Sony is launching the “Ice Silver,” a new version of its PlayStation Portable, this fall and is expanding on its “Dude Get Your Own” campaign to promote the release to its target teenage audience.
The campaign for the new products will be promoted through a multichannel campaign that includes print, TV, outdoor and online. The campaigns feature the actor from last spring’s “Dude Get Your Own” campaign, which was launched to push the PSP’s price drop from $199.99 to $169.99 to a younger audience.
“The structure works very well for the PSP campaign and it resonated [strongly] in our research reports for that core teenage customer,” said John Koller, senior marketing manager at Sony PSP. “We wanted to bring it back in a new way.”
The original commercial features a teenager who is always trying to steal his friend’s PSP, and when the owner is finally annoyed enough, he says “Dude, get your own.” Since it was launched last May, sales have increased with July 2007 figures 52 percent higher than the year-ago period. The new commercials, which target non-owners, will include the same campaign concept with different contexts. The new campaign will be broken up to focus on the three key new products: the newly designed ultra light PSP console, the Daxter PSP Pack Entertainment Kit and the limited edition Star Wars PSP console.
The campaign to promote the Star Wars Battlefront entertainment kit that comes with an exclusive game and console begins October 9. It will include TV, print, online and billboards in New York and Las Vegas. The commercial features the same annoying friend. In this version, he thinks he is a Jedi, but he still doesn’t have a PSP, so the limited edition console is shown along with the catch phrase, “Dude, get your own.”
“The overall objective for the Star Wars push is to really promote the limited edition nature of these SKUs, and to play to the hard core fan,” Koller added.
The Daxter Entertainment kit, which comes with the new PSP and the Daxter game and episodes of TV show Family Guy, will be pushed through a general version of the commercial with the annoying kid also trying to steal his friend’s gaming system. It’s due in September in print, TV and online.
This fall, the new PSP console’s push will focus on the new video out feature, which lets users plug the console into a TV with the same quality video as a DVD. This feature is being aimed at parents and kids as a travel device, as it includes the ability to watch movies in a hotel.
Along with more traditional channels, the products will be featured on Playstation.com and in online advertisements on hardcore PSP blogs, niche PSP sites and on sites such as lifestyle and sports-oriented destinations.
The online ads will include the fact that Sony has partnered with T-Mobile to offer six months of free wireless Internet in any of T-Mobile’s hotspots to PSP users.
