Amazon Meeting Shoppers Where They Are, With Products They Already Want
By Gary Symons
TLL Editor in Chief
Amazon has launched two new technologies, allowing shoppers to buy products directly from video games and TV shows.
In doing so, the online retail giant is creating a vast array of new, direct-to-consumer licensing opportunities … but it may also be threatening other retailers that can’t offer the same on-platform experience.
The first of the two programs is called Amazon Anywhere, in which players can buy physical products from Amazon stores from within the new augmented reality (AR) game Peridot from Niantic, the same company that created Pokémon Go. The second program involves product placements on TV shows offered through Amazon’s Prime Video offering, with the first of its direct retail offerings being launched on the company’s new spy thriller series Citadel.
Let’s tackler the video game option first.
With Amazon Anywhere, players can now discover and by physical products from Amazon stores without ever leaving their game or app.
Whether you’re playing video games or using your favorite mobile app, Amazon is extending the fun within virtual worlds and interactive digital environments with a new immersive shopping experience called Amazon Anywhere.
With Amazon Anywhere, you can now discover and buy physical products from Amazon stores without ever having to leave your game or app. When playing Peridot, for example, you can access physical products within the game as you care for one-of-a-kind creatures and explore the world together.
After linking your Amazon account to Peridot, you can find Peridot-branded products such as T-shirts, hoodies, phone accessories, and throw pillows featuring artwork of magical creatures from the game. Essentially, the program is an enhanced version of the product placement one already sees in films, with the exception that you can now buy these physical products directly. Once inside the ecommerce link, users will see the familiar product details, images, availability, Prime eligibility, price, and estimated delivery date as one would in Amazon stores.
Importantly, the system allows players to just tap the ‘buy’ button and check out using their linked Amazon account without leaving the game. Products will ship to you like any other purchase from Amazon, and you can track and manage orders via the Amazon app. In essence, Amazon has just created the framework to add an Amazon store inside any video game in the world.
“We’re creating a new landscape for shoppable entertainment and digital experiences while continuing to meet our customers where they are, with the products they love,” Amazon said in its launch release. “Most shopping in virtual worlds is currently limited to purchases of virtual currency and in-game digital items, with no easy path to purchase physical products. We want to change that.
With Amazon Anywhere, we’re bringing the convenience and ease of shopping in Amazon stores to Peridot. There’s a sense of excitement in discovering unique and relevant items within the game that you can get delivered right to your door.”
For video game or app developers, the new program adds a potentially lucrative revenue stream, not just from selling merchandise related to the game, but also selling licensed products. Amazon has also created a creator’s page, showing how developers can sign up for the program, so the days of Peridot being the only app with this functionality are very numbered.
Amazon Anywhere is open to developers of virtual worlds (like Decentraland or The Sandbox), video games, and all types of apps. For example, Amazon gives the example of a yoga instruction app selling athletic clothing. Amazon is also making it easy to find products to sell, as developers “can now curate products from the breadth of Amazon’s selection, including a brand’s own merchandise.”
Developers can click on the link to learn more about Amazon’s new immersive shopping experience.
The Citadel Shopping Experience
Amazon’s second tech innovation essentially turns your SmartTV into a shopping cart, and the shows you watch into glorified vehicles for product placement.
While the show has gotten a lukewarm (at best) reception from critics, the one innovation it does have is quite mindboggling in its implications for licensing and ecommerce.
Amazon’s big idea is what are called ‘shoppable ads’. Users who pause a show while watching will now see an option to Shop the Store, which then brings up a QR code that takes them on their mobile device to the show’s retail site on Amazon. Once there, viewers will see a selection of show-related merch, and in the case of Citadel, fashion brands that will allow them to dress like their favorite super spy from the series.
The ads allow Amazon to take advantage of its position as a streaming provider and a retailer all at the same time.
The innovation is actually an offshoot or update of a technology Amazon brought in back in May last year; an advertising tool called Virtual Private Placement, or VPP.
That function stopped short of direct shopping, but did allow for things like billboards, signs, and screens within a show to have different messaging throughout the show’s life on Prime Video.
Obviously, product placement in films and TV series is nothing new, but Amazon’s innovation is actually a bit of a jaw dropper, as it allows advertisers place branded products into TV shows and movies AFTER they have been produced. That’s also important for showrunners and filmmakers because they no longer have to think ahead and put all the elements in place for product placement while they’re still making the show.
The tech was implemented last year in several Amazon Prime Video and Freevee Originals, including “Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan,” the Bosch franchise, “Reacher,” and “Leverage: Redemption.”
Amazon also says VPP had a positive effect on sales, with one consumer products business reporting a 14.7% increase in purchase intent for their campaign after using VPP, and a 6.9% increase in brand favorability.
Unlike most other streamers, Amazon gets to keep 100% of the revenue from shoppable ads, because the ads direct customers to its own retail website. That means users should expect more such ad campaigns on Prime Video shows, and shouldn’t be surprised if the technology spreads more widely to other streaming users.