"BMW have decided they will be leaving Second Life in the near future," Achim Muellers, Head of Brand Relations for BMW, told Aleister Kronos. It's not clear why the auto company is leaving, but it's hardly the first brand. During the wave of Second Life backlash last summer, brands like Adidas, American Apparel, and Starwood were all cited as early entrants that didn't make it. Those, though, never really succeeded at building a long-term community around their brands in Second Life.
More likely, BMW fits in with more recent departures like ING or AOL. While some have found support from the community, they may be realizing that marketing isn't really the main point of Second Life. New CEO Mark Kingdon has defined Linden Lab's core markets as educators, enterprise-level organizations, and individuals. My personal guess, is that it's increasingly going to be the first two, making Second Life more and more useful for collaboration--and less and less for branding. [via SLAmbling]
BMW has decided to leave Second Life - hardly comes as a surprise. Since BMW never defined why it came into Second Life to begin with. Did BMW ever ask residents to design new BMW cars, did they hold discussion forums to talk about BMW in 2020, or even have a BMW product specialist available to talk to visitors about BMW brand and products.
Where was the BMW merchandise - the T-shirts, the posters, anything?
How did BMW promote its existence in Second Life beyond advertising in 1990 methods. Did they even attempt to inform residents of SL that they were there?
3D virtual worlds are turning the world on its ear - yet companies are still trying to use outdated marketing in a new world.
To BMW - before you build in SL again - and I believe you will - spend some time on why. Think about it like you were building a new car - first find out what the drivers want, then build to suit them - with your style. It becomes a win win scenario.
Posted by: Antony van Zyl | July 30, 2008 at 09:42 AM
marketing, promotions, advertising, and branding are NOT the same thing.
Maybe the vr writers/pundits should understand this, and the vr efforts by companies in SL wouldant have sucked so much.
SL is perfect for branding and promotions, any other expectations were sold as a bag of magic beans...
bart
Posted by: bart | July 30, 2008 at 10:43 AM
Fiat was/is doing way kewler stuff anyway. No BMW, I'd rather have Fiat! (only in SL, though :/)
FIAT brazil sim is awesome:
http://www.vintfalken.com/fiat-in-second-life/
RL ad from fiat containing 'virtual' characters:
http://www.vintfalken.com/all-avatars-want-a-fiat/
Posted by: vint falken | August 09, 2008 at 10:56 AM