Chipotle Scarecrow is the future of advergaming on mobile

This is a good writeup about an extremely interesting subject, and the beginning of what is sure to be a major trend. But the author kind of lost me here:

"Chipotle Scarecrow will, without a doubt, go down as one of the most successful marketing campaigns in history."

Really? On what metrics? It seems extremely successful as far as reach is concerned, sure. It probably drove a good deal of positive brand sentiment, which is great. But how did this campaign drive sales of burritos? How did it drive gains in share against competitors? What was the actual ROI?

It always bugs me when people talk about "marketing" as though it's purely about reaching eyeballs. That's a big part of advertising, which is a subset of marketing. But it's not how a successful marketing campaign is solely measured. Especially when we're talking about marketing for a restaurant chain. Distributing a very engaging mobile game is a wonderful and rare accomplishment, but Chipotle is in the food business. It needs to demonstrate that Mobile Success A led to Business Success B.

This campaign was extremely clever, creative and innovative. It was a huge hit on mobile devices, and it garnered a great deal of attention. All of those things are to be commended. But unless the ROI was positive, unless this campaign really moved the needle in a major way on sales, we can't speak about how "successful" it actually was -- let alone speak in hyperbolic terms about how it was one of "the most successful marketing campaigns in history."

In time it may well prove to be a huge success. Perhaps even an enormous success. But the jury is still out.

This kind of thing kind of scares me to be honest. It's almost a peek into a horrific dystopian future where piracy is so rampant that games, music videos, and perhaps even movies are only made as a marketing effort and are filled with advertising, branding, and product placement.

Your fear is misplaced.

1) The game exclusively on IOS, where piracy is minuscule. It couldn't have been the motivator.

2) People are willing to pay for good quality and convenience instead of pirating (e.g., Steam, Netflix, game consoles).

I downloaded and played the game one morning as fast as I could to get the free burrito and never touched it again. I didn't watch the video, I didn't read any of the crap on there...I basically just did the bare minimum and got my free burrito.

I have a feeling that's most people who downloaded that game. I can't imagine it brought back in a ton of revenue.

But, I could be completely wrong! Maybe most people aren't heartless bastards who just want a free burrito!

I haven't tried the game at hand, but I'll say that the Chipotle ordering app is by far one of the most revolutionary day to day uses of the iPhone, in my admittedly not exciting life. Build a burrito, save the order for future purchases...at any time, just send the order to the nearest Chipotle, and when you get there, you skip the line to pick up your order. Few other consumer apps so impact such a traditional and frequent workflow