New media & brand community - Effects on Sony's PlayStation

Companies especially in gaming have resorted to invest a lot in understanding consumer behavior to gain maximum benefit for the firm in terms of sales and consumer in terms of gaming experience. Companies have identified that brand community and new media as the best medium to interact with its loyal customers.This thesis intends to make contributions to the understanding of how new media and latest technologies have brought changes in today¿s marketing environment. Advancement in technology has led to increased number of online activities resulting in augmented interactions between people. This research examines the interactions between consumer and the company and tries to gain insights on the impact of marketing strategies used by Sony to market its PlayStation. It also identifies if the strategies implemented by Sony are effective. And in order to achieve this, both the company and consumer point of view was observed from new media techniques and brand communities.Even though a lot of marketing strategies used by Sony was effective, it was found that the consumer¿s perception about the reliable source of information was not available from the official forum.