By Nabil Moutran, Founder and CEO at Division, Dan Moore, Co-Founder and Managing Director at Division and Ziad Khammar, COO at DMS.
Ziad Khammar:
The gaming industry is experiencing massive growth, both in terms of the number of players and in terms of revenue generated from in-game revenues, sponsorships and brand collaborations. What kind of growth do you expect for brands and advertisers in this sector in the region?
In a world where consumers’ entertainment options have multiplied, brands are vying for their attention through video streaming, social media, music, podcasts, and the fastest-growing market, gaming. Gaming is a mega activity and community that is best activated by the source itself, the gamer himself. Brands are aware that influencer marketing via gamers’ social media and streaming channels offer more authentic reach and engagement than advertising alone.
With DMS already representing numerous platforms and solutions across the region, what made you choose DIVISION to join your portfolio? What was it about their offering that particularly excited you?
Arab gaming is an exciting market that requires a deep understanding of the culture, trends and preferences of gamers. We chose DIVISION because of their understanding of this market and proven track record of successful campaigns with top brands. DIVISION’s experience and expertise in influencer marketing management and content creation make them an ideal partner for brands seeking to engage with the gaming community in the MENA region. Combined with our existing network and reach, their capabilities in this field can deliver real results for brands looking to leverage the gaming community in their marketing campaigns. So, it was a no-brainer for us to partner with DIVISION to offer our clients an innovative and effective way to reach gamers.
What is the trend on spend that you are seeing moving to solutions such as this?
Recent years have seen explosive growth in the gaming industry, and this trend does not appear to be slowing down anytime soon. There are several reasons for this, including the growing accessibility and availability of current-gen and web 3.0 gaming experiences on a wide range of electronic devices. Moreover, the development of the entertainment industry has resulted in an increase in life streamers, content creators, and how-to guides available on popular platforms such as Twitch, Facebook Gaming, TikTok, and YouTube Gaming.
As a result, media spending within the gaming field has been on the rise and is expected to keep increasing, whether it be through event sponsorships, integrations with content creators, or custom activations with both influencers and consumers.
Nabil Moutran:
Which sectors do you think would benefit from DIVISION’s solution, and what response have you gotten from your clients so far?
Naturally, there are industries that will have a centre of gravity on gaming and our platforms like FMCG, tech, telco, and fast food chains. However, we have also seen interest from other promising sectors such as cosmetics and financial services. The platform now serves pretty much any sector that wants to engage with audiences who consume gaming content, reaffirming that there are no preset demographics for gaming.
Your solution focuses on content being deployed while gamers are streaming live on platforms such as Twitch. Could you explain how brands can benefit from this sort of solution?
Attracting your audience’s attention is the name of the game today. By introducing brand integrations into an actual stream, the brand’s message becomes part of the narrative rather than disruptive. This enables brands to enjoy a longer attention span from the audience in an authentic and relevant manner. Our platform simply enables brands to do this at scale.
Dan Moore:
Tell us a little bit more about the platform and what plans you have in place for growth in the region. Are there any other new features you will be bringing to the platform?
We launched the platform knowing that the introduction of new product features would be deployed throughout the year, and our main focus is on delivering a user-friendly solution that takes an advertiser from activity concept to completion in an easy step-by-step process. We’re also planning to optimize and introduce new product features for both the advertiser and the gamer to benefit from during this year. As our growth plans are aligned with the development roadmap, we are aiming to grow our gamer database into the thousands by the end of the year. Today, we can reach approximately 10 million people across the MENA region, and we’re expecting to grow this number considerably as we introduce more features and gamers onto the platform.
