My Market Research Shows That Your Market Research Sucks

turgy22

Nothing Special
After reading the threads following The Wizard's World and Back Issues, I've been thinking more and more about how Wizards of the Coast should be marketing the Pro Tour and organized Magic in general.

First off, I don't think most people have any problem with the Pro Tour. Some people want to go to the tournaments and that's fine. You do your thing, I'll do mine. But the way it's marketed makes it come across as something that every Magic player should be part of and a lot of the casual players get pissed off over hearing about how great it is. However, the Pro Tour is still obviously something that Wizards should be proud of. It separates Magic from other games and can certainly make it more dynamic. So, naturally, they want to keep it supported and will continue marketing it.

This makes me believe that the entire problem with the PT might not be the event itself, but the way Wizards presents it. It's evident that ideas such as the Pro Player Cards did not go over well with casual players because they were viewed as a self-congratulatory gesture to all the WotC insiders who were once on the PT. Same thing with the so-called Hall of Fame. I think both of these were terrible ideas, but they were both probably marketing ploys to increase interest in the PT.

So my question to all of you is how can Wizards effectively market the Pro Tour without upsetting the larger contingent of purely casual Magic players?

One suggestion I had was that the next time WotC finds themselves with some extra money for marketing, they should include token cards in tournament packs and precons instead of Pro Player Cards. Everyone enjoys getting free token creatures because they're actually useful and therefore wouldn't just throw them away, as is happening with the PPCs. On the backs of the token creatures, they could print a giant advertisement for the Pro Tour. It would actually maintain its visibility since people would hang on to them, thereby making it a more effective advertisement, in addition to giving casual players something they actually want.

Any thoughts of other ideas?
 

Spiderman

Administrator
Staff member
I think that's a good idea. But I think that there's always going to be someone who has a beef with the Pro Tour, whether its the idea of it or how they market it or whatever. I personally didn't have a problem with the Pro Tour cards - like Mark said, it was probably a mistake to "preview" them with the particular card they did with that guy in a goofy pose. If they had a "well respected" name (or more familiar at least to me) like Jon Finkel in a "respectable" pose like simply playing Magic or holding a favorite card, I don't think there would have been any controversy.

Same with the Hall of Fame, although I think it was more due to Mark's vote for whats-his-name than anything else. It's simply a way to recognize those players who have contributed or achieved something great in Magic and that's players basically from the Pro Tour.

I guess what I'm saying is that there's a huge number of casual players. Are they truly being represented by the vocal ones who post their discontent or is that just the "vocal minority"?
 
G

Gizmo

Guest
The Pro Tour is such a small deal these days - just 4 this year?
 
H

HOUTS

Guest
"So my question to all of you is how can Wizards effectively market the Pro Tour without upsetting the larger contingent of purely casual Magic players?"
You asking: "How do you get people who don't care about winning from those who do, those who don't want to play tournament from those who do, and those who have no goals in this game from those who do."

You can't. Nor do you have to.


GG.

-HOUTS-
 
A

Apollo

Guest
I think Pro Player Cards is an absolutely stupid idea. Even when I actually followed the pro tour all the time, read the tournament reports (especially Mssr. Wakefield), and was insanely curious about what tech would dominate each format, I would have thrown away a Jaimie Wakefield card.

Why would anyone other than the player want one, anyway?

I do think the token cards are a fantastic idea. People LOVE the token creatures. I'd go for Unhinged lands, too.
 

Oversoul

The Tentacled One
I think it was bad market research in the sense that it mainly seemed to disgust players and give them something to complain about.

But in the sense of having serious impact on card sales (and isn't that what market research would be geard toward?), it seems too small a deal to matter.
 

turgy22

Nothing Special
I think the mistake was the Pro Player cards themselves, not the way they were introduced. Of course, the vocal majority of people complaining online saw the stupid Antonio De Rosa card and called them out on it. But I play with a lot of kids who have no interest in reading the wizards website or any other website about Magic. When I got back from the Ravnica prerelease, a couple of them asked me about the PPC I had mixed up with the new cards and the consensus from them, without me chiming in, was that they were the stupidest things they’d ever seen. (Although most weren’t playing when Vanguard was introduced.)

I also don’t think the issue is getting people who will never care about organized Magic to care about it. There’s a portion of players who go to organized events, a portion who are aware of organized events and have no interest in them (like myself), and a much larger portion who are completely unaware of organized events. This last group is the group that is being targeted by the marketing. I think Wizards plan was to try to make all of them aware of organized events. That way, the ones who would have an interest in it would start going and the rest could carry on with their lives.

So the issue at hand is execution. And the PPCs were poorly executed. They wanted to make them like baseball or football cards, but Magic is an entirely different entity than professional sports. Kids have heroes in sports because it’s a very public venue that gets a lot of media attention. Sports cards aren’t just marketed to kids playing baseball or football in their backyards or basketball in their driveways. Their marketed to fans, regardless of whether or not they can play.

On the other hand, Magic is something that no one has interest in unless they play. Therefore, I think Wizards should have presented a marketing plan that would entice everyone who plays, not just the people that follow the game closely. Hence my suggestion of token creatures. Every player would appreciate some brand new token art and an easy way to keep track of their token creatures. Since they’re not used in decks, the backs of the tokens can have a giant advertisement for the Pro Tour. It could say, “Play Seriously! Make Millions!” or “Take Your Game to the Next Level!” or any other catchy phrase that would interest kids in organized play. Perhaps a website to learn more about local events. I don’t think they should feature info about players on the Pro Tour. That comes off as saying, “We’re doing this for us.” Token creatures and generic advertisements imply, “We’re doing this for you.” In addition, people wouldn’t be throwing them away, so the ads would actually stay relevant. This is even better than magazine ads, where people are trained to ignore them and eventually throw away the magazines anyway.

Unhinged lands are a neat idea… even more rewarding in a way, but the problem with those is that it doesn’t benefit Wizards. The backs would need to be printed as regular backs since they’d be getting shuffled into decks, meaning the PT ads would have to be printed directly on the front. Maybe they could do funny “real” lands like these:
Island = Pro Tour Hawaii
Swamp = Pro Tour Japan
Mountain = Pro Tour Czech Republic
Forest = Pro Tour Charleston
Plains = Worlds – Paris, France

Like I said, I think the purpose of this marketing is to get people interested in organized play – not to get them to buy more cards. I don’t believe anyone who says they’re buying less cards because they have “issues” with WotC. As long as the game is dynamic and enjoyable, you should keep playing otherwise you’re only hurting yourself.
 
L

Larcen26

Guest
As seems to often be the case, I totally agree...

It was just bad marketing.

I don't think it did anything like what they were planning.

As I was doing some research for my "Wizard's World" article, I was re-reading Randy Buehler's Knee Jerk Poker article. And there was something in that that jumped out at me.

In it there was a part that, in essence, said..."We don't need the players, the Pro Tour is bigger than them!" Or at least that is how I read it, and I will bet I am not alone.

I think that there may have been some injured pride there. It was a few months after that article that the "Pro Player Perks" were announced. I think that these cards, as well as the Hall of Fame and Pro Player's Lounge etc., were possibly an attempt to mend any broken fences from that article.

So were they marketing devices? Sure...bad ones of course. But I definately think that there was a certain amount of "We appreciate you! Look! We think you are stars!" in it.

They just could have done this sort of thing in such a better way.
 
O

orgg

Guest
Well...

I enjoy the Pro Player Cards. I'm missing one for a complete set. I don't know who, though, and I don't want to know.

I'm a weirdo, though. I'll admit that.
 
Top