Chapter Three: The Party Invitation & Emotional Attachment
Although Destiny had reached a point where many details about the game were leaked, those details were not confirmed by Bungie themselves thus leaving some of their customer base with a "wait and see" mindset.
The "wait and see"
mindset means that people are intrigued but are not yet allowing
themselves to get emotionally attached to the possible
outcome.
Think back to a time when you
were in the throes of a new relationship. You may have been really
interested in the new person but unless they opened up to you and
shared intimate details about themselves and their life, there is a
good chance that you kept your cards close to your chest.
Regardless of how much you may have liked them, you may not have
allowed yourself to get emotionally invested until you felt
reciprocation on their end.
This has a direct correlation to
marketing as vulnerability, transparency and openness are crucial
to creating the emotional connections that are needed to convert
people from prospect to customer.
As Bungie's fan base waited for
more concrete details to be released, they sat with baited breath.
They didn't allow themselves to get invested in the game at an
emotional level but rather shared the speculation and news with
interest and intrigue. Hopeful but not yet committed.
In Bungie's case, the official
release of the game's name didn't come until February of 2013;
nearly two years after the initial Easter egg placement and almost
an entire year after the first mainstream hints were dropped to
gamers.
The official release of the name
came by way of a blog post on Bungie's blog. It read:
"So, our
game is called Destiny.
In a
matter of days, we're going to give you your first glimpse into the
vision and ambition that's driving the creation of our brave new
world. To make room for the resulting chatter, we've launched some
official social media channels.There's a new Destiny page to like
on Facebook, a new Destiny feed to follow on Twitter, and a new
Destiny page on Google+. And, of course, we've opened a new
Destiny forum here on Bungie.net where you can discuss upcoming
news."
Once the name was released to the
public, people got on board, got excited and it didn't take long
for gaming websites and media outlets to begin talking about the
game from a different perspective. This new perspective was: the
game is definitely real, let's get excited.
So, what did Bungie achieve by
making the move from speculation to certainty? Emotional investment
and the opportunity to invite people to the party before it
began.