Published on the 23/09/2022 | Written by Heather Wright

Unilever and ANZ Bank offer insights…

Wherever your customers want to do business, you should be interested in – and right now, consumers are shifting towards metaverse experiences.

That’s according to panellists on a recent Trans-Tasman Business Circle webinar, who say their businesses are among the many experimenting in the metaverse and trying to find the business models to drive real business value from the metaverse.   

“What we are seeing is that customers have and are shifting towards metaverse experiences and we are really seeing that those virtual worlds and gaming are driving mainstream culture,” Sarah Sorrenson, Unilever A/NZ media and digital hub director, says. 

“If our customers are moving, we want to follow – or ideally lead.”

“From a brand perspective, we really want to be where consumers are consuming culture, so it is becoming bigger business and bigger opportunities for brands, and that’s why from a brand perspective the hype is kind of real and important for us to test.” 

Nigel Dobson, ANZ banking services portfolio lead, agrees. He says while metaverse is currently in an elevated phase of the hype cycle finding business models that make sense and are going to be sustained will drive the metaverse concept beyond the hype cycle.  

Marty Resnick, a vice president on Gartner’s Technology Innovation team, told attendees at the recent Gartner IT Symposium on the Gold Coast, that the metaverse comes with ‘lots of hype, lots of scope, lots of opportunities, lots of cautions’. 

He says the number one call he now gets is ‘what is the metaverse’? for the record, Gartner defines it as ‘a collective virtual shared space created by the convergence of virtually enhanced physical and digital reality’. 

“It’s the next level of interaction in the virtual and physical worlds. We can’t lose the physical aspect of it. It’s not about putting on VR glasses and going into another world,” he says. 

And don’t be expecting a single metaverse, either, he cautioned. Instead what we see is emerging metaverses.  

He identified three areas for a ‘complete’ metaverse – transporting people to another world (not necessarily through VR); transforming the physical world through technologies such as augmented or mixed reality, or more so spatial computing; and transacting. 

“Web 3.0 right now is the economy and structure of the metaverse. When we look at blockchain, crypto, NFT, we think that is going to be the economy and infrastructure of the metaverse. 

“That transact area has yet to be defined.” 

Dobson says the persistent nature of the metaverse – in that it continues to function and evolve even when the user isn’t in it – distinguishes it from typical gaming experiences. 

“This persistent virtual community, including the creation of virtual assets is an extremely interesting development and one that traditional supporters of the digital economy, like banks, should be planning for,” Dobson says.    

Sorrensen says she’s seeing a number of ways to create brand loyalty in the metaverse. 

“When consumers are interacting within the metaverse or these gaming environments, ensuring brands are there in the communities they’re creating is one way to create brand loyalty. 

“Another we are seeing is the opportunity to create really unique experiences within the metaverse as a key way of building brand loyalty.” 

She cites the example of Adidas which partnered with Bored Ape to create a series of NFTs. Purchasers of the NFTs could unlock exclusive digital and physical merchandise from Adidas along with unique content and virtual experiences.  

“It was really creating something in the metaverse that you weren’t able to achieve without participating in it and that really created a connection with the brand.” 

In South East Asia, Unilever enabled couples to ‘immortalise their love on the blockchain’ with an opportunity to mint their own NFT marriage certificate in another effort to build brand loyalty – and love. 

It’s not just about brand loyalty, with companies keen to create virtual experiences that create real world payoffs too.  

Nike’s Nikelands, in Roblock, provides a virtual gaming experience, enabling users to learn about the Nike story, interact with products and create their own virtual Nike sneakers which can then be purchased in certain stores – though not in Australia and New Zealand. 

“You’re not only creating virtual sneakers your avatar can wear and purchasing those, but they are also creating value in the real world with you purchasing those sneakers you have designed in the virtual world.” 

Those virtual purchases too are creating value for brands. 

Closer to home, the Australian Open served up NFT artwork linked to plots on the tennis court. Its Art Ball NFTs were linked to live match data, with each NFT linked to plots on the tennis court. If the real world championship points landed on your plot, you received the tennis ball used in the championship point with the artwork on it associated with the purchased NFT. 

Australia’s Naked Life Beverages meanwhile, became the first local customer hosted in the ANZ Worldline Payment Solution showroom in Decentraland earlier this year.  

“It’s an example of how we are working with customers taking first steps into the metaverse, but also bringing with it commerce, transactions and the ability to settle,” Dobson says.  

That’s providing a testing ground for whether genuine commerce is feasible – commerce which Dobson notes needs to be ‘enforceable commerce with recourse and all we expect’. 

“We think there are opportunities and the ROI metrics are not going to be that different from our current physical world returns or the business models that survived on the internet,” he says.  

For Sorrenson, measuring ROI when it comes to brand loyalty, still has some way to go.  

She says while it should be measured in the same way any type of interaction, physical or virtual, is, how you capture that in the metaverse is still being worked out. 

“In our business globally we’re looking at that, but wouldn’t profess to have worked out exactly how to track the reaction you get from activations in the metaverse,” she says. 

“The principles of how you measure impact remain the same regardless of the world, virtual or not.  

“So we would be looking at understanding brand value but also revenue generated through activations or experiences on the metaverse. The challenge that is in front of all of us is how you specifically measure in that environment that is still be conceptualised and built.” 

Banking on tokens 

For banks, Dobson says tokens are ‘a really important component and where banks can play’. 

Historically, cryptocurrency has been the primary means of settlement in decentralised venues, but Dobson says it’s not for everyone and for the meta audience to expand and feel a sense of comfort and trust a more stable and trusted means of value settlement is required.  

“We see increasingly commercial opportunities where our customers and their brands will want to be situated in the metaverse, but there will also be this sense of ‘I want to buy something, own something’.  

“In a persistent world, ownership rights really matter and you want to be able to store assets and value so that’s why use of smart contracts on chain secured with native coins that could be issued by a bank is a really important development.” 

The bank has already created a stable coin – the A$DC – that can interact on a range of blockchains.  

There are, of course, plenty of issues to be ironed out still. Australian eSafety Commissioner Julie Inman urged the need to ensure safety is built in, from the beginning.  

“The threats in the multiverse are going to be the same threats we see today, just on steroids, and this includes child sexual exploitation,” she says. 

The addition of haptics stimulating the sense of touch, adds to the complexities and potential dangers – as well as opportunities, she says.  

“It’s not just about privacy and security, but adding the reduction in personal harms and online safety. None of this is going to happen spontaneously. 

“There is an opportunity for us to learn the lessons of the Web 2.0 world and think about how to create a more civil, less toxic metaverse for the future and build in protections now.” 

Whatever the future, Sorrensen, Dobson and Resnick are all urging businesses to at least start testing and, says Resnick ‘cautiously investing’ in the metaverse or at the very least exploring it in detail. 

“We tend to think of the metaverse as really futuristic concept, but we’re seeing consumer behaviour, business behaviour really embracing the new era of the internet and we’re seeing consumers really asking brands to participate,” Sorrenson says. “Organisations should test, learn, and understand how to engage within the metaverse.” 

Adds Dobson: “If our customers are moving, we want to follow – or ideally lead and be there waiting for them to present them with choices and options. This is an example of where the operating model of commerce is changing and we have to move with operating.”