In this inteview Darius speaks with Chris Erwin the founder of RockWater, a research and advisory firm for media, tech, and commerce brands. The conversation covers a wide range of topics including influencer marketing, livestream shopping and a lot more.
Chris Erwin is the founder of RockWater, a research and advisory firm for media, tech, and commerce brands. Their clients range from YouTube and ViacomCBS, to Team Coco and Cool Japan Fund. RockWater is also a media brand itself, with a growing portfolio of newsletters and podcasts to help leaders and investors build smarter. Chris's nearly 20-year executive experience spans New Hollywood, venture capital, and investment banking, and was named by Variety as one of Hollywood’s New Digital Leaders.
Connect with Chris on LinkedIn
Full transcript:
Tell me about yourself and what are how you got here
Rockwater has a very simple mission: we service the world's most ambitious and invested leadership that's operating at the intersection of media tech and commerce where we are very specialized and adept and are working with companies to use content I. P. and personality to launch new business lines and drive revenue because we have a little bit of banker blood in our team we can also do emanate and capital raising advisory as well. And you know just. We work with really large companies that can be fortune 50 like Google and you too the large cable networks like Viacom the big Hollywood celebrities and digital publishers
I think Conan o'brien and team co going to schedule arm. And a handful of others. In a nutshell we also publish a lot of market intelligence through our podcasting and through our writing and our our blog editorial and we also host events as well for executives so would you say that you help brands and organizations really make sense of what's going on the speed of how things are changing in digital and new media like how to stay relevant yeah it's a it's a combination of factors so we help our clients stay smart and where where there is broad market opportunity and then also help them understand because it's not just a one size fits all solution where is each client uniquely adapts where they have advantages and resources that make them uniquely positioned to go after like a new revenue line or a new business we help them put those pieces together and we also help them execute as well so we work with them to go pitch their boards and investors to get by and get a green light to launch a new business help place a distant different executives to run and work with their different you know partnerships and external relationships actually make these things come to life we don't want to see ideas and strategy to exit on the shelf we actually want to see these these things get made another way that keeps us engaged and excited about what we're building and keep like the pedal to the metal is we service our clients are also building out our own you know like our own media business we look at ourselves as a B2B media publisher so I was actually just on the phone with a web agency yesterday working through you know everyone wants a largest sub stack or their own membership for market intelligence we have a certain viewpoint on how we're gonna do that differently we've already created all this content that's in our archive but we think that we can best service our clients interests the broader community so we can all rise up together through both audio editorial and then putting on more events for people can be more informed about what's what's happening and like we see a man a massive gap in live stream media and commerce are actually planning a big virtual event. In March 3 of next year that will likely be produced by really awesome live streaming partner to make interactive and fun just not your night your boring old like soon weapon or what have you right now I think there's a lack of like good a lack of good executive connectivity and information sharing in that space and we're gonna change that's awesome to hear we love to have you involved in that sure so let's talk about 1 of your latest reports which is called why every brand needs a live stream media and selling strategy in 2021 I think you mean and beyond yeah ambience so you know the way that we do a lot of our writing is that can at this flywheel of intelligence as we're doing client advisory or talking to just pure executives in the space and investors and the team was researching I think back in September October about the live market and then we also just seeing a lot of different data points about different investments and we start being like it what is a common theme or a through line of what we think is like $9000000000 of capital that was flowing into the space what we notice is that a lot of these companies across like sports music gaming the metaverse all right it's kind of like why interactive steam that was a through line. And so then we said okay there the reason why this capital flowing is because through life it really enables a unique form of engagement with which is the ultimate currency to drive a sustainable business model so they were like let's write a report to best explain these different dynamics and so we actually broke down the 4 pillars. What are the different dynamics of life to get users to really lean in and engage how they work and then from there let's also explain you know what are the legacy live models for news sports live events as well as next Gen live in a live stream gaming and E. sports and the metaverse let's break down the business models and both in and see maybe how they're converging and then also think about what are some of the exciting sectors that are being most impacted by all these capital raises and building that's happening in the space which you know which is across sports commerce live events gaming social and communal watching travel and so much more so that's really what this like this green pieces and report is about let's start from the capital flowing into these industries $9000000000 that's over how many years the majority was over the last year but I think this also dates back about a year point 5 ago there are some capital raises in the summer of 2019 most recently buzzer I'm just like a live sports start up which will take chunk a ball wide right like all a cart wide right she just wrote another article about this last week so that if you just want to watch tune into like the last quarter of an NBA game or the last like 10 minutes out of watching the whole game you can just bought by a bite sized piece of the action right. We also looked at kind of what's happening gaming and so like epic games the owner of Fortnite and us and you other products they just raise in August like 1.8000000000 valuing the company at 17 plus 0 valuation just incredible what they've building but when you see the success of like marshmallow and.
