Evidence Based Posting 4/23

Evidence Based Posting 4/23

I believe that virtual worlds such as Second Life will create a new world of opportunity for companies and retailers to advertise and in turn, build profit. Think about this: in October, 2006, Second Life welcomed its millionth resident. Now there are almost 6,000,000 users with 1,683,013 logging in, in just the last 60 days. The increase is astounding! If the amount of users logging in stayed the same, in one year there would be over 15,000,000 users.

As I walked through Second Life I’m astounded by the possibilities and opportunities businesses and individuals have to market towards avatars. For example, did anyone notice the Barack Obama sign outside of Dewey’s house? With the national election coming up I expect to see many more individuals promoting the candidate of their choice for president. And why not? There are over 5,000,000 people you can reach at the present time.

Right now in Second Life there are several companies making a presence there including: Nisson, Toyota, IBM, Adidas, Sun Microsystems etc. Dell even has its own island where avatars can purchase PCs for their real life or virtual PCs for their Second Life. Businesses can create quite a nice place in second life for practically no money at all. Making it a wise business decision, in terms of budget. Getting your message across to possibly millions of people for very little money at all seems like a no-brainer to me.

I am anxious to see what the future holds for marketing in Second Life.

Evidence:

Tom Krazit “Dell Opens Virtual Outpost in Second Life” 15 November 2006, <http://hardware.silicon.com/desktops/0,39024645,39164083,00.htm?r=1> (16 April, 2007)

Jo Best “How Second Life changes Customer Service” 10 April, 2007,
<http://businessweek.com/globalbiz/content/apr2007/gb20070410_481047.htm?chan=top+news_top+news+index_global+business> (17 April, 2007)