You might have never heard the phrases ‘blockchain’, ‘metaverse’, ‘nft’s’ or ‘Web3’ before a few months ago. Most of us hadn’t. Importantly, the majority still haven’t.

 
But adoption tends to gather pace quickly when heavyweights of the digital world set their sights on something.
 
The online world and all that it encompasses is shaping up to be the next big thing in digital marketing (and far beyond that too!)
 

So, should you be considering this brave new world as part of your business strategy?

 
The short answer is almost certainly yes. For your customers that have already ventured into this world, there’s a wealth of insight and data that you’re missing out on that’s easier to get hold of than you might have thought.
 
Nike, Adidas, Starbucks and Facebook (this might help explain the ‘Meta’ rebrand…) are just some of the household names making significant moves in this space.
 
Whilst your budget and use case may not be exactly as theirs, what’s key is the evolution of a new wave of consumer that these brands have already identified.
 
These leading brands have spent years amassing data on the value of this audience and are quickly taking positions to capitalise on it. These early adopters will be key players in the revolution, a future piece of the digital furniture.

So let’s get into the crux of the matter, what does this all mean for you?

 
When it comes to effective marketing, knowledge is power, the more you know about your customers and potential customers the better, right?
 
The beauty of the blockchain (the technology that underpins it all) is that it is a digitally distributed, decentralized, public ledger that exists across a network… in plain English; you can see every transaction.
 
Now, wouldn’t it be great if there was some kind of unique identifier that allowed you to tie back your customer to any and all of their transactions on the blockchain, regardless of what they’re purchasing and who from… well good news, there already is.
 

Blockchain wallets – the newest personal identifier on the block

 
To transact on any of the blockchains (there’s a lot of them, but we’ll leave that for another day) you need a ‘wallet’ which is where you securely hold your cryptocurrencies and NFT’s.
 
Wallets are becoming far more trusted with the introduction of Coinbase Wallet, MetaMask and Ledger Nano to name a few. A wallet address is generally over 40 characters long and truly unique, so it’s perfectly safe to share.
 
These random ID’s are also pretty hard to remember so there are a range of public naming services now which convert alphanumeric strings into a standard named address – think of these as your “friendly from” address that you would know and share willingly.
 
For some context, “paradigm.eth” recently sold for over £500,000 while “wallet.eth” is a relative bargain at £90,000. Luckily, it’s not such eye watering numbers for a regular consumer. As an example, charlesroberts.eth can be purchased for 5 years for under £30.
 
The best part is that strangers can’t get into wallets or steal anything just by knowing someone’s address, which means users are generally open to sharing them – particularly if there’s a chance that they get something in return.
 
This exchange of value (payment or data for goods or services) is a tale as old as time, so you can probably start to get an idea of why this digital ecosystem is starting to become so important. Increased adoption will only strengthen the market’s perception.

Interesting! Any real world examples to back it up?

 
Let’s take Starbucks as a great example. Their new ‘Starbucks Odyssey’ experience offers members the ability to earn or buy NFT’s (tokens) that will unlock access to additional benefits and experiences.
 
Executive VP and Chief Marketing Officer Brady Brewer said:
 
“Leveraging Web3 technology will allow our members to access experiences and ownership that was not possible before. Starbucks Odyssey will transcend the foundational benefits that our Starbucks Rewards members have come to love, and unlock digital, physical and experiential benefits that are uniquely Starbucks.”
 
What Brady doesn’t mention is what great insight they will get into the behaviours and habits of those customers that take part.
 
The tokens awarded will give Starbucks a real clear indication of customers behaviour and act as badges or tags that will make them easy to identify and segment on.
 
The rewards schemes also incentivise further sales in the pursuit of improving level/status and enhanced reward, it’s essentially the digital gamification of the consumer experience.
 
This move also puts Starbucks at the forefront of the younger generation’s consciousness, as a digitally savvy, forward-looking company, ready to reward its most loyal customers with a whole new level of experience.
 
It creates interest, it drives purchases, it makes them different to other brands – it will make them successful for years to come.
 
Interested in knowing more? You can read their unveiling article in full here.

Your first steps into the world of Web3 – collect wallet addresses

 
The beauty of this brave new world is that you don’t need to dive in with both feet as in the above example, you could just dip a toe.
 
You don’t need to have your own NFT and reward scheme ready to go, but you could start to gather the data on your customers today by capturing their wallet address(es)? You could ask if they’re interested in a future NFT Reward Scheme?
 
In the future you may be able to glean things like:
 
⭕ How much they spend through their wallet?
⭕ When they add funds to that wallet?
⭕ Who are they spending that with?
⭕ How often and when do they spend?
⭕ Are they buying digital fashion items?
⭕ Are they buying music/entertainment in this medium?
⭕ Are they holding and collecting items or trading them? The list goes on.
 
If you start to capture the basics of this information now, you’ve immediately created a whole new ready-made segment of prospects and customers.
 
Now you might have read this and come to the conclusion that it’s not relevant to your brand, either currently or full stop – and that’s fair enough. But even so we hope it’s given you some food for thought.

Web3 and the metaverse are coming – don’t miss the opportunities this creates

 
As Deloitte allude to in their blog ‘Toward the Metaverse’, as a society we have been building a greater digital presence in our lives for a few decades now, with social media and gaming expanding our sense of self into digital representations – profile pictures, avatars, in-game skins etc.
 
Being “online” has become a daily part of most of our lives, with our phones near-permanent extensions of our arms.
 
Web3 and the metaverse are coming and they’re coming at pace, are you ready to ensure that you don’t miss out on the opportunities it will provide? Indeed, can you afford not to be ready?
 

Well then ‘what are RedEye’s plans’ we hear you ask?

 
Well, our mission remains the same as it’s been for 25 years. We’re passionate about providing cutting edge marketing technology, insights and support to help your business be the most successful it can possibly be.
 
So, we’ve been analysing the opportunities in this space for the past few months and are just getting started with a proof-of-concept piece of work to put the theory into practice.
 
If you’ve identified this marketing opportunity already or even if you’d just like to bounce a few ideas around, we’d love to have a chat with you.
 
 

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