Xbox One smashes aside PlayStation 4, Blizzard on TV

The console crushed all it’s competitors in terms of digital attention

GamesBeat has partnered with attention analytics company iSpot.tv, which measures TV advertising in real-time, to bring you a monthly report on how gaming brands are spending their TV ad dollars and which commercials are generating the most digital response (iSpot measures actions across Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and all major search engines). Below are the top five most-engaging gaming industry brands from December 16 through January 15.

TV commercials for console games owned the conversation during the critical holiday time frame. Overall, during the period measured, 31 brands spent an estimated $65 million running 98 commercials over 21,200 times on national TV, generating over 3.7 billion TV ad impressions.

Xbox leads the pack with over a third of the industry’s digital share of voice. It spent an estimated $12.8 million on 13 ads that ran 1,329 times with 430 million TV ad impressions. The most popular spot was the humorous “Madden NFL 17: Karaoke,” featuring Pittsburgh Steelers wide receiver Antonio Brown with music from The Weeknd. This spot accounted for over half (56.2 percent) of the brand’s digital activity. Overall, Xbox ads prompted 2,231,675 online views, 26,900 social actions, and 86,027 searches.

PlayStation takes second place with 20.4 percent of the industry’s digital response. During the period measured it spent an estimated $19.2 million on 8 ads that aired 2,950 times and generated over 851 million TV ad impressions. The PlayStation ad with the largest digital share of voice (45.1 percent) was “You Won’t Believe What’s In Store.” In total, the brand’s spots generated 7,148,321 online views, 37,538 social actions and 49,968 searches.

Blizzard Entertainment takes third place with 16.1 percent of the industry’s digital share of voice, solely advertising for its game Hearthstone. The top commercial was “Hearthstone: Take This Inside,” with 48.9 percent of the brand’s digital SOV. Overall, Blizzard spent $1.1 million on 4 ads that aired 1,626 times and had 111.5 million TV ad impressions. Its ads generated 6,370,240 online views, 21,599 social actions, and 19,666 searches.

In fourth place is King, which captured 13.1 percent of digital engagement by advertising two games: Candy Crush Saga and Bubble Witch 3 Saga. The brand spent an estimated $5.5 million on 2 spots that aired 3,363 times, generating 564 million TV ad impressions. The “Mannequin Challenge, Color Bomb Style” ad for Candy Crush Saga captured nearly three-fourths (74.8 percent) of King’s digital engagement for the period measured. As a whole, the brand’s ads were viewed online 84,795 times, mentioned on social media 4,603 times, and searched for 168,788 times.

Nintendo closes out the ranking with 4.4 percent of the video game industry’s digital SOV. Its most buzzed-about spot, with 45.94 percent of the brand’s engagement, was “Super Mario Maker: Play Everywhere. Create Anywhere.” In total, Nintendo ran seven commercials 692 times, which resulted in 97.4 million TV ad impressions thanks to an estimated spend of nearly $1.9 million. These ads generated 1,738,797 online views, 1,360 social actions and 9,882 searches.