Content Marketing Today

Do Most Marketing Pioneers in Second Life Have Arrows in their Backs?

Maybe it’s time for big-time marketers to stop horsing around with the apparently faltering Second Life. Because they were paranoid about missing out on the next big thing, major consumer brands poured real megabucks into this virtual world.

As the Wall Street Journal noted, October 23 ,2007:

Companies ranging from Coca-Cola and Anheuser-Busch to Kraft Foods and Nissan showed up on Second Life with virtual marketing campaigns. Retailer American Apparel built an outlet selling virtual clothing mimicking the apparel it sells in the real world.

But despite intense media attention, Second Life has failed to draw significant amounts of traffic. The number of U.S. unique visitors to the site who used the software application that’s necessary to interact in the virtual world numbered 235,000 last month, according to comScore Media Metrix, compared with 207,000 in March. In comparison, IAC/InterActive’s Zwinktopia registered 4.4 million unique U.S. visitors last month, while Ganz USA’s Webkinz registered six million unique visitors.

As a user, you really have to want to participate in Second Life, because there is a pretty steep learning curve, before you can figure out what the heck you can do there. Conceptually, it’s intriguing. In reality–virtually speaking–it’s a bit boring for most of us who had a brief Second Life flirtation.

As it turns out, for most folks who signed up, there wasn’t nearly enough to do. So they have moved on to their next stops on the virtual world tour. And the big consumer brands are running off after them.

My advice: unless you have a very big budget that can tolerate expensive missteps, wait to see how this virtual world phenomenon shapes up before you abandon content marketing efforts that are already achieving measurable returns.