Some thoughts on the metaverse Some thoughts on the metaverse

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Good morning, Marketers, and here are some cheerful thoughts about the metaverse.

You have your metaverse marketing strategy in place, right? No, I thought not, and don’t worry because according to the experts I talk to we are going to be waiting a couple of years before it actually exists. And let me tell you, it’s strange to be researching a story about something that doesn’t exist.

Thanks to VR and video games, of course, one has some idea of what the metaverse will be like. It seems such an inviting place. People, including the vulnerable and the young, will be able to cut themselves off from reality even more decisively than when playing an immersive video game. They’ll be able to do so for many hours at a stretch, wandering (virtually) through an environment, large parts of which are likely to be controlled by Facebook or Google or other giant companies that have proved so capable of creating safe digital environments, enhancing both our mental health and our social interactions.

Okay, you detect some sarcasm there. The alternative to a metaverse dominated by big walled gardens might be Web3. But that’s a whole other story.

Kim Davis
Editorial Director

Shorts 

What we’re reading. Social commerce is a model brands, retailers and platforms must embrace. It’s set to be a $1.2 trillion space by 2025. An excellent explainer on the social media space from Accenture: “Why Shopping’s Set for a Social Revolution.”

About The Author

Kim Davis is the Editorial Director of MarTech. Born in London, but a New Yorker for over two decades, Kim started covering enterprise software ten years ago. His experience encompasses SaaS for the enterprise, digital- ad data-driven urban planning, and applications of SaaS, digital technology, and data in the marketing space. He first wrote about marketing technology as editor of Haymarket’s The Hub, a dedicated marketing tech website, which subsequently became a channel on the established direct marketing brand DMN. Kim joined DMN proper in 2016, as a senior editor, becoming Executive Editor, then Editor-in-Chief a position he held until January 2020. Prior to working in tech journalism, Kim was Associate Editor at a New York Times hyper-local news site, The Local: East Village, and has previously worked as an editor of an academic publication, and as a music journalist. He has written hundreds of New York restaurant reviews for a personal blog, and has been an occasional guest contributor to Eater.