Manipulative Marketing

Radiance · December 2017

As the title would suggest, I'm here to discuss the Predatory Marketing Practices I've observed and dispel the notion of their usefulness. I'm not even about to continue the debate on Crown Crates, regardless of what side you're on, it has already been WELL established there is a great deal of dissatisfaction surrounding this worsening disaster. You're more than welcome to add to this list but the 2nd most Destructive Technique I'd like to address directly is the use of DeadLine Timer sales that have become abused by their frequency and are designed to Project the Illusion of Exclusivity to blatantly INFLATE the value of MERE PIXELS in order to convince those, who may only Want a particular item, that they Need it and must "BUY NOW" if they don't want to miss out on the opportunity, pushing them to spend money they may not have as opposed to just casually working up to a reasonably priced purchase.

My whole reasoning for writing this post is not to bash Zos but, to call out to better natures by simply stating this...

People want to spend money and are more than willing to do so even without the manipulative marketing techniques,
We don't need to be tricked.

OPEN the Crown Crate ShowCases to Selective Purchase, Leave items in the store long enough for fiscally responsible individuals to determine their purchase is worth the indulgence and
Allow the Multitudes of Variety to remain so everyone is not sporting the exact same Cosmetic, Costume and Mount the second it hits the market.
This is not about crates or anything in specific other than addressing the Regret & Disdain being instilled in Potential Return Customers who are not likely to buy again due to these abusive practices.

If you want people to be happy and continue to buy at their leisure, it's really not that difficult... Just give them what they want.
STOP with all the Smoke & Mirrors, unless the purpose IS TO Alienate your base, it's all completely and utterly unnecessary.
Come to a Mutual Respect in the reality that without Demand, Your supply has no value.
The greatest flaw in Capitalism is the absence of the Renewable Resource Concept. If you squeeze the source for every last drop, the well will inevitably run dry... But, if you handle it with care, it will continue to supply you with ever-lasting nourishment.

Katahdin · December 2017

I agree with all of the above.

Unfortunately they are raking in the money by the truckload. As long as the system keeps working and people keep throwing money at them (or crown crates become illegal), there is no incentive for them to change it.

Arobain · December 2017

GW2 does this same thing, just except over there, there are no lootboxes for bought currency, why not complain over there as well?

AlienatedGoat · December 2017

Arobain wrote: »

GW2 does this same thing, just except over there, there are no lootboxes for bought currency, why not complain over there as well?

I don't play GW2. I play ESO. Why not keep the topic to the game at hand?

ForsakenSin · December 2017

Phage wrote: »

Arobain wrote: »

GW2 does this same thing, just except over there, there are no lootboxes for bought currency, why not complain over there as well?

I don't play GW2. I play ESO. Why not keep the topic to the game at hand?

Stewart1874 · December 2017

I agree.

How many subs does ESO actually have? If 10 million stories is anything to go buy thats a hell of a lot of money just in subs. I don't think its outrageous to ask Zenimax to adopt more ethical practises. No-one is telling them they don't have a right to earn money, the only complaint is the way they are going about things.

If something is going to be on deadline timers it should be 30 days minimum. Enough time for folk to make informed decisions/wait for pay day to roll round so they aren't either putting themselves in a tough spot or missing out because of being skint. Lets not forget previous Mounts have been priced at 4000 crowns which is a lot of money ( $28 for 5,500 so about $21 for a *** mount..).

Tbh, I'm getting to the point where I'm growing very disillusioned with the practises I'm seeing. I enjoy the game but how much content such as outfits and mounts are being held back to be sold to us as microtransactions? In the year ahead, there better damn well be changes of I'm going to have to reconsider - This means nothing unless I actually drop my sub, but if changes do not happen then that will happen.

Then theres the Lootboxes, of which there are enough threads to highlight the community wide disgust towards that practise. So I'll leave it there.

I may be a consumer, but I'm a gamer first. If things do not change I'll cease to be a consumer and play games which are less money hungry and more content heavy.

Katahdin · December 2017

Arobain wrote: »

GW2 does this same thing, just except over there, there are no lootboxes for bought currency, why not complain over there as well?

I used to play GW2. People did complain about the fact that you need to buy keys in their cash shop to unlock the boxes that drop in the game. The keys did drop in game but were very very rare or given with leveling up at certain levels (at least until they stopped it because people were farming keys by rerolling characters The prices for them were a lot cheaper as I recall and the items in the boxes weren't on par with what is available in the crown crates for the most part.

Dragath · December 2017

Stewart1874 wrote: »

I agree.

