Branding 3.0
In my career in advertising, I remember encouraging brands to take a look at YouTube when it just launched. They laughed at me. I didn't understand media, they said. It was small time, they chided. TV was king, they assured me. I took my lumps and dug deeper into offering them more "traditional" campaigns.
It didn't take long for the early "virality" of YouTube to spin its way into the consciousness of brand managers. Suddenly I started getting briefs to "make a viral video." Oh, the clients loved this. They'd see a group of no name kids who kicked a football against the cross bar, and suddenly they'd "re-imagine" the idea with famous global football stars. Narrative was dead they said. YouTube was all about the quick, magical stunt. Kobe Bryant jumping over a car. Wayne Rooney hitting targets with the ball. The only goal of YouTube was to game the system and make a video that got passed around.
This is the phase we are at with the emerging web3 and NFT scene. Brand managers are looking for 24-hour derivative turn arounds that result in pfp projects and virtual beer/deodorant/pizza. I get it. It's intoxicating to join the hot, new conversation that your audience is aware of. Just like it was exciting to "make virals" back in the day for YouTube. But savvy brand marketers will realize that behaviors and possibilities are changing radically. It's a fundamental shift. It has implications for your business, not just for making a cheap "WAGMI" joke on a Tuesday afternoon.
Eventually, YouTube didn't go away. It grew into THE platform for digital video. People flocked to YouTube for everything. To learn things. To relive their childhood culture. To laugh. To sing. To feel. YouTube ate all of digital video. It was no longer about being "viral" or trying to capture or fake some unbelievable stunt. YouTube just became a platform to tell stories and give information on. Eventually all the marketing budgets starting pumping into YouTube as the place to get your TV ads seen. Showing up early on YouTube, this didn't come as a surprise. It was easy to see that what YouTube was on launch, wasn't what it was going to always be. It ushered in a new fundamental form of online behavior. Suddenly video was king. And it hasn't gone away since then.
This is where we are at in web3 and NFTs in March, 2022.
Brand managers are looking to make "viral" projects. They are thinking about the next two weeks, and that's it. What they are failing to realize, is that NFTs, and the underlying technology, is doing what YouTube once did to online behavior. NFTs let you own your presence on the web. No more like buttons. No more hearts feeding straight into a marketing algorithm that prints money for their holding companies.
For the first time, users, individuals and people matter.
That's what NFTs represent.
You have to look past the headlines and the easy memes about bad drawings or right-click-and-save crusaders. This is just the first volley. This is "everything has to be a viral video" phase. No. This is just the first chapter. It's the early innovators playing around and casually defining one form or use case. From here, the pie gets bigger. From here, behavior gets normalized. From here, the jargon goes away and "digital ownership" starts to become tangible.
People in charge of brands need to realize that the digital world is evolving. It's not just a passing lightweight meme. The fundamentals are changing. The visionary and the first movers will catch this early, and they will start building out their actual business models to fit into the evolution of our digital lives.
That's exactly what Michael Jordan and his son are doing with HEIR. They have founded a web3 and digital culture company that will bring elite athletes and their fans closer together. This is an actual business. This is not a weekend project. HEIR will use Jordan's legacy as a centerpiece, and then build their business around this generation's co-signed athletes to offer digital products (NFTs), access and physical merchandise. To align with this, they have filed a series of relevant patents to stake their claim to the space strategically. Nike has done the same thing. The smart businesses are not just going for the one-off campaign or cash grab. They are adapting their business to where digital behavior and commerce are leading us.
It's easy to be a hater. It's easy to look at the stupid, amateurish videos that first came out on YouTube and dismiss the entire platform. How is it premium? How can it compete with TV advertising? But for those who look deeper and consider the operation and potential in emerging technologies, they give themselves a chance to see a longer runway. And those who get their first and create a tangible impact early, will be able to define the space and position themselves and their companies as first movers. This in itself is a branding win. The Nike's of the world are consistently early to emerging technology and it has helped them to control and distribute their message, brand and products consistently with where culture is gathering.
If you're spinning your wheels trying to come up with the perfect blockchain pun to post on Twitter, you're probably not gonna make it.
So keep your antenna up as these evolutions in technology speed up. If you pay attention enough, see what is being done, you'll start to see gaps where you can do something differently. That's where the wins for a brand lie. And unlike media only innovations, the emergence of the blockchain brings together media and business possibilities.
If you haven't realized, every brand is a tech brand now. The winners will be the ones who opt in earliest.
