Many might think that broadcasting is very traditional, loosening its grip on the cultural current as people turn more and more toward immersive, interactive experiences like gaming and the metaverse. But the IBC Show is anything but traditional, and this year our Monks on the ground (and on the stage) explored the broadcasting’s transformation in the virtualized era, from capturing new kinds of content to showing off workstreams that unlock incredible, new storytelling opportunities.

If it’s not interactive, it’s broken.

Video killed the radio star—and with the rise of the metaverse and an increasingly digital culture, is TV next on the chopping block? Smithingham opened the second day of the event with a keynote talk, “Step Into the Metaverse,” in which he set the stage for a new era of multi-dimensional, interactive media. The central thesis: traditional, flat media is less relevant today’s Gen Z and Gen Alpha audiences. “A core undercurrent across all of this is if something is not interactive to younger generations, it feels broken and disconnected,” says Smithingham, showing how live sports viewership is down and that most of the discussion surrounding the Super Bowl is about the halftime show instead of the game.

Still, Smithingham doesn’t want to discourage the industry; rather, now is the time for broadcasting players to take an active part in driving culture forward. “Broadcasting is culture. It’s the vehicle by which culture spreads,” he says, making the case by illustrating how text messaging volume directly correlated with American Idol viewership throughout the aughts. Likewise, broadcasting can embrace emerging technologies and behaviors—like livestream commerce—to connect more closely with today’s audiences and tap into new storytelling possibilities. For example, we partnered with Logitech to break out of the exclusive, VIP-focused awards show format with the Song Breaker Awards, making it more accessible and interactive for audiences in the metaverse. 

To Rob McNeil, VP of Live at Media.Monks, these immersive experiences will become complimentary to more traditional broadcast experiences. “It will coexist. Certain people will gravitate toward certain kinds of content,” he says, noting how he personally would rather watch sports in VR rather than on a TV. While he sees a future in 180- or 360-degree movies and TV shows, music performances and sports seem to be the use cases that make the most sense right now. “These are natural areas for immersive experiences,” he says, noting how music in particular takes advantage of spatial audio in the Meta Quest 2.

The lesson for brands and broadcasters? Break out of the traditionally one-way conversation of broadcasting and instead create a multidirectional ecosystem: a halo of virtual worlds, social content, streaming content, creator channels, podcasts, audience interaction and more. “It’s about feeding an audience that’s always on,” says Smithingham. “We have to evolve how we tell our stories.” You can learn more insights from Smithingham in the IBC interview below.

Esports points a way forward.

Marketers and broadcasters looking for examples of multidirectional ecosystems can turn to the esports space, which is taking some learnings from traditional sports while also establishing best practices of its own. Esports are a fast-growing industry, with 29.6 million monthly esports viewers this year—an 11.5% increase over 2021, according to Insider Intelligence. Funs Jacobs, our Gaming Category Lead, shared the stage with Nicolas Bourdon, CMO at EVS, and George Pratchett, Production Manager at Promod Esports, to discuss the new frontier of esports as they become increasingly mainstream.

Jacobs notes that most of the revenue earned in esports comes from sponsorships—but the number of esports games per year pale in comparison to, say, your average FIFA league, which amounts to less opportunities for sponsorship overall. That’s why in addition to hosting more games and tournaments, Jacobs encourages competitive gaming developers, leagues and teams to explore fan engagement on new social platforms. In addition, there is a new opportunity to strengthen their communities with blockchain-enabled technologies like NFTs, as brands can now cultivate a sense of ownership with their fans.

Teams like FaZe Clan and 100 Thieves have done well to expand beyond tournaments into video content—FaZe Clan has four YouTube channels and 8.66 million subscribers to its main one—apparel, NFT drops, podcasts and dozens of channels run by individual content creators and pro players that have signed onto teams. 100 Thieves is even in the early stages of developing a game of its own. 

The variety of digital content offers not only new opportunities for sponsorship and revenue, but also different options for fans and viewers to engage as they see fit. “One thing we can learn from streamers is the level of accessibility,” says Jacobs. “These creators are so accessible despite being so far away in terms of lifestyle and skill level.”

