted to identify how the characters and their interactions influence consumers’ emotions and behaviors in advergaming contexts. The current study fills the gap by focusing on the effects of characters and the interactions among other influences related to characters. This study makes new theoretical and practical contributions to the literature by showing that brand trust plays a mediating role and demonstrates that game characters can stimulate purchase intentions more persuasively depending on gamers’ trust propensity and involvement in the advertised products. The findings contribute to theory regarding congruency effects of game characters and the theory of brand trust.

Based on flow theory, the purpose of this paper is to explain why the use of mobile advergames can enhance players’ brand perceptions and purchase intentions, as well as the factors that affect players’ flow experience.

Data from 212 participants who played a mobile advergame was analysed. Structural equation modelling with PLS was used to test the research model.

The results reveal that challenge, interactivity, focused attention and telepresence significantly influence the flow experience while playing mobile advergames. Results also show that the greater the flow, the more positive the attitude towards the featured brand and the greater the purchase intention.

The findings of this study are important for advertising practitioners and advergames developers as understanding the key game features that promote flow is crucial to designing engaging mobile advergames that persuade players most.

This study contributes to the literature in two ways. First, it provides new insights into the effectiveness of mobile advergames, which is an under-researched area. Second, it offers a conceptual framework based on flow theory for understanding why the use of mobile advergames can enhance players’ brand perceptions and purchase intentions.

The purpose of this paper is to attempt to answer whether there is a difference between retrieving memory by using recall or false recall of brands in an interactive and imagery-rich environment such as advergaming, and there are differences in memory in the same context if the languages of proficiency are based on the same script (e.g. alphabetic/alphabetic such as Spanish/English) versus cross-script (e.g. logographic/alphabetic, such as Chinese/English).

A series of international experiments addressed memory of brand placements in advergames – via correct and false recall – across groups of bilinguals from China, Mexico and South Korea.

The most salient finding of this study revealed advergame interactivity increased false memory more pronouncedly in the proficient groups (“experts”), supporting the notion of increased false recall as a result of feelings of accountability that experts naturally experience.

The procedures of the international experiments were susceptible to some limitations concerning sampling design and experimental stimuli. Despite its limitations, this study helps to uncover the effect of these elements in short-term brand memory, to guide marketers for an effective use of brand and product placements in advergames.

Analysis of both correct and false recall of bilinguals in imagery-rich environments is of utmost importance. In these environments, memory may originate from experience or from imagination. The study addressed brand memory among diverse Internet audiences by taking into account both correct memory scores as well as false memory scores within the advergaming context.

The purpose of this paper is to understand how healthy eating involvement (HEI) impacts the evaluations of branded food advergames.

This paper invokes the elaboration likelihood model and reactance theory to explain the effects of different levels of brand integration within a food advergame on individuals with different reported levels of HEI. Undergraduate students were assigned (non-random) to play one of three different advergames with varying levels of brand integration. Furthermore, participant’s health involvement was measured and incorporated as a moderating variable on brand and advergame attitudes. Regression analyses were used to analyze the data.

The results showed significant interaction effects between HEI levels and level of brand advergame integration. Individuals with higher levels of HEI showed more negative attitudes toward the brand and game when integration was high. However, lower levels of brand advergame integration resulted in positive effects among lower HEI individuals.

Limitations of this research are that gamer experience was not measured prior to game play. Also, that no control of advergame playing time was conducted. However, a manipulation check was conducted. Future research should examine the impact of healthy advergames on individual’s reactions and information processing.

Editors and creators of advergames must be more aware of the impact that branded items have within a gaming situation. Individuals may not always positively evaluate the brand integrated within a fun online environment. Furthermore, better consumer targeting will likely lead to higher message acceptance based upon individuals levels of self-congruency with that message.

This study provides needed examination of contextual and individual level variables in responses to advergaming content.

Previous work examining the effect of emotional responses (arousal) in the online context has addressed one type of emotional data, relying only on self‐reporting. This paper aims to investigate the effect of arousal on short‐term brand memory in the context of advergaming, comparing both qualitative (observed behaviors and physiological data) and quantitative (self‐reported data) approaches.

Observed behaviors and physiological data were recorded during exposure to brand placements using an electrocardiogram machine. Qualitative results were compared to self‐reported data measured via a post‐exposure paper‐and‐pencil questionnaire.

The results revealed that the impact of physiological measures on memory was the most salient. The most robust finding was the negative effect of physiological measures on recall scores.

As a laboratory procedure, the method is susceptible to some limitations. First, the similarity of the distractors is not tested and possibly the recognition tests may be either more difficult or easier than the recall tests. Second, as with any other physiological measure, EKG recording faces the limitation that some participants do not feel comfortable being connected to electrodes.

The results reinforce the need to include qualitative procedures when dealing with the effect of arousal on memory in the online context, in order to provide guidelines into an effective use of emotional measures and their effect in brand memory.

The study highlights the importance of the use of qualitative research methods to corroborate results from quantitative work when measuring emotional responses.

This study aims to examine how brands can leverage on advergames as an interactive marketing tool to foster prosumer culture and build a sacred brand. Drawing from game theory, this research scrutinizes how advergame format (cooperative vs noncooperative) influences consumers’ perceived brand sacredness by harnessing positive brand relationship quality (BRQ) and intention to prosume. It also examines how reward types moderate the relationship between advergame format and advergamers’ BRQ.

