Definitions.
Being a Geriatric-Millennial, I’m used to looking up words on a dictionary, so when I decided to write a post to try and better define what The Metaverse is, I started with Merriam-Webster. Unfortunately they don’t have have an official definition (I’d bet an ETH or two they will soon):
I then tried Dictionary.com, who I’m guessing are less formal on adding new words, and found this:
Basically a mix of Minority Report, The Matrix, Her, Blade Runner, and Ready Player One.
Fun right?!
Why would Marketers suddenly be talking about this Nerd’s dream/nightmare all day long? Because it’s both the shiniest of shiny new things (hype), and in other ways the future we are all likely to be living in soon(ish).
It has become, in a surprisingly short time, the single most used buzz word with the widest variety of definitions that I’ve seen in my career, and I’ve been in Advertising for 15 years. This sudden craze reminds me of when Social started, or Influencer Marketing became a thing, people in our industry suddenly became experts and were selling all sorts of things to brands. Want to see what I mean? Check this LinkedIn search:
10,000 people on Linkedin have Metaverse in their profiles. Ten Thousand people work on something that doesn’t exist and isn’t clearly defined. What do they all do?
2,280 open Metaverse jobs in the US. To be fair, many are from Meta who has allocated $10B to building their presence in the Metaverse, but still, there’s a lot of people looking to spend and make money here.
There have been tens of thousands of articles on this topic and we’re nowhere near having a better understanding of what it really is and why Marketers should care. I don’t think we will for a long time, but I will try my best to give you a clear explanation of the vision for The Metaverse, the current reality, and what brands should really focus on today instead of being distracted. There are many other sides of this I won’t touch for now, technical, philosophical, moral, etc., but I will revisit some in the future as things evolve.
Here’s a brief chronology of the term, why it’s now EVERYWHERE, and why it’s so confusing:
Origins of the term:
The term was coined by science fiction writer Neal Stephenson in his 1992 novel Snow Crash to describe a centralized virtual world that people connect to, very much like what we see in Ready Player One. It’s a great book by the way, highly recommend it if you like science-fiction. If you don’t like science fiction, you should, it’s a great way to explore future possibilities.
Evolution of the vision:
Since then it started morphing into a vision to describe a decentralized and interconnected world where the digital and the physical merge into one. Matthew Ball, previously of Amazon Studios and now involved in a number of Venture Funds, has rapidly become the leading Metaverse thinker/storyteller. If you really want to understand the vision and all its building blocks, check out his brilliant Metaverse Primers.
He’s even built a Metaverse Index Fund (I’m a very very very small investor in the ETF) that shows you what companies he believes are building the future of the Internet, i.e. The Metaverse. Most useful to understanding what to pay attention to is his analysis of the components that are required for The Metaverse to happen:
Everyone jumps on the Bandwagon:
Suddenly in 2021 we started seeing a slew of big corporations jump onto the Metaverse bandwagon, turning the noise to 11. Every single tech company seems to be touting their own Metaverse: Facebook changing their name to Meta, Microsoft announcing a lot of things that somehow converge into Teams being a Metaverse, Activision, Epic, Riot Games, and many more gaming companies embracing The Metaverse narrative. In parallel we have the explosion of NFTs and Web3 companies that are building new virtual worlds on the blockchain, Decentraland, Sandbox, and more.
All clear?
What it really means for brands today.
In simplest terms The Metaverse is a vision of the future, in some ways the next version of the internet, one that bleeds into the offline world once and for all.
It’s not one virtual world, game, or VR experience where we all have no legs and sit in the same boring meeting we would normally attend in real life that should have been an email. It’s going to be a collection of technologies that allow us to interact with each other and the world around us in a lot more interesting, imaginative and powerful ways. Gaming is certainly a huge part of that, VR will play a part, AR I think an even bigger part (no coincidence Apple already talks a big game here and has been rumored to be close to a big announcement, as is Google). Some strongly believe that the only way this happens is by moving to a Blockchain based internet, i.e. Web3.
This future is years, maybe decades away, so the best way for brands to start getting involved is to look at the building blocks of The Metaverse and focus on those that best align with their Marketing strategy, appetite for experimentation, and risk tolerance. Ignore the hype and the snake oil salesmen who will call anything remotely digital “The Metaverse!” and try to sell you something you don’t need. There’s also a lot of controversy surrounding these emerging spaces, fraud and scams in the Crypto/NFT world, debates on whether any of this is good for young people, increased polarization of society, etc. For any brand choosing to step into these areas I think it’s critical they think very carefully about what and who you’re associating with.
Here are the consumer facing building blocks of what will one day (maybe) be known as The Metaverse, ones that brands can play a meaningful role in today. These all flow into each other, but I think it’s easier to look at them one by one and then at how they connect:
My plan is to dig into each one of these in the coming weeks, looking at what brands are currently doing, successfully and not, and where they’re heading.
Why I’m Skeptical.
The word Metaverse means absolutely nothing right now and is being thrown around to describe all manners of things. Yes the Pandemic has accelerated existing trends around our lives becoming more digital and interconnected, but claims of life never being the same seem exaggerated in the short term. Too many use this word without an agreed meaning to sell things to brands under the threat that they either get with the program now or will be forever lost. I don’t believe that to be true at all. There’s a frenetic urgency attached to this word, Metaverse, that will cause many to waste money and tarnish their brands unless they take the time to separate what’s real from what’s just hype, noise and in some cases, scams. I’m skeptical also because marketers tend to see new technology as blunt instruments to bludgeon consumers with to get their attention. We’ve already seen many examples of brands “Metaversing” in all sorts of cringe worthy ways, technology doth not make you cool if you’re not already.
Why I’m Optimistic.
There are undoubtedly big things happening in the areas I mention above that brands have been playing in and should continue to do so. Consumers, especially young ones, are increasingly building their lives online in ways that more closely mimic the real world. Gaming, VR, AR, Digital Identity and Assets are not new concepts or realities, but we are getting closer to mass adoption in ways we’ve never seen before. I’m optimistic because Marketers who don’t get distracted by shiny toys and understand that people’s behaviors don’t drastically change because of new technology will be able to continue building things that consumers engage with. These innovations offer us chances to create incredibly imaginative experiences for consumers like never before. Knowing that most brands will instead clumsily try to place ad-like-objects everywhere they can, smart clients and agencies can stand out and maybe, just maybe, help build a better way to engage with consumers than bludgeoning them with an ad.
There’s way too much hype and noise out there, but there are also very exciting things happening. Whenever someone uses the word “Metaverse”, look them in the eyes and say:
Stop. Put down the buzz word and tell me what you’re really trying to do here. Maybe it’s great, maybe it’s shit, but it definitely isn’t the Metaverse. Not yet, and that’s OK