How many subs does ESO actually have? If 10 million stories is anything to go buy thats a hell of a lot of money just in subs.

10 million stories refers to 10 million accounts over the lifespan of the game.
active accounts are around 1% of that number, subs a lot less.

Radiance · December 2017

Dragath wrote: »

Stewart1874 wrote: »

I agree.

How many subs does ESO actually have? If 10 million stories is anything to go buy thats a hell of a lot of money just in subs.

10 million stories refers to 10 million accounts over the lifespan of the game.
active accounts are around 1% of that number, subs a lot less.

Hate when people try to use MATH as a defense and don't bother to take the time to calculate...
So even by that logic...
10,000,000 x 0.01% =
100,000 x $15.00 Monthly sub =
$1,500,000 x 12 months =
$18,000,000...

That's still $18 Million Dollars in a year... Before Tax... A monthly sub is actually about 16.22 or so
And Not considering the $60 the full 10 million had to pay to even get the chance to play the game and God know how many more on each DLC, Morrowind and the Millions of monthly micro-transactions on Crown store purchases and Crowns themselves. I'd be happy to calculate all that as well but, I think you catch my drift...

AlienatedGoat · December 2017

Dragath wrote: »

Stewart1874 wrote: »

I agree.

How many subs does ESO actually have? If 10 million stories is anything to go buy thats a hell of a lot of money just in subs.

10 million stories refers to 10 million accounts over the lifespan of the game.
active accounts are around 1% of that number, subs a lot less.

Source on that 1% or I'm calling BS. 100,000 is way too low of a number across all 3 platforms.

Dragath · December 2017

ajdawson18ub17_ESO wrote: »

Dragath wrote: »

Stewart1874 wrote: »

I agree.

How many subs does ESO actually have? If 10 million stories is anything to go buy thats a hell of a lot of money just in subs.

10 million stories refers to 10 million accounts over the lifespan of the game.
active accounts are around 1% of that number, subs a lot less.

Hate when people try to use MATH as a defense and don't bother to take the time to calculate...
So even by that logic...
10,000,000 x 0.01% =
100,000 x $15.00 Monthly sub =
$1,500,000 x 12 months =
$18,000,000...

That's still $18 Million Dollars in a year... Before Tax... A monthly sub is actually about 16.22 or so
And Not considering the $60 the full 10 million had to pay to even get the chance to play the game and God know how many more on each DLC, Morrowind and the Millions of monthly micro-transactions on Crown store purchases and Crowns themselves. I'd be happy to calculate all that as well but, I think you catch my drift...

try to read before you reply.
i never said they had 100k subs. i said subs are a lot lower than the number he used.
my comment had NOTHING to do with the way Zenimax does its business. it was aimed to clarify for him what the 10 million stories is about.
sit down and take a breath. you seem upset. accept the fact that it will not change for the better or move on and be happy. coming in the forum and getting riled up by a normal comment makes it quite clear that this game might not be good for you.
IF you really want to get your voice heard, you are at the wrong place.
you'd have to contact the ZeniMax Media Inc.

Radiance · December 2017

"Dragath wrote: »

sit down and take a breath. you seem upset. accept the fact that it will not change for the better or move on and be happy. coming in the forum and getting riled up by a normal comment makes it quite clear that this game might not be good for you.
IF you really want to get your voice heard, you are at the wrong place.

Why do anything by this logic!? Is it forbidden for costumers who spend their leisure time together to have a financial discussion on observation and shared experience?

davey1107 · December 2017

I like to also ask that PEOPLE stop with MANIPULATIVE use of CAPS and BOLD CAPS in their posts for EMPHASIS. If you write a readable post, we don’t need UNNECESSARY grammar guideposts to TELL us how YOU FEEL

Lol

Micro transaction practices will live or due based on customer satisfaction reports. Right now the industry is playing a really dangerous game (ha...pun). One metric used by sales companies is the percent of customers who say they made a bad buy decision. As a guide, Wall Street gets nervous if a company exceeds a 2% regret response for their products. Apple maintains a 0.05% regret ratio. Micro transactions on video games polled last year at a 52% regret ratio. They are absolutely creating customer dissatisfaction.

Stewart1874 · December 2017

Dragath wrote: »

ajdawson18ub17_ESO wrote: »

Dragath wrote: »

Stewart1874 wrote: »

I agree.

How many subs does ESO actually have? If 10 million stories is anything to go buy thats a hell of a lot of money just in subs.

10 million stories refers to 10 million accounts over the lifespan of the game.
active accounts are around 1% of that number, subs a lot less.

