Marketers at NFT.NYC positive about brand building in the meta-verse

Marketers seemed unwavering in their zeal for NFTs. The price of crypto is down – by an estimated $ 2 trillion since November – and high prices for NFTs have faded. Most NFTs are purchased using cryptocurrencies. And as the crypto market has declined, so has the value of digital collectibles.

Some companies may fail because of it, but the industry is going through a necessary maturation process, said Julian Holguin, CEO of Doodles, a collection of 10,000 NFTs.

“At the end of the day … I think you’re leaving [to] “See many unique utility cases from people who treated them as lifetime projects and real businesses – not just a way to generate some quick capital,” he said. “The future is incredibly bright.”

Companies including Samsung Electronics Co.

virtual world platform The Sandbox, and Paramount Global’s Nickelodeon held events alongside the conference last week to showcase the future of NFTs, Metaverset and Web3.

Many buyers of NFTs hope to use their digital collectibles in the metaverse, a term used to describe virtual worlds. Web3 is a form of decentralized internet built on the blockchain, which is the same technology that underlies cryptocurrencies.

Many companies at NFT.NYC talked about how customers can take advantage of brands that create NFTs and go into the metaverse, said Jeff MacDonald, director of social strategy at Mekanism, an advertising agency recently acquired by marketing company Plus Company.

“They show real – world examples of how, if you’re a loyal customer, or if you buy our product early, you’ll see an upside, whether it’s a financial upside or a boast,” he said.

Companies like Gucci and Samsung have rushed to create NFTs or set up countries in the metaverse to attract younger consumers, freshen up their brands and generate new revenue streams.

Many NFT projects now range from virtual evanescence to longevity, with years-long product roadmaps and plans to expand beyond digital art collectibles.

For example, Doodles announced that they had hired rapper Pharrell Williams as their new brand manager. As part of his appointment, Mr. Williams will produce an album for the Doodles community.

“Brand partnership is a very big part of the roadmap because it brings new audiences to the table and hopefully, in some cases, can actually make our product better,” said Mr. Holguin, who joined Doodles last month from Billboard, where he was president.

Cool Cats Group LLC, another NFT community, created an immersive pop-up experience outside the conference that allowed both NFT holders and unconverted to earn points and purchase items such as needles, stuffed animals and clothing. The company wants to increase the way people experience the brand when it is expanded from an NFT collection to other projects.

“We want to get to the point where it’s either plush, or toys or vinyls, or animated series or a game – we have as many points of inclusion and accessibility as people can relate to,” said Evan Luza, one of the founders. of Cool Cats.

Even NFT projects that exploit nostalgia appeared at the conference, and suggested how brands that already have a dedicated fanbase can enter Web3.

An example of this was Neopets, a pet collector game popular in the early 2000s that has expanded to include a new experience, Neopets Metaverse. It gave a preview of what the virtual world will look and feel like, as it also gave away stickers and stuffed animals.

Brands with existing fans should think of Web3 as another form of content to expand to, said Carlin West, founder and CEO of Carlin West Agency LLC, the official licensing partner of Neopets, which is owned by JumpStart Games Inc.

“It’s very important for brands to reinvent themselves,” West said. “They should not change the grades. They should change platforms, stories and expand the narrative. “

Also in the nostalgia category, Nickelodeon releases an NFT project in July, and sells 10,000 profile pictures of the network’s characters – from “Rugrats”, “Hi Arnold!” and others – for $ 50 each. It’s another way for Nickelodeon to engage fans and introduce a new kind of storytelling, said Zach Bruch, CEO and co-founder of Recur Forever Inc., an NFT collector platform.

“People will begin to recognize that NFTs are an incredible tool for community, and an incredible way to have an engaging experience with the audience,” Bruch said.

Whether marketers develop NFT projects or go into the metaverse, they will need to become better at evaluating gamification tactics to gain consumer trust and loyalty, said Michelle Crossan-Matos, Marketing Manager at Samsung Electronics America.

“Marketers need to learn how to play, how to design games, how to really be in the moment, can swing if there is a challenge, if something can be made even stronger, that does not really exist today,” said Ms. Crossan-Matos.

This month, Samsung set up a server on Discord Inc., a chat startup, and reached more than 100,000 members in 12 hours, the company said. Back in January, the electronics giant created a virtual world called the Samsung 837X in Decentraland, a metaverse platform.

Brands would do well to build a community first before creating NFT or metaverse projects, commented Mr. MacDonald of Mechanism.

“Brands that understand the core value of the communities, they are going to persevere,” said Mr. MacDonald. “They’re going to be the ones who still see success.”

Write to Ann-Marie Alcántara at [email protected]