What is Metaverse?

Metaverse is a word used by science fiction writer Neal Stephenson in his novel Snow Crash, which describes the idea of a shared virtual space for people to interact with each other. This virtual space is called Metaverse, and it is considered the next-generation Internet platform. It's similar to the Web 3.0 concept – an internet that combines digital technology and the physical world to bring us an online experience that's more interactive and immersive than ever before.

These concepts have been around since the invention of cyberspace in its early age, when it was described as "a consensual hallucination experienced daily by billions of legitimate operators, in every nation" by William Gibson (the author of Neuromancer).

Metaverse is an online, shared space that allows users to interact with each other and their surroundings in a virtual reality experience. By offering a room full of people who have chosen to be there, dressed in the same virtual outfit, sitting at the same desk, and working on the same project, Metaverse has some unique advantages for marketers looking to sell products or gain brand exposure.

Marketing in Metaverse

Dynamic and entirely new, the Metaverse is the next frontier for marketers to conquer. By positioning yourself in this new space with a clear strategy, you'll be able to reach your audience when they are most open to your message.

The Metaverse is entirely different from our current reality: it will be more participatory, immersive, and conducive to experiences. With an understanding of what makes this digital space unique and how it's changing the way we interact with technology and one another, you can use that knowledge to improve your marketing strategies.

As mentioned, the Metaverse is an emerging digital world where people can meet, interact and shop in 3D spaces. Although this may not seem like the most immediate opportunity for marketers today, it's a space proliferating in popularity and usage. Just last year, Epic Games – the creators of Fortnite – closed a $1.78 billion Series-D investment round to fund their metaverse endeavors. The second-largest recipient of this funding? Improbable World's Metaverse: SpatialOS.

As adoption increases, marketers will be presented with new online real estate that must be accounted for when planning out the omnichannel marketing strategy of tomorrow. In fact, these opportunities are already here; we just need to start taking advantage of them! Nowadays you can use location-based AR games like Pokémon Go or Ingress to promote your product or service by luring players into brick & mortar locations with sponsored 'lures' and 'keys' (the latter ability was removed from Pokémon Go early on but is still a feature in Ingress). You can also place sponsored content directly within other virtual environments such as Second Life or Sansar through Direct Marketing Placements (DMPs) or Product Placements (PPs). These content placements can vary from custom branded objects within a scene (e.g., Coca-Cola vending machine) all the way up to whole virtual worlds that exist solely as an advertisement campaign or product demonstration area (e.g., Red Bull Air Race Island).

How to Market in Virtual Reality

• Marketing in virtual reality requires you to know some specifics. These include how to make good products, how to deliver them, and what kinds of products do well in virtual reality.
• You can market all sorts of things through virtual reality. This includes digital content like apps and games and physical products like cars and planes.

As you start marketing your product or service in the Metaverse, there are three main types of campaigns you should consider: Brand awareness campaigns that are targeted at specific audiences, lead generation campaigns that focus on acquiring qualified leads for sales purposes, and product research campaigns that help companies understand what consumers think about their offerings before they launch them.

To effectively market in virtual reality, you'll need to understand the possibilities and limitations of the medium and how it differs from real-world marketing.

The possibilities of marketing in virtual reality are vast and exciting, but they also come with some unique challenges. For example, people can be easily distracted in VR spaces, just like when you're reading a book or watching TV, and someone asks you a question, and you have no idea what they just said because you weren't paying attention. To make your message clear to your audience in VR, you'll need to figure out how to grab their attention and hold it for long enough for them to absorb what you're trying to say. And that's where things get interesting...

Virtual Reality Marketing Ideas

• Virtual Reality Shopping

If you run a retail business and have a physical location, virtual shopping is an excellent way to engage your customers in a new way. The beauty of offering a virtual shopping experience is that it gives people who wouldn't usually be able to shop at your store the chance to do so. With VR, they can walk around and explore your stores just as if they were there, putting them right into the action with all of the products on display.

• Virtual Reality Gaming

Game developers have already been using VR in some video games for years, but imagine combining virtual reality with board games like Monopoly or Clue! It could give gameplay an entirely new dimension -- quite literally -- that players would rave about for days after playing. People love sharing their experiences and "bragging rights" about things they've done or places they've gone, so why not let them brag about being part of the first round of players in this new version of their favorite game?

• Virtual Reality Brand Experiences:

In addition to hosting promotional events such as these, you can develop content that promotes brands and find new ways to interact with customers via VR experiences rather than selling them something outright while they're trying out your product! For instance, I was once sent a VR experience where I was given 10 seconds at an exclusive beach location filled with other celebrities at an event sponsored by my favorite cosmetics company!

• Virtual Reality Tours:

Another great way to promote your products is by making tours available around various destinations (whether cities worldwide or within the same city).

We're excited to see the next steps for Metaverse and virtual reality. We anticipate it will be used for several things, from communication to education and entertainment. We're eager to see what impact this technology will have on society.