Hate when people try to use MATH as a defense and don't bother to take the time to calculate...
So even by that logic...
10,000,000 x 0.01% =
100,000 x $15.00 Monthly sub =
$1,500,000 x 12 months =
$18,000,000...

That's still $18 Million Dollars in a year... Before Tax... A monthly sub is actually about 16.22 or so
And Not considering the $60 the full 10 million had to pay to even get the chance to play the game and God know how many more on each DLC, Morrowind and the Millions of monthly micro-transactions on Crown store purchases and Crowns themselves. I'd be happy to calculate all that as well but, I think you catch my drift...

try to read before you reply.
i never said they had 100k subs. i said subs are a lot lower than the number he used.
my comment had NOTHING to do with the way Zenimax does its business. it was aimed to clarify for him what the 10 million stories is about.
sit down and take a breath. you seem upset. accept the fact that it will not change for the better or move on and be happy. coming in the forum and getting riled up by a normal comment makes it quite clear that this game might not be good for you.
IF you really want to get your voice heard, you are at the wrong place.
you'd have to contact the ZeniMax Media Inc.

Did you just assume my gender.......

idk · December 2017

It has already been well established that crown crates are popular. Players buy them, not me, but if they were not selling then Zos would make changes. That much is plain and simple obvious.

OP also mistakes the limited time offering as a technique to inflate prices when it is a technique to get us to spend our crowns we have now and push players to buy more crowns when they are not on sale. Very simple aspect that for some may not be so obvious.

Just wanted to correct those two assumptions made above.

Apache_Kid · December 2017

Dragath wrote: »

Stewart1874 wrote: »

I agree.

How many subs does ESO actually have? If 10 million stories is anything to go buy thats a hell of a lot of money just in subs.

10 million stories refers to 10 million accounts over the lifespan of the game.
active accounts are around 1% of that number, subs a lot less.

Source the claim for the 1% please. I find that hard to believe.

victoriana-blue · December 2017

idk wrote: »

It has already been well established that crown crates are popular. Players buy them, not me, but if they were not selling then Zos would make changes. That much is plain and simple obvious.

OP also mistakes the limited time offering as a technique to inflate prices when it is a technique to get us to spend our crowns we have now and push players to buy more crowns when they are not on sale. Very simple aspect that for some may not be so obvious.

Just wanted to correct those two assumptions made above.

ZOS is making changes: why offer free crates if the sales are at a satisfactory level? Why make customers angry by offering some items only by gambling, going against the entire point of of the gem system and the many (many) pages of feedback when crates were announced?

And limited time sales allow ZOS to charge more per item, so you and cyrt are both correct: limited time sales both clear our existing crowns and push purchases of non-sale crowns, and ZOS can make more from fewer purchases. The limits also pressure customers to decide now instead of taking the time to consider or save, and this is compounded by the fact we can only buy crown items in-game: if we can only play one day on a weekend we have to decide by the time we're finished playing, especially people who don't follow the forums for showcases or data mines, instead of being able to buy on the site at any time over the weekend.

"I wanted this, but it's $20 over my game budget, but I have to decide in the next two hours and I want it..." There's a lot of money spent to turn psychology against consumers to make them spend more, and limited sales are part of it.

VaranisArano · December 2017

ZOS engage in manipulative marketing techniques? Surely not.

SisterGoat · December 2017

I hate to break it to you, but manipulation and marketing go hand in hand. It's part of marketing's job to convince you to want something that you don't need.

exiars10 · December 2017

^^^
Exactly.

Also, Veblen Paradox (Snob Effect), one of the first things you learn in Microeconomics.

heaven13 · December 2017

When a pixel mount is $21, are we really talking about microtransactions anymore?

Personally, I would be much more willing to spend the balance of crowns I have if I could buy things I want directly. Too many things are locked behind RNG crates and I just won't participate in that practice. There are hairstyles and pets (chub loon!) that I would have happily purchased but refuse to gamble for. Instead, I'll sit on the crown balance I accrue for subbing until things I want are available directly. And by want, I mean legitimately want. Not settle for because it is all that is available.

JamilaRaj · December 2017

Heh, you may sit on them all you like, ZOS already got your money through sub and does not give a !@#$% your crowns.

vanillexhope · December 2017

JamilaRaj wrote: »

Heh, you may sit on them all you like, ZOS already got your money through sub and does not give a !@#$% your crowns.

As was pointed out earlier, their goal with these flash sales is to deter you from sitting on your crowns too long, so that you will spend them in a moment of impulsivity and buy more.

Rinse. Repeat.