Travis Scott and their performances on Fortnite and the men of revenue and the new brand partnerships that they're driving not surprised to see these numbers as a massive massive growth opportunity for them a few other ones too is the new virtual concert space like wave VR thing just raised 30000000 we're there to like live motion capture artist who then went to simulcasting concert into all these different distributed social platforms like like twitch and Facebook and Instagram and more it's raising money to improve their tax and their product actually acquire more partners to help more talent partners to do these concerts see that's really fun and then even caffeine raised over 100000000 I think this past summer where they're becoming they are streaming their becoming the go to streamer or rap battles and like Drake is a major investor there and so yeah we just simply there's so many examples that were kind of like on this report maybe one last one worth highlighting 2 is network in terms of shoppable commerce I think network just raise last summer 10000000 making their toll rates for the past couple years around 25 to launch a platform as their founders Rogers shopping at the speed of culture where they have the easy like unique time limited commerce drops which are unique product collaborations with with different artists that are in their network and you have to create a lot of hype around these these product types and they sell out really quickly and their goal is you know Erin talks about this just interviewed him on our podcast trying to go from one from 1.to drop or data 40 plus products they need money and resources to make that happen as you said before it takes a lot of planning life is being used in so many different industries yeah which one you think is the most advanced of all the different industries that gaming right now or as far as like monetization you said what's happening in gaming and then also on live stream shopping particularly here in The Asia and China based market is where we're seeing a lot of things like the most activity but we expect a lot of that to be great. To the U. S. and other international markets we entered the live streaming if you just if you look at what twitch has done and a lot of the different interactive features that they've developed and how their consumption has like significantly grown during cove it we've observed the application of everything it's wildly impressive in gaming which also speaks tangentially to the metaverse like the growth of those platforms over the past 9 months has been incredible I think each of them are generating over 1 to 1.5 viewership hours between Fortnite and roadblocks and M. and animal crossing individually just a few months ago a weapon are from the chief revenue officer roadblocks their platform went from 70 to 80000000 monthly active users now to like 120 200 39 plus this is a few months ago that's probably just grown grown since then so this is really really taking off and then in terms of like live stream commerce look at some of the numbers coming out of the Asian market where live from selling was I think 60 5000000000 in 2019 in China this year is projected to be 120 9000000000 and adjusted Alibaba singles day from like you know the first couple weeks of November they just generate I think $6000000000 of gross merchandise volume over that very short period the numbers are absolutely staggering from those 2 areas we actually wrote a separate report on this because we were blown away when we saw what my team resurgence at Chris that mark is gonna be 130000000000 this year and I said that's not possible more people would be talking about it I've never seen a number before like going double check that they went back and let me triple check this this Israel is growing this fast from like last year and is projected be even bigger and there are some different structural limitations for why this hasn't taken off in the US but this is real in Asia and I just thought to myself like I talk to executives and banners and media and commerce and tech companies like every day for my work Why are this not more part of like the site guys in our world why are not more people talking and building towards a system. Massive missed opportunity not only to drive revenue and profit but you're really delight users and give the user a great shopping at discovery and entertainment experience all in one that a lot of Chinese platforms are figured out so we started writing about it because like more more people need to be talking about it only through come through communal sharing and analysis does the whole industry move forward but you know what we found is in the Asian markets they have this like very unique kind of gave you super apps