Cloud-based workflows unlock new storytelling opportunities.

Broadcasting of the future requires new ways of working, and Smithingham joined Samira Bakhtiar, Director of Sales, Media & Entertainment at Amazon Web Services (AWS) to give conference attendees an inside look at our global, AWS-based virtual production team. While broadcasts are typically produced by an on-the-ground team tangled in wires and packed in a truck, our cloud-based setup unites personnel who are working across several different locations. 

Here's what it looks like. We put together a rack of gear, coders, monitors and uninterruptible power supplies. We then send two or three people to a location who take the rack, power it up and plug it directly into AWS via a network connection. “This is a direct connection outside of the internet, so we’re not susceptible to interferences, says Patrick Jones, Senior Director of Engineering, Live/Broadcast and Creative Solutions at Media.Monks. “We don’t have issues like outages from local ISPs.” 

Anywhere from 36 to 40 virtual machines are connected in the cloud, ranging from graphics servers, audio servers, playback servers that enable instant replays, and more. The cloud also connects dozens of people throughout a distributed team. “A director in Florida can collaborate with a tech director in England and audio people in New York,” says Jones. And despite the distance across teams, latency is negligible and just a matter of milliseconds.

Still, any live broadcast comes with a series of factors that may present the need for redundancies, whether that be extra equipment or multiple recording backups. “We’re the department of redundancy. It’s what we do: continue to make sure we have multiple systems in place to protect us,” says Jones. He notes that while traditional broadcasting trucks also have redundancies built in, things break, and having two of every piece of equipment isn’t practical. “If you’re in a truck, you may not have the ability to get another computer in. But in the cloud, we can quickly pivot to spin up another system or backup.”

Beyond the added efficiencies in stability and collaboration, one benefit of the AWS-powered workstream shouldn’t go unnoticed: it greatly reduces the carbon footprint of a broadcast, which would traditionally involve flying out an entire fleet of professionals. “We just have three people flying in for a typical production, and everyone else is in the cloud,” says Smithingham.

Broadcasting continues to evolve and innovate.

“Two years ago, we didn’t have some of the tools in the cloud that we have now,” says Jones. After exploring the showroom floor, he applauds the level of innovation at IBC. “Seeing all the people that are innovating, we advanced by maybe three years in six months. The pandemic forced a lot of companies to up their game, and we’re all reaping the benefits of that.”

We showed off our own innovation at the booth for RED Digital Cinema, who is disrupting the film production scene with camera equipment that is more affordably priced than more traditional names. At the booth, we shared a behind-the-scenes look at the making of Post Malone’s Twelve Carat Toothache VR performance, viewable on Meta Quest devices captured on RED’s cameras. Our team built a way to live-stitch the footage to accommodate VR viewing in a 4K resolution, streamed directly to Quest headsets as the footage is captured.

The shooting-to-viewing pipeline is important because advanced imaging isn’t just a learning curve for production crews; it forces performers to engage with the camera in new ways, too. “The camera’s movement is often limited, due to naturally occuring motion sickness,” says McNeil. “For artists, that’s challenging because they have to come toward the camera, rather than have the camera come to them.” Throughout the Twelve Carat Toothache shoot, the crew could let Post Malone inhabit the viewer’s perspective in between performances, influencing his stage presence.

To bring the same experience to the demo booth, we had headsets on hand capturing live footage of the conference floor. “As people create content with technology like this, we become desensitized to it, but people experiencing it for the first time were like, ‘This is simply stunning—absolutely amazing,’” says Jones.

The demo between team Media.Monks and team RED demonstrated more than just the potential of new technology. It also showed a spirit of partnership that permeated much of IBC this year. “You saw a lot of people going from booth to booth—not like an upstart going to the industry giants to get their foot in the door, but rather a lot of established names wanting to work together,” says McNeil.

To say that the world has changed since IBC’s last in-person conference in 2019 would be an understatement. But this year’s edition showed how the broadcast itself is in a state of evolution—one that will show no signs of slowing down soon. “We need to virtualize everything from our culture to how we do our work,” says Smithingham. From expanding content across different formats, to learning from emerging industries like esports, to exploring entirely new workflows, IBC 2022 offered several looks into the future of broadcasting—and it’s looking bright.

