Value Creation In The Metaverse !

As with the previous jumps in technology (think the emergence of the internet, social media, mobile, and cloud) new strategies can quickly become table stakes. This is the case with the metaverse as well, which is a new iteration of the internet.

Here are some quick facts:

• $120b+ in investments has flown into the metaverse in 2022.

• More than 15% of corporate revenue is expected to be generated in the metaverse by 2028.

• 79% of active consumers on the metaverse have made a purchase.

Reports showcase that the metaverse will generate up to $5 trillion in value by 2030. This makes it too big for companies to ignore. It will significantly impact our personal and professional lives and unlock substantial value for companies.

Everything from employee involvement to customer experience, multichannel sales and marketing, product innovation, and community creation can be influenced by the metaverse. For businesses, the significance of an immersive, persistent and decentralised digital environment will be enormous.

In this insight, we’ll examine the fundamentals of the metaverse, the metaverse report by McKinsey, and actions leaders and businesses should consider for value creation. You can also reach out to Growth Jockey to help your business unlock its full potential in the metaverse.

Demystifying The Metaverse

The metaverse is still being defined, both physically and metaphorically. The consensus is the metaverse is the next form of the internet. The big difference? It’s something we are immersed in, rather than something we just view. Its potential to unleash the next wave of digital evolution appears to be growing, with real-world benefits already surfacing for individuals and businesses.

For brands, it’s the front end of the business and is the future of how humans will interact with the internet. A digital experience is currently accessed through a variety of physical devices, such as consoles, mobiles, televisions, desktops and laptops, VR headsets, and others. The metaverse will ease this human-to-hardware friction over time, making the experience more fluid and natural.

It should be noted that the metaverse is not limited to Augmented Reality (AR) or Virtual Reality (VR). They are crucial interfaces for assisting people in experiencing the metaverse and pointing to some of its more fascinating experiences. However, AR and VR are only two of the numerous ways individuals may connect with the metaverse, alongside smartphones and laptops. In the future, we may access metaverse platforms using quite diverse gadgets.

The metaverse’s impact is so big because it allows us to correct many of the flaws in the present version of the internet. The social web is largely a publishing and consumption medium with just the most basic types of interaction built in.

The roadmap for success in the metaverse begins with providing meaning, with the help of rich and immersive experiences. This will flip the business model to allow communities to enjoy the economic rewards of the virtual environments they construct. The bottom line? Value creation is the word of the hour.

Interoperability- The Key To Value Creation

Bloomberg Intelligence’s metaverse report 2022 states that the metaverse is predicted to become an $80 billion industry by 2024.

‘Facebook’s metaverse’, Reddit users believe, is the next generation of its social networking, communications, and e-commerce platform. Immersive gaming and self-service features are being used by Electronic Arts and Roblox to enable customers to produce and monetise new forms of content. Salesforce and other SaaS companies are exploring how their metaverses may leverage 360-degree customer experiences to increase loyalty.

However, there’s a catch. Today's emerging metaverses are fortified walled gardens. It's more along the path of a multiverse than a metaverse. They are a vast collection of diverse platforms, each tethered to its own distributed ledger technology. There is no means to interact or operate across them. This gives rise to the question: how can we get from a multiverse to an actual metaverse? In a nutshell, the answer is interoperability.

The advantages of interoperability are enormous.

• With interoperability, individuals may freely transfer themselves, products, and money between ecosystems without changing their identities. Anyone in a Web 3.0-enabled, fully interoperable metaverse might simply and efficiently move their digital identities, NFTs, and currencies between platforms.

• It allows individuals to have a more unified experience, mimicking the real world. This will give rise to a more portable and seamless VR metaverse experience.

Free movement between major metaverses is essential to creating proper value and using this invention to the fullest.

How Can The Metaverse Create Value For Businesses?

Satya Nadella, Microsoft CEO quotes, “The metaverse is here, and it’s not only transforming how we see the world but how we participate in it – from the factory floor to the meeting room.”

As world builders investigate value creation, they are also building the ecology for value exchange, which involves

• Platform participants (for example, Meta, Decentraland, and Sandbox).