like vertical ice infrastructure where on tell Alibaba scalp cabin or on WeChat by Tencent you have payments content discovery distribution peer to peer activity product logistics distribution and fulfillment it can all happen within the same ecosystem that really powers as live stream commerce push we don't yet have been in the U. S. but that's going to change as more people build towards that there is so much market activity and so many players that are in the Chinese market it's hard to keep track okay Alibaba and Timol and tell about and then J. D. J. D.com and can do do enjoy and and like the multitude of others it's important because we actually advising if the technology company I want to enjoy the live stream shopping space we broke down using simple frameworks alike here's a different types of players that are out there that are that are activating here you have content first destinations commerce first destinations and then there's a hybridization of the boat do you want to be a destination platform or do you want to be a technology company that services like existing acts that and then also on top of all that you always have to be thinking about what is the user and the creator wants you to like them you're gonna when they looked at 20 to 30 plus different lives you shopping platforms we created a framework of like what's the creator journey for the creator for signs up to participate migrate their audience and sell products on these platforms and then what's the user journey for when they get markets you by the creators based on integrated.
How may participate in the live stream they purchase and then how are they activated afterwards and enter each single step we look at how each of these platforms support this part of the journey differently and we found how like where there's the comparing and contrasting and where we think there's room for improvement it was very time intensive exercise but that's what it takes to say how can we build upon this and be better and where is our opportunity all this capital flowing because that life means more engagement which means a more sustainable diversified revenue streams so then what are what are the dynamics of life with a simple way to break like why it works they're forming colors tune in lean in connectivity and sharing so with tune in it's when something you know when something is live you're going to a concert that night or you're you know you're watching some program like you're watching an NFL game that night your true name because if you missed out you're not gonna be part of the water cooler conversation the next day you're not gonna be part of the zeitgeist like that relevance is gonna change like that content that experience is made for that unique moment she got.
And second factor is lenient so once you're watching this experience you are glued to the screen your mobile device or your TV screen or whatever it is because you don't want to miss a moment this could be the moment when there is a touchdown catch what is a really exciting moment in a concert and it's why people typically are watching live we'll be watching that live stream for 10 to 20 times longer than recorded the third is the connection this is like the connection between the the host the publisher a live streamer and the audience because it's authentic it's more it's more raw it's more real anything can happen in life is just like a filter and I think that all just the same way when you 2 came about disrupted traditional in your video people love you too because it was personality based programming this is now the next generation of that working B. personality based or just or live in real time but it's even even more raw and unfiltered fourth pillar is the sheriff right so speaking to those water cooler moments are when you participate you're watching a game you're typically on like a second screen where tweeting about the current NFL game or maybe you're texting with your friends about watching the marshmallow concert on Fortnite you're sharing your you're promoting it that's a very very powerful marketing engine and feature I'm particularly when you can cater to that and use some of those some of those tactics for your business model so those 4 pillars that really causes increased engagement that can be monetized so then from there we then broke down in our report what are some of these legacy live models what are the next on live models what are the characteristics how do they make money if you are building a new product you need all of these fillers or wood covering like 2 or 3 of them really well they'll give you an opportunity in in the market every every user's attention is being directed towards so many different mobile apps mobile games content destinations web.
