6pm under the Eiffel tower, with 3 dedicated barges, one big screen, a radio dj, one show on MTV & GameOne, 1000 guests... Customers had the worst event experience of ever for a new game machine launch... Just trying to explain what I've seen there. Customers were supposed to be accommodated at 6pm, i was there only at 7pm but anyway... First, the event was announced to be under the Eiffel tower, not really true... It was on the quay... so what was going there?
I've been accommated by 10 vigils, a wall of barriers blocking the access and several cops... Welcome! ... 50 boys and girls where waiting... One vigil was talking the 3 20-25 years old and well dressed guys but with different origins... Telling them that if they're not going to buy the machine, they could go away... After some hesitation i asked to a vigil what's going on...
He told me : "No demonstration, just wait midnight (very cold weather), show your payment card, enter, buy, and go away..." Ok so it's exactly like in a classic store like FNAC or Virgin without the good customer relationship management of the sellers. OK after some minutes walking around the place to see what's really happening, i didn't see anything, just one dj's announce telling exactly the contrary of what the vigil said to people... Go home and watch the event on MTV Greg...
I want to say thank you to Sony Marketing FR guys and responsible event agency if there is one. Great job! Lot of money waste, great ROI (Only 50 machines sold versus 1000 on the barge!). The event could have been great but if you had allowed people to enter, maybe there would have been more people there and more machines sold... What i understood there was that Sony wanted to dedicate the event to VIP only. Ok cool... Ensure that they're will be there next time!
But main thing : the ones who buy your machine are not VIP and you should have test to make them feel like VIP during this event... Lost! Let's play Wii, Xbox 360 & DS...
One special thanks to Xbox 360 Marketing team for the great XBOX 360 barge action "XBOX 360 loves you", it was the only funny things of the event...
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