• Assets, materials, levels, immersive layers, and hardware are contributed by developers and creators.

• Organisations and companies that engage consumers in virtual worlds, establish destinations on virtual lands, set up shops for commerce, training, or recruiting or even develop their purpose-built worlds.

• Enterprises that provide infrastructure and services that support design standards, transactions, currencies, smart contracts, and blockchains.

The Growing Need For A New CMO (Chief Metaverse Officer)

Brands know that the metaverse is the next big thing and they don’t want to miss the party. Thus, they are creating multiple universes and job positions specifically to target metaverse consumers.

For instance, Disney has appointed Mark Bozon to help oversee the company’s push into the metaverse. LEGO invested in Epic Games, which is the maker of Fortnite. Luxury brand Balenciaga has also created a metaverse division. Joanna Popper is the Chief Metaverse Officer of CAA. Nike has Nikeland in Roblox and Wendy’s has had an event in Fortnite and a presence on Horizon Worlds.

Nowadays, businesses are frequently shifting digital budgets to metaverse-related campaigns, across almost every industry. McKinsey research states, more than $120 billion was invested into metaverse companies in 2022, which was more than double the $57 billion invested in 2021.

According to metaverse Reddit, this is being done to align the physical with the digital. We all know that businesses are present where the consumers are. If the reports are right, more than 60% of consumers are excited about the transition of daily activities to the metaverse. This number is only going to keep growing. It makes sense to enter the scene beforehand to avoid the mistakes of the past. Brands are investing early and are ready to provide digital-first experiences.

What You Can Do?

These are some strategies that your brand can use to create value in the metaverse. You can always reach out to Growth Jockey and we’ll help you analyze your needs and strategies to ace the metaverse game!

- Develop a value-focused strategy: It makes sense to define your business goals and the role you want to play that will generate value. Jot down your metaverse goals. Do you want to generate demand across existing and new segments? Or do you want to build communities and create a new revenue stream? Also, work out what exactly you’ll be doing in the metaverse. This could be anything from building experiences to facilitating interactions and enabling infrastructure.

- Test, learn, and adapt: Launch initial campaigns, monitor results and refine. As they say, trial and error is the way to go. Explore opportunities such as NFTs, immersive experiences, native advertising, and having a metaverse presence. Monitor the results with the right metrics and test out long-term monetisation options. Finally, examining consumer behaviour on different platforms. Research, research, research!

- Prepare to scale: Identify and begin scaling capabilities by finding the necessary individuals and developing the appropriate technological infrastructure. Incorporate the metaverse into your company strategy and operational model, while clearly outlining who will lead projects inside your organisation.

Confused? Don’t fret! Growth Jockey is here to help!

The Bottomline

State-of-the-art technology is the backbone of the metaverse. It’s the engine behind it and the enabler of this special place. However, like any other space, maximising the user experience is crucial to becoming successful, even in the metaverse. Focusing on the human experience within the metaverse is a must, not an option. To reap the full benefits and opportunities of the metaverse, brands, companies, and agencies have a responsibility to design positive experiences for consumers, end-users, and citizens.

Another thing to focus on is creativity. Value creation for businesses occurs when technologies combine with creativity to build value for and with communities in this virtual world.

Companies that prioritise diversity and representation in their digital world will see active participation. Brands that adopt content development tactics that allow them to create rich and engaging experiences at scale will enjoy better returns. Only those that engage in two-way connections and distribute the wealth produced, to the communities that inhabit them will survive and thrive. Companies who believe they can simply throw money at the metaverse to generate new income? They will be left behind as their revenues bleed to a new generation of market leaders.

Are you ready to make the transition to the metaverse? Growth Jockey will help you understand, strategise and implement a growth plan for you!

At Growth Jockey, we are fully committed to crafting personalized solutions that effectively address the crucial challenges faced by our clients across diverse industries. Regardless of the size of your company, whether it's a small-scale enterprise or a large corporation, you can now explore the potential of the metaverse. Take the decisive step towards unlocking the next level of growth for your brand by contacting us today!