Sites the streaming wars of Netflix and Disney plus an NBC used peacock and so I think to really stand out from the noise those players that can address all 4 of these key pillars are gonna best stand out because this ecosystem is increasingly competitive for their lower barriers to entry for people to create content into develop fan bases and so I think this is why we kept this rubric simple is that you want to strive for these 4 and they all work very closely together as well their interest one right so if if you look at the 2 in part that part of it is where anybody who wants to use live for example needs to get people's attention to actually come and join a live session so that's the first thing if you can't do that the rest of it it doesn't matter yeah I think specific to that point there is like you want to come up with a like a format that only works and what is it it's a format that can also work in like a recorded version like some premium scripted narrative series that's not necessarily gonna driving the tune in that like a live sporting events are live gaming events we're like a chronic drop reveals gonna have you have to make sure the content is uniquely defined that's going to work in a live in a live environment yeah it's very interesting because like you know again because I'm involved on the shopping side of it I'm I'm thinking. On the E. commerce site for example if I am looking for a deal I'm looking for a TV and I'm looking for a deal.
And maybe I can just do a search on Google or another were abolished Amazon or whatever so I I I I usually do my son my search and I'm gonna find hundreds of answers results on a specific given type of a TV there are. And the process of going through that.
And actually making that purchase. Can be pretty pretty well served right now with the current form of E. commerce and with minimal really involvement from a human being probably. So what would a live experience of shopping for a TV ad that E. commerce does not act and I think that's weird we need the human side of. Thank the interaction really comes into play and were I'm like really like waking up to the other side of this whole thing is like the power of the person the salesperson that the whatever you call them the influencer the that the celebrity whatever it is it just like it's so important I think yeah you're totally right I was reading an article about Alibaba singles day and by anything Austin Lee who are like the 2 highest performing live live stream creators on that day that sold hundreds of millions of worth of product people tuned into them because they trusted their curation of product is is best better than just going direct to like a retailer publisher site is like we trust these personalities if they put their stamp of approval on it that means they had their team like verify that these products are great and worthy of being on this live stream.
And then you know why you want a white wanted to name is because then you can actually interact with the hosts like you inspire the content so you you can ask questions to the live streamers saying Hey I'm you know I'm curious I want to know more about this product I have a question or if you interact and then you make a purchase that purchase is also celebrating the moment where if you make a purchase or through an angle ecom site you don't get that like excitement feeling but if you purchased or I'm gonna buyers live streams she can say oh yeah Hey Jerry S. like thanks for making a purchase that was fantastic or even can do a deal that allows or like team purchases your whole team your social crew can maybe get a call out one of those videos so that level of interactivity is also really exciting another reason why you want to tune is because there are there might be a discount code that's available for that product only during the live stream that you have to tune in if you're not tuning in you don't get access to that special discount code.
Also in like what works on a network with their product drops is there's only like a limited edition a limited number of units for sale so often they sell out very quickly in the first few minutes from going you know from being available on the platform and so similarly if you're logging on to JD.com or check out our hot shot and if you knew Hey I got to be god be on within the first 5 minutes or this is product inventory goes out you were going to tune in and lean in and be very engaged those are formats that work very well in a live environment.
Yes so that's that's very interesting that the limited quantity part is it's kind of interesting because like QVC of course the granddaddy of live stream shopping probably has been. Be it one way but I mean they didn't break they've been working on mastering it for many years decades yeah and of course like you know. Guild group and these companies that actually were doing also another type of limited availability we're also trying to do that even Groupon at some point of time that it was just that that the limits that's really drove people and now it seems like companies like network or other ones are really merging those together with the live experience and the interaction side of it and yeah it's very interesting how. You have. Yeah and to add that there is too I think.
What but people are also trying to solve or no this is also part of why Facebook and Instagram have lot shops is there's you know there's intentional purchase where you go specifically to a certain like to Amazon because you want to buy a sushi knife we want to buy some like a new chair for your home office that's like very intentional I want to transact but part of shopping as entertainment where you browse different products you read reviews you learn about them you're talking from sales people a lot of this is what happens in the traditional brick and mortar retail environment right it's entertainment so the key with these live streaming shopping platforms that they want to bring that browsing about discoverability that education that learning. Into these virtual live environments as well and so the platforms it really nailed that and the creators that can also best programming create formats that support that is really important. That's another trend that we're seeing yes I've heard more companies talk about.
