Amazon shocked everyone (well, me at least) this week when it announced that it acquired video streaming service Twitch. The sale wasn't the surprise so much as it was the buyer. It was almost a given that YouTube would be the one to make the acquisition.

Still, the buyer isn't as much of a big deal as what the acquisition symbolizes. Gaming is huge and attractive to large online companies because it is made up of special kinds of products that consumers build ecosystems around.

Amazon has created an in-house gaming studio for the purposes of developing lightweight games, but it upped the ante when it acquired Double Helix Games, the maker of more high-profile games like Killer Instinct. Amazon has also launched the Fire TV, which offers a limited selection of games, but Amazon could certainly up the ante with Double Helix. It has the platform, the game developer and with Twitch, something to invite people to build an ecosystem around games.

Twitch brings something different to the table that Amazon didn't have. Twitch offers a live-streaming platform that feeds gamers' desires for more game content. They can watch others play, share their play-throughs and watch professional gamers compete, and yes, people are doing this in droves.

Twitch has enabled people to do something every brand should hope customers do — share their product experiences.

Gaming is About Product Experience

Twitch has more than 55 million unique visitors and more than 15 billion minutes of content. Its users generate more peak broadband traffic than Facebook and Hulu, and all of Twitch's users have one thing in common: games.

No product category delivers an experience quite like games. People are consuming video games before launch by going online to speculate on game features and view preview videos. Then after the purchase they share their experiences on the micro level with friends and on the macro level with services like Twitch by streaming or contributing to Wiki guides on how to accomplish certain game tasks.

Now, it could be argued that people exhibit similar behavior with music, movies and other entertainment, but it's certainly not to this level because with video games, people are in complete control. They're not only commenting on the quality of the work of someone else, they're controlling and sharing their personal, unique experiences.

Brands Can Learn from this Outlier

Video games have a lot going for them. By their very nature they're fun, the users are highly connected online and the tools for content creation are becoming more and more freely available, easy-to-use and accessible.

The best part about video games is players do a good share of the marketing for them, and that's any marketer's dream. So what can we learn from games and the people that share experiences around them:

Offer multiple opportunities to create. Gamers have a variety of platforms they can share their gaming experiences to, and their shares can take multiple forms from video to photos to written content. Every brand should consider why its customers would care to share, and if so, how can they do it?
Let the community support itself. Platforms like Twitch are largely run the by the users. They answer each other's questions. They help each other out. They actually have a stake because its theirs, and helping others gives them credibility. People don't go to developers to ask how to get past a particularly tough part of a game. They lean on each other, and others come to their aid. How can people support each other related to your product and brand?
Give up all control. People can do amazing things when brands let them. Microsoft let users do experiments with its Kinect device, and users created some pretty powerful uses for the product that were not originally intended. Nintendo, on the other hand, learned the hard way when it forced users to take their gaming videos offline. Are you comfortable with people reinterpreting your products?
Make everything the spark to a conversation. Gaming is a spectacle all-around. From events to conferences and even to live-streamed competitions, nothing in the gaming industry is a whisper. Things are announced in big ways and influencers are given multiple opportunities to spread the word.

People fall in love with products the same they do with games — through experiences. As marketers, we should think through how we can translate even the smallest experiences into something worth talking about, creating for and sharing with others.