Monetizing Virtual Worlds
A few weeks ago at a Future of Media event, I watched an inspirational presentation by Craig Tattersall, Gaming Strategy Director at GEEIQ, a company providing insights and strategy in gaming and virtual worlds to brands such as L'Oréal, Walmart, Versace, and the BBC.
What particularly caught my attention were the latest figures on audience engagement. They are mind-blowing and dwarf those of social media, which is also much higher than traditional media.
It was very natural for me then to ambush Craig at the end of the session and invite him to the "not just ADZ" podcast.
The rationale behind it deserves some analysis, especially in an industry split into tribes that are, more often than not, ignoring each other. Just think about how in traditional media the separate worlds of audience revenue/subscriptions and advertising exist.
Traditional media must evolve. Products and channels, the way audiences consume content become obsolete, but quality content never will. It is paramount for the sector to stay young and curious about trends and developments, and not just focus on the topics circulating in individual echo-chambers.
What is the future for content consumption?
The younger generations of today will be the older audiences of tomorrow: are we expecting them to wear some slippers at 50 and start reading print?
There are a lot of learnings from virtual worlds. There are two points made by Craig that I will take away from our conversation:
1) Succeeding in gaming and virtual worlds requires tapping into culture. It means being audience-centric, understanding audiences, their priorities and expectations. It requires also a sophisticated approach to audience diversification, as it cannot be considered and treated as a unique block. I'm posting in the comments below an article I wrote a few months ago on the nuances and requirements for such an approach.
2) Younger generations smell inauthentic approaches in their digital interactions miles away. It reinforces the previous point and highlights the need for a "first-party" mentality. A direct relationship. Dead and buried is the "third-party" world.
Enjoy the full video below!