What is the I. P. one of the formats that are going to work in a live stream shopping universe that are going to propel this forward think about like on boxing's on YouTube and what's inside 4 minutes on you too what is the version of that it's going to work across all the live stream shopping platform that's going to delay creators delight fans and the light retailers and you know what we're hearing that like a lot of the early days of life is that you have these sales people go on and act as lectures on behalf of their like retail brand. And they don't do a great job they're not made to be on camera they don't have the expertise it's a little awkward right you really got to know what you're doing anything with the right format and the right training the right personality it's what makes this whole ecosystem shine there's a lot of work to do there right. Yeah I mean that that's you know again it's such an interesting topic I can't stop talking about it. One of the things that I tell people.
Now with the current form of Ecommerce and with minimal real involvement from a human being probably what would a live experience of shopping for a TV ad that E Commerce does not act and I think that's a word we need to take the human side of.
Thank the interaction really comes into play and were I'm like really like waking up to the other side of this whole thing is like the power of the person the salesperson that the whatever you call them the influencer the that the celebrity whatever it is it just like it's so important.
I think yeah you're totally right I was reading an article about Alibaba singles day and by anything Austin Lee who are like the 2 highest performing live live stream creators on that day that sold hundreds of millions of worth of product people tuned into them because they trusted their curation of product is is best better than just going direct to like a retailer publisher site is like we trust these personalities if they put their stamp of approval on it that means they had their team like verify that these products are great and worthy of being on this live stream.
And then you know why you want it why you wanted to do this because then you can actually interact with the hosts like you inspire the content so you you can ask questions to the live streamers saying
Hey I'm curious I want to know more about this product I have a question or if you interact and then you make a purchase that purchase is also celebrating the moment where if you make a purchase or through an angle ecom site you don't get that like excitement feeling but if you purchased or I'm gonna buyers livestreams she can say oh you know Hey Jerry S. like thanks for making a purchase that was fantastic are you in pain do a deal that allows or like team purchases your whole team your social crew can maybe get a call out one of those videos so that level of interactivity is also really exciting another reason why you want to tune is because there are there might be a discount code that's available for that product only during the live stream that you have to tune in if you're not tuning in you don't get access to that special discount code.
Also in like what works on a network with their product drops is there's only like a limited edition a limited number of units for sale so often they sell out very quickly in the first few minutes from going you know from being available on the platform and so similarly if you're logging on to JD.com or check out our hot shot and if you knew Hey I got to be god be on within the first 5 minutes or this is product inventory goes out you were going to tune in and lean in and be very engaged those are formats that work very well in a live environment.
Yes so that's that's very interesting that the limited quantity part is it's kind of interesting because my QVC of course the granddaddy of in a live stream shopping probably has been. Be it one way but I mean they didn't break they've been working on mastering it for many years decades yeah and of course like you know. Guild group and these companies that actually were doing also another type of limited availability we're also trying to do that even Groupon at some point of time that it was just that that the limits that's really drove people and now it seems like companies like network or other ones are really merging those together with the live experience and the interaction side of it and yeah it's very interesting how. Yeah. And to add that there is too I think.
What but people are also trying to solve or no this is also part of why Facebook Instagram have lot shops is there's you know there's intentional purchase where you go specifically to a certain like to Amazon because you want to buy a sushi knife we want to buy some like a new chair for your home office that's like very intentional I want to transact but part of shopping as entertainment where you browse different products you read reviews you learn about them you're talking from sales people a lot of this is what happens in the traditional brick and mortar retail environment right it's entertainment so the key with these live streaming shopping platforms that they want to bring that browsing that discoverability that education that learning. Into these virtual live environments as well and so the platforms it really nailed it and the creators that can also best programming create formats that support that is really important. That's another trend that we're seeing. Yes, I've heard more companies talk about.