Media.Monks will take on media strategy, planning and buying, and measurement for Unity globally. With subject matter expertise in gaming, VR, Web3 and the metaverse, Media.Monks’ integrated team will scale up media to engage Unity’s core gaming business and its B2B audience.

“Media.Monks is the right fit for our business given our shared expertise and belief in how RT3D, the metaverse and the next phase of the internet are changing not only gaming but many other industries,” said Carol Carpenter, CMO, Unity. “We are excited to partner with them to unify our media efforts globally, and work together to deliver unique solutions for customers.”

In addition to the media AOR assignment, the Media.Monks creative development teams use Unity software to deliver real-time 3D solutions for clients across a wide range of industries. Recently, the Unity technology powered Media.Monks’ development of an award-winning AR experience, ‘Anne Frank House: The Bookcase for Tolerance,’ honored at the Cannes Lions Festival of Creativity in the Digital Craft category, and many more including The Webby Awards, The One Show, ADC Global and D&AD.

Learn more about the work Unity and Media.Monks are doing to build successful B2C brands in the metaverse by tuning in to an on demand discussion between Unity’s VP of Accelerate Solutions, Ryan Peterson, and Media.Monks' SVP, Tim Dillon. Tim will discuss insider lessons and insights gained from working with major consumer brands––from getting started in the metaverse, ways to leverage a real-time 3D game engine to making a genuine impact, and more. Listen now.

This review was led by Tenx4, an agency search consultancy who specializes in helping Global B2B Brands identify the right agency partner. “We’re on a mission to fix the broken agency RFP process to be about ‘the fit’ rather than ‘the win’ and it is clear that the partnership between Unity and Media.Monks is the perfect fit,” said Ashley Cohen Chandler, Partner, Tenx4.

In addition to making digital spaces like the metaverse accessible to audiences far and wide, it’s crucial that brands offer consumers a wide variety of representational features to facilitate self-expression and secure a sense of belonging. Online you can be whoever you want—the beauty of the internet is that it has long enabled people to self-present on their own terms, but it is up to the creators behind the scenes to provide consumers with the tools to do so. 

Why are representation and self-expression in the metaverse important?

To younger generations, real-life and digital identities are equally important. The first generation that grew up with digital avatars has now come of age, and digital experiences are pivotal to shaping their identity, our virtualization report highlights. In fact, 60% of Gen Z and 62% of Gen Y “believe that how you present yourself online is more important than how you present yourself IRL.”   

Digital platforms are important spaces for identity construction, and virtual-first brands can satisfy an audience’s desire to build identity by providing accessible, personalized experiences that enable self-expression. Movements like #BlackLivesMatter and #SayHerName, which have a standing both online and offline, are driven by identity and fuel the growth of social groups connected by shared beliefs, interests or experiences. Virtual-first brands that actively engage with such new, hybrid identities are able to foster a sense of belonging for diverse audiences.  

Beyond the element of fun, the metaverse can serve as a tool for empathy. Brands play an important part in determining the metaverse’s impact on consumers. The Ancient Greek philosopher Plato once said, “you learn more about a person in an hour of play than in a lifetime of conversation.” While we’re well into the 21st century, this statement is as valid today as it was back then. 

“The metaverse gives us a shared sense of space that you don't get through 2D experiences,” says Catherine D. Henry, SVP Growth, Metaverse & Innovation Strategy. “This medium enables intellectual and emotional connections that transcend our physical bodies, allowing us to experience (once again) the purity of relationships formed as children—when people connect over interests and shared play, rather than commonalities and socially imposed signifiers. This is truly liberating, and the reason why fantastical avatars and gender fluidity in the metaverse are so important.”

