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Second Life Pros

Ignore Second Life at your own peril!

by sbrunozzi on April 24th, 2008

http://www.virtualworldsnews.com/2008/04/mckinsey-compan.html

McKinsey & Company, a famous management consulting firm (wikipedia), is deeply involved in virtual worlds, and Second Life.

From a news source:
An unnamed senior consultant told the Times Online that companies “absolutely” should be “experimenting in virtual worlds” to attract customers under 30 and were “ignoring them at their peril.”

I agree: virtual worlds, and social networks, will be HUGE, and companies can’t ignore them NOW. Investing in them only when they become the most important thing in the world will be too late.

What’s your take on this?

Tags: mckinsey, second life, virtual worlds

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Robert
Apr 24, 2008 at 12:27 pm

I agree - to an extent. There simply is no way to gauge whether the virtual world community will bend to the whims of its advertisers. Like almost every other marketing phenomenon, I strongly believe that it has to be first embraced by “purists” that will comprise its core user base before truly becoming attractive to the masses. That being said, as long as their “virtual world” strategy is not cost-prohibitive (by that, I mean that it’s cheap to get into and not an atrocious loss to get out of if it fails) then it’s definitely worth looking into for select markets.
sbrunozzi
Apr 24, 2008 at 1:31 pm

Thanks Robert!
A agree with you… that’s why companies HAVE to invest now, before it’s too late :-)
Laura Spencer
Apr 25, 2008 at 1:38 pm

Very interesting! I’ve heard of companies actually buying advertising in virtual worlds.
sbrunozzi
Apr 25, 2008 at 1:41 pm

Correct, Laura, but they’re still unsecure about the professionality of advertising firms in virtual worlds.
Bigger investments will come when we’ll see solid firms out there.
Karl Staib - Your Work Happiness Matters
Apr 26, 2008 at 3:51 pm

Information is probably the top 5 money maker in the world, maybe oil and a few others might be higher, but I don’t think that will last. So companies should get out to the public, informing them about how they can help improve their lives. That’s how they will educate people to use their products instead of another company’s.

Great point!
sbrunozzi
Apr 26, 2008 at 4:48 pm

Thanks Karl! I definitively agree with you (that’s why someone calls the 21st century “the information age”).
Jean Murray
Apr 28, 2008 at 9:08 pm

Is there a way to find out if the people I want to market to (people starting health care practices) are actually out in Second Life, before I go wandering around in there? (Sorry for my ignorance)
sbrunozzi
Apr 29, 2008 at 4:37 am

Jean: best thing to do is find the right Mailing List (like SLED, Second Life EDucators, for educators and professors), look on groups.google.com.

Let me know if you find something relevant.
:-)