Tim Lion, Head of EMEA Gaming Marketing, Global Brand & Programs, Facebook Gaming at Meta, knows that most marketers don’t grasp the huge potential of the gaming audience. His Shiny New Object is gaming because of the diversity and addressability it offers to those who understand it.

Tim’s career has been extremely varied, thanks to an attitude he calls “the blind ignorance of being willing to have a go at things with my career pivots.” Having started out in the hospitality industry in Australia, he then pursued his passion for film making which landed him in Ireland. Eventually, through some soul searching, he switched to tech and advertising at the beginning of social media, which led him to roles at Sony Electronics and Activision Publishing (who are, among other titles, responsible for Call of Duty). From there, it was a hop across to Meta into their gaming marketing team, where he’s been ever since.

Gaming represents huge opportunities for performance marketing thanks to the diversity and the openness of its audience. Over 80% of gamers are actually not the stereotypical teenage boy playing on a console in his basement. In fact, most of the gaming audience is on mobile, digitally literate, and very discerning.

Because gamers know what they want and can be a “tough nut to crack,” Tim thinks most advertisers don’t consider them a targetable audience. However, they also miss the fact that gaming is a huge part of those people’s lives, which represents a huge window of opportunity. Meta research shows that gamers who play mobile games are very open to advertising, as long as it’s a solid value exchange (for example, receiving lives or coins for watching an in-game ad).

Dynamic ads targeting that market could turn around a marketing plan, if brands started to consider it more closely. 

Listen to the full episode to understand more about gaming advertising and to hear Tim’s top tips for linking your marketing job to commercial objectives.

The host of the Shiny New Object podcast is Tom Ollerton, founder of Automated Creative.