Through play, people can engage with others in a fun and meaningful way and learn to get along with their peers, as seeing others from a different point of view allows people to practice empathy, our Social Innovation Lab argues. Research shows that the embodied experience of inhabiting an avatar that is physically different from oneself can lead to behavioral changes that align with that avatar and influence someone’s self-perception, suggesting one can start to see overlap between the avatar and the self. “This is important because empathy and tolerance can be fostered in virtual environments, and help bridge the social divide created by Web2,” says Henry. “The missed opportunity for brands is not so much to have games, but now it’s more about amplifying authentic, often underrepresented voices and creating space for people to learn.” So, rather than an escape from real-world problems, virtual-first brands view digital as a tool to help solve them.

Besides all the perks, digital spaces also come with problems—that’s no secret. One thing to watch out for is (unconscious) biases of creators that limit representation and self-expression, such as customization options based on stereotypes and cultural appropriation, or exclusion of customization features that people want to use, like Black hairstyles. Even more worrisome is the issue that user behavior can go against expectations. Think of how some social media platforms are used as a tool to manipulate through fake news, or how online groups are weaponized to harbor hate groups—when they could serve as a refuge for those looking for belonging. However, the metaverse is a new digital chapter and thus presents new opportunities to do better. 

So, how do we achieve representation and self-expression in the metaverse? 

Diversify avatar use and customization. Given that in the US 48% of Gen Z consider themselves non-white and one-third of Gen Z identify outside the gender binary, providing a wide variety of representational features to facilitate self-expression and belonging is essential. This means offering a range of skin tones, choice of prosthetics, hairstyles, body shapes, voices, and so on. Another important step brands can take is to keep default avatars free or cheap, and only charge (more) money for additional differentiators, like a cool jacket. That said, features for self-presentation can go beyond physical characteristics to represent a more emotive sense of self-identity as well. Adidas, for instance, partnered with Ready Player Me to create unique avatars that are based on a person’s personality rather than their physical likeness, ensuring an authentic reflection of who they are. Above all, don’t force people to show up as themselves, but allow them to choose whatever they want their avatar to (re)present in the metaverse. 

As a brand, give user-makers the tools and get out of the way. It’s crucial not to constrain user-makers, since they’re the ones forging the future of how we use the metaverse—keeping in mind that we encourage brands to be transparent about how they monitor their users’ contributions to ensure the metaverse remains a safe space for everyone. That aside, brands can invest in education and work with influencers to market the tools they offer to DIY. Duolingo is a great example of a brand that has built assets for its users to create their own games, but then got out of the way. This circles back to the point of accessibility; we need to make sure as many creators from different walks of life as possible are included in the building process to counter biases.

Allow ways to gather and group for belonging. Digital environments offer a safe space for exploring identities—and to ensure safety, brands need to establish ethics and guidelines from the get-go. Online you can be whoever you want, so people tend to feel more confident to speak up. Fortunately, many people are able to bring something from that experience back to their real lives. For instance, people from the LBGTQ+ community were able to form community support systems within social VR—and for some, this offered the only form of support as they weren’t able to access any offline. This combination of a supportive community and the embodied avatar experience empowers many in the real world and helps them understand their identities better.  

In all, the whole engine behind the metaverse world must be diversified. From executives and employees who work at the companies making the metaverse, to decision-makers at brands creating experiences in the metaverse, owners of digital environments, and influencers and user-makers—the metaverse is for everyone, so everyone should be able to contribute a building block. The issue is, many people don’t know how.

In the same vein, looking at the expected influence and impact of the metaverse, brands can integrate metaverse strategies into their ESG commitments—the possibilities to diversify are endless. 

How does this all come back to the real world?

Digital behavior inspires real-world change, that’s a fact. Conversations that take place in the metaverse expand out into other spaces, such as meet-ups, talk shows and other real-life events. In a digital environment like the metaverse, we’re able to meet people from around the world that we would’ve otherwise never met and actually get to know them on a deeper level. Some may just see avatars, but we see people who are willing to be their authentic selves in connecting with others. 

“People are more willing to be open, vulnerable and their real selves when, ironically, they're not actually in person and when they’re behind an avatar, so people have more ‘real’ experiences connecting with somebody that in real life they wouldn’t have ended up talking to,” says Susan Parker, Executive Creative Director. “And then they might take it outside the metaverse.”

