It is very exciting to get caught up in the narrative around the metaverse, Livewire co-founder Indy Khabra told this week’s Mumbrellacast, yet the reality is 17 million Australians are already gaming regularly, and his and co-founder Brad Manuel’s company is working with brands on “practical outcomes”.
“I think metaverse, and the word metaverse is so overused at the moment,” he said. “When we speak to brands, it’s very much around practical outcomes and what we can actually achieve by connecting them to the gaming community and the gaming ecosystem.”
Manuel and Khabra
“When you think of the suite of solutions that we provide brands and our clients, it actually starts right to the point of research and understanding what the consumer crossover is for that brand, and really then leaning into an objective view of what the KPIs and outcomes for a brand is.
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“Predominantly, that’s starting to look at things like customer lifetime value and brand affinity, brand loyalty, but also that could be into more tactical areas and gaming as a gateway to that new set of audience you can actually achieve, whether it’s building a long term strategy to be gaining user acquisition or market share or being defensive. You can actually create that within this new space.”
Despite the hype surrounding the metaverse over the last 12 months, research from Ipsos in May found that only 44% of Australians are familiar with it, and Khabra said that while it is easy to get caught up in the appeal, it is still “in the early days of what the end vision is”.
“I think keeping it practical in outcomes is going to be a better use case for campaigns, and most importantly, the outcomes of campaigns that brands are trying to activate against.”
He said it is a two-way narrative, “not only for brands and marketers but also for consumers because the user experiences have to be there also”.
“You don’t necessarily want to build something that only ten people are going to show up in, and then all of a sudden it’s staying stagnant and there’s a heap of investment that’s been put into it. So there is definitely a balance that needs to be struck.”
While staying modest about the vast amount of opportunities in the gaming space, which Livewire has seen partner with gaming giant Activision Blizzard, and most recently Uber Eats, it has also launched offices in London, Singapore, and Mumbai, already in its short existence.
Livewire recently signed a deal with Uber Eats
Manuel spoke about what can be expected in the next five to ten years for Livewire, and marketing in gaming more generally, which already has a consumer base of 3 billion globally.
“I think we’ll see more and more brands really authentically woven into games, but not just from an advertising point of view. We’ve seen some bad examples already, probably some how not to do it, but their idea and the concept is right.”
“A game like Apex Legends or a Cyberpunk or any game that’s based in a world where advertising currently exists or previously existed, the game creators actually make fake ads, fake worlds, fake shops, fake stores, and fake products, because a modern day world doesn’t actually feel accurate without products.
“So I think we’ll see more global and regional partnerships of how this will integrate into games, and also how publishers will upgrade their technology to be able to regionally cut and segment deals the same way they would for like sports LED screens where they overlay it with different graphics and pieces.”
Catch the full conversation with Manuel and Khabra on this week’s Mumbrellacast.