By David L. Rawle
Marketing Matters

There’s a major new market inhabited by about 5 million people. It’s the Second Life Web site, www.secondlife.com, and smart marketers are flocking to this virtual world in order to get in touch with reality.

This virtual community has become a hotbed of research opportunities for those of us who work in marketing and communications.

It makes sense that one of our staff members already on Second Life is our director of research.

Most of us are seriously time-starved. We are challenged enough to find the time to do what we need and want to do in the “real” world. How can we ever make time for a virtual world?

The answer is that even if we don’t, millions of people do. And, within the last 24 hours, chances are that around $2 million was spent on the Second Life site.

Self-described as “a 3-D online digital world imagined, created and owned by its residents,” Second Life enables participants to choose an identity, which is called an avatar, convert dollars to the site’s proprietary currency and engage in as wide (if not wider) a range of activities as is provided in the real world.

Virtual products are bought and sold, and virtual advertising agencies provide a wide variety of marketing and communications services. Companies like Coca-Cola, American Apparel, Adidas and Starwood Hotels have an active presence on Second Life.

And already several major real world agencies, such as Leo Burnett, Edelman, and GSD&M, have created virtual counterparts.

So, what’s this all about?

Traditional advertising was created in an interruption model. You’re reading a newspaper or watching television and your editorial experience is interrupted by an ad. The relevance of this model has been changing rapidly as the Internet enables people to read and see pretty much whatever they want, whenever they want it. Consumers want a marketing experience that is interactive and customized to their needs. They want to share an experience; they don’t want to be sold to.

While the real world of marketing and communications is moving in that direction, the virtual world of sites like Second Life is already there.

Marketers succeed in the Second Life world by building a relationship and creating content that adds value. It’s a two-way dialogue. Purchase experiences are easy and even playful, quite different from their often-stressful real-world counterparts.

In the virtual world, you take a more lifestyle approach to marketing. You simply cannot push a product on an avatar. You need to create the right environment, make it fun and engage them. If your presence isn’t interactive and immersive, you will not succeed.

There are more practical aspects as well.

You can test a store design or product offering in the Second Life space, and then apply what you’ve learned to what you actually do in the real world.

It’s a different world, to be sure. But it’s the world of the not-too-distant future.

By participating in the virtual world, we can be better equipped to effectively market and communicate in the real world, because the virtual world is a laboratory for the future.

Exist in it now and the trends you might not be adequately sensing become so much more apparent to you. You will know where our culture is going tomorrow and therefore be a more effective marketer today.

David L. Rawle is chairman of Charleston-based Rawle Murdy Associates Inc., a marketing, advertising and public relations firm. E-mail him at drawle@rawlemurdy.com or visit his blog at davidrawle.blogspot.com.

SUBSCRIBE | REPRINTS | CONTACT US

Phone: 843-849-3100    Fax: 843-849-3122