The idea of people coming together in virtual environments isn’t new, as any fan of online games will tell you. But as these worlds become more mainstream, we’re seeing a shift in the role they play in our lives, whether it’s a pivot from competition to cooperation or enabling people to push beyond limits that hold them back IRL. This is virtualization in action: a set of new audience behaviors and cultural norms resulting from 30 years of digital transformation, hyper-accelerated over the past five years. These behaviors vary from one metaverse platform to the next, meaning an understanding of its culture is crucial to success in the space. In some ways, it’s not so different from identifying which city or neighborhood is the best location for a brick-and-mortar store.

Do you need to find your way into the metaverse? Don’t despair, because we’ve mapped out some of its preeminent worlds. Discover what differentiates one from the next with the information below. With a better understanding of each space, you’ll be able to better envision your brand’s place within the metaverse—wherever that may be.

Roblox.

Despite its quick rise to fame in recent years, Roblox dates back to September 2006, and today has a monthly average user base of 190 million. Its worlds are user-created, meaning they can vary drastically in look and feel; you never know what you’re going to find there. Users have the ability to develop their own assets (models, textures, audio and more), adding to the variety on the platform. This ability to create and sample a diverse array of activities is what makes it so appealing to players. Roblox is free and multiplatform—available on PC, mobile, Xbox One and VR platforms—and its developer tools are surprisingly accessible for those without deep coding experience.

More than a game, Roblox is a creation platform that has allowed millions of amateur developers to try their hand at making games and virtual environments for the first time. Players can both create and share individual assets, build robust games or simply play. The level of creation enabled by the platform, as well as its younger-skewing audience, makes it ripe for memes. Don’t expect avatars to mirror players’ physical likeness; fanciful avatars are the norm here. One great example of a brand embracing gamified elements in Roblox is the Song Breaker Awards, presented by Logitech For Creators. The experience reinvented the awards show format to be more accessible and interactive, inviting viewers to participate in a narrative that unfolded throughout the show.

Horizon Worlds.

Meta’s foray into the metaverse is the newest virtual environment on our map—and the only one that requires a headset to enter. Since its launch in December 2021, Horizon Worlds now has 350,000 monthly active users. Like Roblox, environments in Horizon Worlds are largely user-created, meaning there’s a lot of variety in the worlds you can build or step into. The Unity-powered platform has a cartoon-like look and feel, with environments ranging from the fantastical to the ordinary, like a virtual comedy club or recording studio. Based in VR, Horizon Worlds requires an Oculus headset to enter, although its creation tools are accessible and intuitive.

Built by Meta, developer of some of the biggest social platforms on the internet, Horizon Worlds is first and foremost a space to socialize and create. While users can build competitive environments, connection among communities is key. The space also lends well to cultural moments like live sports or musical performances, which users can immerse themselves within from afar. Given the platform’s connection to Facebook—users can join with an existing Facebook account, although Meta just recently announced a unique account system—avatars and identities in Horizon Worlds are meant to reflect one’s real-world identity. This also makes safety and moderation a key consideration on the platform. Speaking of identity, a stand-out Meta’s Going Beyond: Women’s History Month event, made in collaboration with the NBA, is a stand-out experience. Throughout an interview focused on representation, viewers had a front-row seat.

Minecraft.

Officially launched in November 2011, Minecraft is home to 170 million monthly average users. The blocky, open-world simulation game places users within a unique, procedurally generated landscape that they can explore and manipulate to their desire. What’s really driven Minecraft’s popularity over the decade is its marketplace of downloadable content and customization tools, allowing for the design of diverse worlds and environments. While Minecraft is a paid download, its wide availability on PC, consoles and mobile make it widely accessible to audiences.  

Minecraft’s culture is focused on building. Players take enjoyment in creating environments together and sharing them with the community—or even breaking apart pre-made environments. Users are afforded complete control of virtual spaces they inhabit, allowing for a high sense of ownership and collaboration. One of our favorite Minecraft activation is the Uncensored Library, which cleverly uses the game to circumvent state censorship and offer access to articles banned around the world. Of course, we have a soft spot for the time our VP of Platforms and Products Brook Downton built our New York office in Minecraft, too.