Three different studies were conducted. Study 1 develops a measure to capture advergamers’ intention to prosume. Study 2 uses survey to collect data from brand-controlled gaming community platform. Study 3 is an experiment that uses 2 (game format: cooperative vs noncooperative) × 2 (reward type: hedonic vs utilitarian) between-subject format.

Study 1 provides a reliable and valid measure to capture “intention to prosume.” The results of Study 2 elucidate that (non) cooperative advergame format generates strong cold (hot) BRQ, leading to intention to prosume, which, in turn, drives brand sacredness. The results of Study 3 elucidate that using (utilitarian) hedonic rewards strengthens the impact of (non) cooperative advergame format on (cold) hot BRQ.

This research has examined the roles of cooperative vs noncooperative game design formats and hedonic vs utilitarian reward formats. Future research may focus on other possible advergame design formats and reward types.

This research provides insights to advergame marketers toward designing appropriate hedonic or utilitarian game rewards to strengthen the impact of cooperative vs noncooperative advergame format on brand sacredness through enhancing BRQ and intention to prosume among the target advergamers.

This research applies game theory in the advergaming context to manoeuvre game format and rewards so that a sustainable prosumption culture is built, which has strong beliefs about the sacredness of the brand.

Advergames, or integrated brand messages within digital games, have received considerable attention from researchers and practitioners. Despite increased use of advergames as a brand promotion strategy by a range of well-known brands, limited understanding exists about a number of issues related to the effective use of such games. This paper aims to critically review the literature on advergames by performing a detailed analysis of existing research in this area and propose an organizing framework. Based on this framework, the authors discuss key issues with current understanding and propose important questions for future research.

This literature review follows Webster and Watson’s (2002) concept-driven systematic review methodology elaborating on the key antecedents and consequences identified in advergame studies (what we know: current knowledge), followed by the discussion of key factors that should be investigated as antecedents and consequences (literature gaps).

This paper presents a review and synthesis of advergame studies based on Terlutter and Capella’s (2013) integrated marketing communication framework. It identifies game, individual and social factors and suggests how these factors could affect a consumer’s brand-related cognitive, attitudinal and behavioral responses. The authors further propose an advergame framework that identifies two different “unit of analysis” (antecedents and consequences of game factors and antecedents and consequences of individual and social factors), which can be used by scholars to center their research efforts in a more detailed fashion.

Research questions posed in this literature review indicate that future research in the area of advergames should focus on investigating the effects of various game, individual and social factors on consumers’ cognitive, affective and behavioral responses.

The advergame framework provided here provides firms with a guide to the factors that may affect their consumers’ cognitive, affective and behavioral responses and helps them in developing effective advergames.

The paper provides a comprehensive review of the advergame literature that has not been done before and develops a general advergame framework that can be applied in all contexts and will guide future studies in the area. Overall, the study helps the researchers to identify critical issues and concepts related to advergames and shapes future research in the field.

The purpose of the paper is to examine whether there is any difference in persuasion of brands embedded in the advergame because of the differences in nature of the game (speed), and are there any differences in persuasion in the same context if the brand is prominently placed versus subtly placed and congruent versus incongruent with the game context.

A 2 (nature of advergame: fast or slow) × 2 (brand prominence: prominent or subtle) × 2 (game-product congruence: high or low) between-subject measures design is used; 280 graduate students participated in the study. A 2 × 2 × 2 between-subjects ANOVA is used to test the hypotheses.

The findings support that slow-paced advergames with prominent brand placements result in high ad-persuasion compared to subtle brand placements. On the other hand, fast-paced advergames show no difference in persuasiveness despite the fact that whether it is a subtle placement or prominent placement. Furthermore, results also indicate that slow-paced games with prominent placement in low game-product congruence condition resulted in high ad-persuasion compared to that in high game-product congruence condition.

The process of experimentation used in this study to collect responses were susceptible to some limitations. However, findings of the study are very important for advertising practitioners in terms of game design, implementation and for an effective use of brand and product placements in advergames.

This research contributes to the literature of online advertising, specifically advergaming context by exploring the impact of nature of game and brand prominence on gamers’ ad-persuasion. Also, this study is the first attempt toward understanding the moderating role of game-product congruence on gamers’ ad-persuasion in the context of advergames.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the impact of product involvement and brand prominence on advergamers’ brand recall and brand attitude in an emerging market context. Specifically, this research illustrates the conditions under which brand placements in online games create attention, elaboration and subsequent brand recall and brand attitude by drawing the insights from the limited capacity model of attention and the elaboration likelihood model.

A 2 (product involvement: low or high) × 2 (brand prominence: prominent or subtle) between-subject measures design is used. In total, 280 students participated in the study. A 2×2 between-subjects MANOVA is used to test the hypotheses.

In the context of advergames, for a low-involvement product, a prominent brand placement results in greater brand recall than a subtle brand placement. However, for a high-involvement product, a subtle-placement results in greater brand recall than a prominent brand placement. Further, results reveal that for a low-involvement product, a subtle brand placement results in more favorable brand attitude than a prominent brand placement. For a high-involvement product, a prominent brand placement results in more favorable brand attitude than a subtle brand placement.

The findings and conclusions are very important for advertising experts in terms of advergame designing, execution and for an operational use of brand placements in advergames.

This investigation adds to the online advertising literature, specifically the advergames context by examining and analyzing the real-time roles of advergame-specific factor, such as brand prominence and the gamer-specific factor, such as product involvement in creating gamers’ brand recall and brand attitude from attention and elaboration perspectives in an emerging market context like India.