Understand the Future of Consumer Marketing with Gen Z Service Safari
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Nine activities to step into the Gen Z shoes.
Going beyond the buzz words 🚀
Who are the future consumers? How should the brands communicate with them? What is the next big thing? What trends should we pay attention to today?
If you are tired of trends whack-a-mole and confused with all the metas, metaverses, NFTs, Web 3 and XYZs, here’s a drop of signal in the noisy world:
I invite you to a Service Safari to better understand Gen Z and future consumers.
Go and explore key gen Z phenomena yourself as the consumers do today, and gain perspective in return
Don’t read about it, just do it! Step into the consumers' shoes.
Here are nine service safari activities to try 🔎
1. Play Roblox
Roblox — a game played by over 200 million users each month, a sandbox, and a collection of 3D games created by users — a game inside a game, an open co-created world, with all the good and ugly.
Insight: Some consider this to be today’s most prominent example of a metaverse — an open world, user-generated content, self-expression. More messages are sent daily on Roblox than on Whatsapp. “Fun” fact: A Virtual Gucci Bag Sold For More Money on Roblox Than The Actual Bag
2. Play Minecraft
Minecraft — similar to Roblox, but a self-contained game vs an open co-created platform. Just play and build pixely things.
Insight: First such a popular sandbox game. A proof that game mechanics matter more than tech and design fireworks. Simple, yet powerful.
3. Explore Discord
Discord — “the easiest way to talk over voice, video, and text.” This is how the new generation of consumers communicate and form communities. It’s like an instant messaging disco, a neverending Zoom meeting after 10 espressos with an avalanche of messages, bots, and emojis you did not know exist. And yet, there’s something special about it that might just suck you in.
Insight: Consumers might find really creative ways for using a service beyond the original design intent.
PS. If you need an example server / room to get started try Roblox or Minecraft for the game communities, Science and Technology for science news, Dunder Mifflin for the Office fans or Chill for… some sort of chill?
What is Discord about?
More about Discord — The Movie.
4. Play Fortnite
Fortnite — a multiplayer online survival, exploration, and battle game (so-called battle royale), where you socialize, compete and occasionally… attend concerts.
Insight: the game generated $9 billion in gross revenue up until December 2019. Prominent for brand cooperation — what we will see more of in the metaverse future, but also in the center of a dispute with Apple on revenue sharing.
5. Play Pokemon Go
Pokemon Go — AR and mixed reality game in which you catch Pokemons wherever you are. Played by over 150 million users each month.
Insight: First to break Augmented Reality into the real world mainstream. Possibly closest to what we will have in the future when engaging with the world around us.
6. Level 0: TikTok
TikTok — if for some reason you’re not familiar with it yet, TikTok is an app for short video content. Be careful because its algorithm might suck you in, and get to know you better than you do yourself.
Insight: It’s the most downloaded app of 2021 with one billion monthly users. The most engaging algorithm among social platforms — short video content is engaging users by leveraging dopamine and novelty needs.
7. Download Snap
Snap — future of VR and AR. Started as a novelty with ephemeral messages, creative camera filters and stories (sound familiar?)
Insight: Heavy into the camera-first business and mixed reality with existing AR interactive experiences for brands, like this one:
8. Visit OpenSea
OpenSea — Amazon for NFTs — tokenized scarcity, smart digital collectibles. The biggest NFT marketplace to mint, sell and buy digital art and collectibles leveraging blockchain.
9. Axie Infinity— level super hard
Axie Infinity — A blockchain-based game with Pokemon-like creatures, where you first buy characters, breed them, earn special currency, and can earn money back from reselling.
Insight: Complex mechanics of (Pay-to-)Play-to-Earn, over $3.6B traded in the game marketplace. The game is known for the largest-ever cryptocurrency breach when hackers have stolen an equivalent of ~$620 million from the network.
If you manage to go through the setup process — kudos! Now you also understand why blockchain and Web 3.0 need more advances for broader adoption.
Bonus:
If you have a teenage child who is already playing any of the online games — join them, like Tom Vanderbilt did when he started playing Fortnite with his daughter and learned a ton.
Go and learn things!
