Pokénomenon

In the interest of trying to increase my readership, I thought I’d pander to the masses and write about something more timely for a change; namely, Pokémon Go.

Have I played it? No. Am I going to play it? Probably not.

And yet, neither myself nor anyone else can seem go escape the “Pokénomenon.” It’s like the whole word has become a giant Poké Ball. Or, is it that we’ve all become Ash Ketchums zealously trying to capture all 150 Pokémon?

Correct simile aside, I’m intrigued by how the game has taken the world by storm. At least the parts of the globe where you’re not banned from playing the game.

Gabriel Rosenberg’s article for NPR outlined both the positive and negative attention that Pokémon Go has garnered since its release on July 8^th, which ranged from a Pokémon Go Walk of more than 1,000 people in Perth, Australia, to four young men in a suburb of St. Louis, Missouri who used a PokéStop to rob several players at gunpoint.

One of the more “…Huh!? Well, how about that!” stories to arise from the Pokémon Go was its surpassing of Tinder on Android smartphones in terms of downloads. Pokémon Go also broke the Internet when the search term “pokemon go” overtook “porn” in popularity, according to Google Trends.

Do these stories mean that Pokémon Go will supersede humanity’s more base and primal instincts, leading to the demise of our species? Highly unlikely.

What Pokémon Go can do, however, is offer businesses an opportunity to increase their revenues by capitalizing on the game’s popularity. Pokémon Go players can purchase “lures” that attract Pokémon to an area when activated, and it’s what a few business owners have been doing already to attract more customers.

It’s hard to say from a marketing standpoint what the future holds for Pokémon Go and other augmented reality (AR) games of its kind, but that doesn’t stop people from speculating.

To wrap up this post, it’s said that one should never let a crisis go to waste. My advice to business owners during this time: don’t let a Pikachu go to waste, either.