Will This New Ad Strategy Make Sony a Fortune?

While Sony's (SONY 0.04%) latest ad strategy could bring in new revenue, it could also detract from the gaming experience on its platform. In this Motley Fool Live segment from "The Gaming Show," recorded on April 25, Fool.com contributors Jon Quast, Ryan Henderson, and Jose Najarro discuss advertising in the gaming market. 

Jon Quast: Sony is, it looks like they've got a new perhaps ad strategy. So this is very similar to the news that Jose brought last week with Microsoft and the Xbox. So it looks like Sony is going to introduce ads inside of free to play games. So this might look like you're playing a game and then all of a sudden there's a billboard advertisement there in your periphery and it's kind of an interesting take on advertising within free to play games because historically, it's disruptive. You got to watch a 30 second ad to keep playing or something like that, and not well received by most people who wants to be shown an ad whether you're playing a game or watching YouTube, right? So this is just a report, it's not official from the company, allegedly, the marketplace will be private. Still, no word whether or not Sony would be getting a cut of that revenue, or if it might be generating revenue by selling player data, that would be a very interesting conversation, and players may be able to earn as well for the advertisement. So maybe this is a, you watch a 30 second ad, you opt into it, you get paid to watch it. I don't know, what do you guys think about this?

Ryan Henderson: There's so many ways this can go. I don't know if that means, like, the games that Sony publishes, they're going to put in creative ways to include an advertisement or if there's going to be like a pop up on the Sony main screen that has, like comes down, it's like, check out this game, it's kind of like a sort of an empty announcement. We don't know what it's going to be, I hope it doesn't detract from the platform in any way, or detract from the gaming experience. The other thing is maybe they don't own all the games on their platform. Obviously, there's a lot of publishers that are selling into those platforms, so I wonder, it's not their ad inventory to sell if it's in those games. 

Jose Najarro: I think it's super interesting that a lot of big players are kind of entering into this kind of ad market, like Ryan mentioned, it's there's so many ways that can go about it and some of the like loopholes or things that have to go through it, but it's still just interesting. I'm guessing the reason that advertisement is coming to the gaming market is just because companies believe this is where the next set of eyes are are going to be. So I think at the end of the day, that kind of bodes well for the gaming market as a whole. But still, I want to see where it goes from here. 

Ryan Henderson: It feels like a perfect spot to advertise because your engagement is so high, it's not, if you can target the right advertisement, this is not a passive entertainment experience, you're very much involved in what's going on, so it feels like a perfect place to to run the right ad.