Innovative marketing: gamescom epix

How does gamescom unite the international gaming community? And what role does gamification play in your marketing?

Tim Endres: Every year, gamescom brings the international gaming community and the entire games industry together in a unique way – both on a local level in Cologne and on a global level in a digital format. The in-person event attracts hundreds of thousands of fans, while millions attend online across the world. It also draws in a wide range of players from politics and business. That makes gamescom the world’s biggest event for computer and video games. Koelnmesse and ‘game’, the German Games Industry Association, organize the mega event. Gamification is obviously a key part of gamescom’s marketing and has become a real crowd-puller.

gamescom epix is a gamification campaign. Could you tell us how it came about?

Tim Endres: It all started in 2020 when we were looking to develop a new multi-channel strategy for gamescom. The goal was to engage the community more to boost brand awareness and attachment. The idea was to provide entertaining content on the website to closely link all gamescom channels together and create a seamless experience for fans. The solution: the gamescom epix gamification campaign.

That really does sound epic! How does gamescom epix work?

Tim Endres: “gamescom epix is a role-playing game where gamescom fans accompany gamescom’s imaginary firewall ‘Electric Protective Intelligence’, or EPI for short, on nerdy adventures through the gamescomVerse, solve quests, and prove their gaming know-how. Players can earn experience points, icons, wallpapers, and goodies including discount codes and merchandise. The grand finale then takes place at gamescom, where quests can also be completed on site and prizes can be won.”

What is your takeaway from gamescom epix so far? How is the gamescom community responding to the campaign?

Tim Endres: gamescom epix went live for the first time in a simplified version on August 1, 2021. Back then, the community had to solve 30 quests together to win partner prizes. The scoring was manual and time-consuming, but the gamification approach proved to be a hit: in the first year, gamescom epix had 30,000 registered participants and generated more than a million impressions. A huge success for a new campaign implemented during a gamescom that was being held entirely digitally due to the pandemic.

Without a doubt! A lot has happened since then. How did gamescom epix evolve next?

Tim Endres: gamescom epix made a big leap forward in 2022 and was optimized on a technical level and automated. Users now had a profile and could unlock personalized rewards. Quests became more creative and were unlocked gradually. The enhancements were worth it: there was a significant increase in page impressions and the number of participants. There was a 75% probability that an epix user would return to see if new quests had been added since they last played.

New partnerships further cemented the campaign’s success. For example, McDonald’s recognized the campaign’s potential and commissioned two of its own quests. That laid the foundations for expanding our partnerships in the year to come. Since 2023, gamescom epix has provided up to seven ‘sponsored quest’ placements. Partners including Amazon Gaming, Bandai Namco, and Disney have already utilized the opportunity to tell their stories in their own quests and offer attractive prizes.

Wow, what a success story! As marketers, we’re of course interested in hearing some figures. Do you have any hard facts for us?

Tim Endres: As a gamification approach in online marketing, gamescom epix has not only resulted in users spending more time on the gamescom website, but has also encouraged fans to immerse themselves in the content more. We’ve been able to boost brand awareness and community engagement as planned. At the same time, the gamification strategy offers monetization options for other companies and intrinsically motivates users to organically return to the content. That’s also demonstrated by the main KPIs from the gamification campaign in 2023.

Thank you for the inspiring chat, Tim, and all the best for this year’s campaign. Over to you for the last word!

Tim Endres: Get involved! The next round of gamescom epix starts on August 1.