Stoke the fire: 7 point plan for SL strategy, point 6. I’ll (try to) leave the real-world marketing analogies out of this post.

In the context of businesses and brand owners operating within SL, stoking the fire refers to the importance of keeping residents interested in what’s going on at a venue – interested enough to make a return visit (or ten).

1. Changing features/concepts: updating the features and functionality of the venue itself. This includes introducing new products/services either before (like the Nissan Sentra) they are available or integrating RW launches into a SL venue. In addition to this, adding new functionality into an existing SL venue is another good way of encouraging people to return.
2. Competitions: Running competitions or sales promotions via the SL venue is another excellent way to get return visitors. Universal Studios recently run an in-world competition to promote the movie ‘Smokin’ Aces’. Via a dedicated HUD, participants were able to hunt down play against other people, with L$ as prizes.
3. Events: Run events, promote them, get people to your venue. This option is excellent for niche audiences. And, taking this concept one stage further, we’re slowly starting to see simulcasting in SL – taking a real world event and broadcasting/re-creating it at the same time in SL.

Point one: this is marketing, so have a plan
Point two: keep the builders at bay
Point three: integrate
Point four: give
Point five: keep the seats warm

Request the full report here.

This entry was posted on Thursday, February 15th, 2007 at 11:56 am and is filed under Virtual World strategy. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.