EA Case Study

EA is the #1 video game publisher in the US, with over a hundred popular titles such as NFL Head Coach, Madden NFL 2006, The Sims, Need for Speed: Most Wanted, and Medal of Honor. It develops games under such brand names as EA GAMES, EA SPORTS, and EA SPORTS BIG. It also distributes titles for third-party labels and publishes games based on Hollywood franchises, including The Lord of the Rings, The Godfather, Harry Potter, and Batman. We spoke with Nathan Fahrenthold, Senior Community Manager.

You re-launched your online community last August. What wasn't working for you up until then?

Well we started out with something five years ago. But we were having a lot of problems. It was bottlenecked performance-wise and our customers have no patience for slowness -- I mean, they're gamers. We needed something that could scale easily. Something quick, so it could handle a lot of conversations and traffic. Not to mention handle our tough security demands. A lot of free or less expensive solutions couldn't offer these performance features. Another huge factor was that Marketing was interested in building something that could compete with the best of the heavily loved and trafficked gaming communities out there -- a community that was extensions of each brand.

Nine months after we launched with Jive Software, our community grew 1,600%. — Nathan Fahrenthold, Senior Community Manager

What was important in extending the brand?

Well we're a "house of brands" and have very distinct branded products like Madden NFL, The Sims, and major movie brand tie-ins like The Lord of the Rings. And these products have extremely loyal fan bases. Our communities need to be extensions of each brand. They needed to look and feel like each product. The content needed to be appropriate. And the environment needed to feel resonant and safe to help with contribution. Jive Forums was extremely easy to integrate and customize so that we could skin a single product in ways that made sense for each brand.

Now that you're been up and running with this new environment, can you share some results?

Honestly, we've been floored. From a traffic, posting and membership perspective, our original plan was to be in beta for six months while we closely monitored growth, which we expected to be flat or about the same. As soon as we re-launched the community as brand extensions, with fast performance and excellent content moderation -- it exploded. People are actually coming from other non-corporate gaming communities to EA's because ours are better. Members are using it to recruit other members to join their virtual teams. Two months after launch we had grown 10 times as big. And now, 9 months later, our participation is 1,600% larger than we were at launch. And that's for a community that was already five years old. Thanks to Jive Forums' built-in clustering, we had no limit on performance and scaling.

Can you think of any specific features that have made a big impact?

I guess I'd answer that in terms of both users and administrators. For users, I'd have to say three most important features have been the identification and recognition of special members, having intuitive navigation and powerful thread management. The most important administrative features, no question, have been multi-level security, easy account management, the ability to highlight messages and great stats.

What key features of Jive Forums do you credit most for your success?

Well, I've mentioned the importance of the built-in clustering and how fast we were able to get up and running -- even in a transition scenario. This has allowed other countries to roll out easily as well. I've also mentioned moderation -- I can't stress how important this is and was. It's managed flame wars and kept it from becoming "the wild west." The option to have as much or as little of the moderation automated is great. Certainly the open standards were important. It was really powerful to be able to add custom code and extend the product. And the site mesh architecture made skinning simple. Oh, and this isn't a product thing, but you guys were always right there whenever we needed you, and that was just as key for us.

Any advice for other people thinking about making the move from one community software solution to another?

The most important thing to keep in mind is that people don't like change. Really think about your customers and prepare them for the shift. Explain what is going to happen in detail so there are no surprises. Don't rush it. Launch it in beta so that members can give feedback. Have both running simultaneously. Find the invaluable contributors and ask them to more formally contribute.