Business Marketing Strategy Games: What Games are You Involved in?

Sometimes I use games theory to help the owners of small businesses gain an insight into business behaviour.

Often they start by denying any games are invovled and we always have an enlightening discussion. There are three rough groups of games that I usually see played in business:

Zero sum - I win, you loose

The Zero Sum game is the common situation where one player's success reduces the returns for the others. Typically this happens anywhere where people compete in a limited market.

Recently in my home town, the two resident butchers have been impacted by the arrival of another butcher: a sales increase for any butcher reduces the sales made by the others.
Similarly, as the supermarket at the edge of town sells only high-volume, low-price goods, our independent hardware store has been restricted to high-priced, low-volume lines.
Many UK charities have suffered since the National Lottery creamed off a lot of the 'pocket money' that the public used to put into charity donation boxes.

For the Zero Sum Game, wherever the size of the cake is fixed, if I cut a big slice, you always get less.

Unconditional contracts - we win or loose together

Wherever people share goals that lead to common outcomes, they can trade by swapping something that the other values.

This happens every time I trade my cash for a shopkeeper's goods that I want to buy - we both benefit.
It also happens where team members contribute their individual skills and knowledge to the team effort - the MD, sales person and production worker need each other for the whole business to thrive.

For Unconditional contracts, the size of the cake is elastic, and if we work together, we all get larger slices.

Conditional positive sums - we choose how we win or loose

The 'prisoners dilemma' is a sophisticated game with three possible outcomes - if I move, I do OK at your cost; if we both move, we lose together, but if we both hold fast, we both maximise our benefits.

In 'free riding', some car drivers are uninsured so the cost of their traffic accidents is paid for by the insurance premium of law-abiding drivers.
Currently our fishermen are suffering the 'tragedy of the commons': the more fish each boat takes, the less fish others find, and without common management, the sea becomes over-fished.
In a business network, I can help other business people link to market opportunities that I know about. They can do the same for me. Where we both help each other, we both thrive. However if either of us feel we are doing all the giving without sufficient getting, we will drop out of the network.

For Conditional positive sums, the size of the cake is determined by our cooperation and mutual trust, and selfish actions can damage everyone's livelihood.

We all have market forces that control our freedom to pursue our business. If you identify which games are going on around you, you may gain sufficient insight to put yourself on the winning side as the game is played out.

Adrian Pepper specialises in helping small business to sharpen their marketing, increase their sales and grow their income. You can contact him through Help4You Ltd, through his website at http://www.help4you.ltd.uk or by phone +44-7773-380133. At http://feeds.feedburner.com/help4you, you can listen to his podcast for small businesses.

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Strategy Games - Classic Game Enjoyment

Are you a strategy game lover? This games are very gratifying. They involve skillful planning and critical thinking in order to achieve victory. The challenges a strategic game present are tactical, logistical, and exploratory. Some have economic challenges. Terrain is also important to strategy. Strategy games come in a wide variety, and each has a specific objective. The player is required to position characters, usually on a hex or grid board. The focus is on large numbers of similar units. Many of these games try to reproduce historically important or tactical battles. Flanking, cutting supply lines and diversions help manage combat.

Proximity, CC Stealth Wars, War Games 1983, Warfare: 1917, Tower Defense Games, Season of War, and Battle Gear 2 - World Dominion are just a few of the strategy games that are currently available to play online. Battle in games occurs between groups of single combatants, or units. Games vary in how many units each side possesses. Each unit has special strengths and weaknesses. Units can vary in speed and movement, along with how much damage or health they can take. Units also have different levels of attack power or range. If a unit is destroyed, it is gone from the game.

Many games have a place for new units to be constructed or recharged. The game player will plan a sequence of actions against one or more opponents to reduce or eliminate enemy forces. Careful planning assures victory, and elements of chance are included along the way. In many games, the player has a superior, topical view of the game world, and elements of warfare are involved. There is usually a mix of tactical and strategic considerations in combat. The ability to explore or manage an economy is often involved, and maps or logistics come in again.

Strategy games require one to out think the opponent, even if the opponent is a computer. The skill level is the about the same between sides. Each side has the same available supplies and actions. The balance between strengths and weaknesses are about the same. Direct action upon an opponent makes strategy games exciting, and planning around the conflict between players. It is easy to see that games give the player more enjoyment than an ordinary, run of the mill computer game. Maybe you have never been in a real-life war battle, but an online strategy game can give you a small taste of it.

Strategy Games

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