Fortnite.

Epic Games’ wildly popular shooter, powered by the developer’s own Unreal Engine, launched in July 2017 and boasts 280 million monthly average users. Having risen to fame at the height of the “battle royale” trend in gaming, Fortnite offers a handful of different game modes that take place on an island that grows and evolves over time. It features a cartoon-like art style, similar to what you might expect from a CGI-rendered animated film. As a free-to-play, cross-platform title available on consoles, mobile and PC, Fortnite has a very low barrier of entry for players.

Fortnite is an evolving space, refreshed seasonally with new competitive modes and events featuring limited-edition skins (avatars) depicting characters and celebrities from pop culture. The promise that there’s always something new is what keeps players coming back. In late 2021, Fortnite launched Party Worlds, or social spaces where players can access minigames, concerts, movie screenings and other content. The space demonstrates the kinds of ways that metaverse worlds can uniquely bring people together in shared, persistent social spaces.

Decentraland.

Decentraland launched in February 2020 and is frequented by 330,000 users each month. There’s a big difference between Decentraland and the other platforms mentioned above: it’s a Web3-based environment built on the Ethereum blockchain. While platforms like Roblox and Horizon Worlds invite users to jump into self-contained worlds, Decentraland is a seamless, persistent landscape in which plots of land are bought, sold and redeveloped by the community—just like in the real-world real estate. Decentraland is accessible in a browser, though the need to connect a crypto wallet can be a technical barrier of entry to users.

The culture in Decentraland is more plugged into the Web3 space and skews very digitally mature. In addition to in-world games and activities, this environment is a place to flaunt what you’ve got: art galleries designed to show off NFT collections are popular, and a bustling marketplace allows users to trade ownership of unique digital outfits and objects. Duolingo expertly captured the playfulness of the space by dropping a giant statue of Duo, its infamous mascot, into Decentraland’s leisurely Terra Zero area. Holding a billboard that cycles through snarky push notifications reminding visitors to do their language lessons, the activation cleverly emulates Duo’s pesky habit of popping up right when the leisurely activities tee off.

The Sandbox.

 Our final metaverse world covered here is also one of the oldest, having launched back in May 2012. Since then, the Sandbox is enjoyed by 300,000 monthly users. Like Decentraland, it’s a Web3-based world where users can purchase land and build their own monetized environments. The platform is relatively consistent in look and feel, taking a voxel art style reminiscent of Minecraft as a nod to its 2D roots. Available on PC and mobile platforms, the Sandbox handles onboarding very easily: new users have the choice to connect a crypto wallet or a social account if they lack one.

As far as interactions go, the Sandbox offers a mix that you’ll find in other platforms. Like Roblox, users can easily construct their own games without coding experience. A play-to-earn model rewards creators and players, incentivizing play on the platform. And similar to Decentraland, a marketplace of NFTs in the form of avatars and unique parcels of land add to the opportunities for users to earn real-world value from their digital creations. One cool example we love is a collaboration between Tony Hawk and Autograph to build the biggest skatepark in the metaverse. In addition to hanging out in the space, visitors can purchase NFTs inspired by Hawk’s career.

Find your place in the metaverse.

Just like how the universe contains too many planets to count, the metaverse is a vast space comprising unique worlds—each with their own distinct culture. From video game worlds to Web3-native environments, each platform offers different tools for people and brands to engage with one another. Before jumping into the metaverse for the sake of it, carefully consider the audience you want to reach and how your brand can uniquely add value inside the world cultivated by its community. After making the right culture fit, you’ll have made the crucial first step in building impactful, authentic metaverse experiences.

The metaverse is a natural progression of the internet, and it reflects a cultural shift brought on by the ongoing process of virtualization. The metaverse is everywhere––a universal and connected experience that transcends geographical barriers and presents exciting opportunities for brands to show up. But, the stakes are high and the barrier to entry is steeper than ever. Advertising in the metaverse shouldn’t look like advertising at all. Brands need to strike a balance between being present and being authentic by providing utility and meaning for people through creativity and technological innovation. In short, brands must create experiences people actually want. While this isn’t a new idea, marketers will have to stretch their thinking for a new, fully-virtualized medium and a highly engaged audience quick to criticize disingenuous marketing efforts.

Want your own map of the metaverse worlds? Download it below: 

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Access the issue now and you’ll learn:

• Game theory and its role in motivating choices and interaction
• How to seamlessly integrate actions between physical and virtual spaces
• How to build a sense of belonging in spaces like the metaverse by enabling a sense of play

In this frenzy, it’s easy to feel like one’s lagging behind in comparison to the big tech companies dominating the scene. But if there’s one thing we’ve learned about the metaverse it’s that no one company can build it, as it relies on the joint development of millions of people and communities under one interoperable ecosystem. And so, the fundamental questions remain: What is the metaverse? How can my brand enter it? Should I enter it?

Mike Proulx, VP and Research Director at Forrester, joined our SVP Web3, Metaverse & Innovation Strategy Catherine D. Henry and Chief Innovation Officer Henry Cowling in an episode of Meet Me in the Metaverse to discuss these questions and more. Sharing insights from his recently-launched report “Ready Player Brand: Marketing In The Metaverse,” published on May 25, 2022, by Forrester Research, Proulx discusses with our team why the metaverse is still finding its feet and what success looks like in this space.

Creating Value is a Two-Way Street

In the last few months, there’s been no lack of investments and experiments around the metaverse—but we’ve only just scratched the surface of what it may grow to be. Today, the biggest challenge is bridging the gap between marketer intent and user behavior, a disconnect whose solution relies on consumer value—and time. As Proulx explains in the episode, maturation is “predicated on the accessibility of devices, making them less intrusive, demonstrating to the everyday consumer the value that they get from immersive media.”  

As marketers, it’s our job to follow people’s interests and find them where they are. But so is creating experiences they can extract value from, especially in a space that’s still in its infancy. When it comes to the metaverse, it’s about showing people why these experiences are meaningful and why they would want to join. “If you can’t create reasons for people to come back, then it will be a flash in the pan at best,” says Cowling. “The smarter brands will be investing in and fostering community over the long term.”

In other words, fostering community calls for a long-term commitment, which is why delineating one’s goals is a critical first step in every metaverse venture. According to Proulx, “The first question all brands need to ask themselves is: what is my business objective? If it’s because everyone is doing it, that’s not a good enough objective.” Rather, making necessary strategic investments today will help you succeed in the metaverse as it matures, because the best way to learn is by doing. Start by gaining an understanding of how your target audience is experiencing XR and how it can be optimized and scaled over time.

Good Metaverse Investments Start with a Purpose

Once you’ve decided to venture into the metaverse, creating value for your consumers also hinges on what aspects you’re factoring in when choosing the right space to interact with them. As Catherine D. Henry explains, it may be tempting to pick the most popular platforms with the highest numbers of active users, but that alone does not equal good results. “Look at what communities are doing, who they are, before commuting to a platform-first strategy.”

The culture and rituals on each platform should hint at whether that’s a good match for your brand. Once you’ve found the right space, it all comes down to experimenting with an open mind and being ready to apply one’s learnings along the way. “I think a near-term opportunity that brands have to activate in this space is simply to create moments of surprise and delight in the customer journey,” says Cowling. “If you consider every digital touchpoint in the customer journey, the metaverse is a new canvas that brands can go in and imagine new experiences, new ways of creating loyalty, and ultimately conversion.”

That said, the main ROI brands can get from tapping into the metaverse today are the learnings that come with it. “I’m all for, and support and encourage, brands to test and learn right now because I don’t want them to become flat-footed as this technology and these opportunities develop,” concludes Proulx. “Don’t let yourself fall behind, but temper your expectations and temper your investments right now.”

Now is the time to test and learn. While there’s still a long way to go until the metaverse delivers on its full promise, brands can start getting acquainted with the community behaviors that will shape the future of digital and learn how to express their brand identity in ways that feel relevant and authentic. Tune in to the latest episode of Meet Me in the Metaverse to explore key considerations as you begin to build a metaverse strategy that suits your unique business objectives.