What is the I. P. what are the formats that are going to work in a live stream shopping universe that are going to propel this forward think about like on boxing's on YouTube and what's inside 4 minutes on you too what is the version of that it's going to work across all the live stream shopping platform that's going to delay creators the light vans and the like retailers and you know what we're hearing that like a lot of the early days of life is that you have these sales people go on and act as lectures on behalf of their like retail brand.
And they don't do a great job they're not made to be on camera they don't have the expertise it's a little awkward right you really got to know what you're doing anything with the right format and the right training the right personality it's what makes this whole ecosystem shine there's a lot of work to do there right.
Yeah I mean that that's you know again it's such an interesting topic I can't stop talking about it. One of the things that I tell people that I talk to is for 25 years E. commerce has been trying to get rid of human beings in the shopping equation.
We now live a live streaming is bringing human beings back and happening in it back in a way that's we're not even used to it so we're not used to going to Macy's and being actually entertained by the sales people the sales people in Macy's of course they're very professional and passionate but they don't entertain you they'll answer your questions they will point you to the right place if you can find them you know but the the the the that's entertainment side of it which you're you know you're pointing out. If it is, it's a very key part of the success of live streaming I think which retailers really need to understand. Yeah I think when you think of the traditional sales people across any industry like car salesmen and women and.
No the customer service support and the retail clerks that are at Macy's or at Nordstrom's wherever the greatest sales people they're engaging they're storytellers are funny the educate you about the product but you want me when they do their job right you want to spend more time that individual and with the brand and so I think historically I think that you're right that a lot of it was probably more transactional the brick and mortar retailers but that does not it wasn't necessarily what was best right everyone is learning it's like all right we have to rethink both are Rickett mortar sales strategies which is why you're seeing a lot more where there are still like temple brick and mortar locations which will see Morgan after cove it that they are entertainment first they are more participatory there is a different training up the sales teams that are there now we're just seeing a manifest online because we're you know we're stuck during cove it and because there's some really cool live stream technologies that are pushing this whole space for so this is about entertainment fun laughter excitement education all the above.
Yeah I think so this is not like really interesting for me is to see how is this going to change the role of the future sales person yeah is it going to be just you know what what do we find these people because of course like if you go to I need to talk to 100 exist current sales people you're probably gonna find one or 2 that fit this model yeah the the majority are not like this so what do we find these people yeah I think it's it's a major like hiring and training and culture rethink that a lot of these companies like a trend that we've seen is.
You know this is why so many direct to consumer brands and product brands are you now becoming media and publishing businesses because for your brand really stand out there has to be a story around it has to be unique values around it there has to be unique community that you've cultivated through sharing content and sharing experience so this is like you know we've seen like a wave of direct to consumer luggage retailer they launched a podcast. We've seen I sherry's and dollar shave club lunch magazines and editorial in blog destinations.
Even Casper has launched like a sleek cats like there's there's we create a whole list of is for client there's like hundreds of examples because now like the product can become you know yes higher quality product we cells but otherwise lower and it's a commodity and so for you to really stand out there has to be story brand values and community and your galvanizing your audience and customer base around in the second part of that is with edit with content user acquisition is becoming more expensive if you're just going on a normal social channels like Facebook Instagram and Twitter you're going to get a certain threshold of band where like your CPM or click through rates are going to be an effective for your business you can't scale.
Through great content and editorial you're gonna see your online marketing campaigns have better R. Y. but you're also gonna see from your overall marking mission. Her impact from your current marketing and organic reach which is really cheap to sustain. Yeah definitely do the metrics are going to be a driving factor of why life is better. No scaling might be different if it's just a completely different dynamic of the number of people that can do it or but for the right products you could actually know. Do a lot better with life then you would try to just be one of the about 1000 different options or search results that come up when people go online to search something so that's interesting so okay so now let's talk about monetization. Legacy live and next in life yeah so we can see live this is the thinking about sports news international live events.
You know let's talk about sports so you look at like the top 3 sports leagues in the U. S. one of like the majority of where they capture the revenues by selling out live rights to different TV networks and increasingly streamers like twitch or YouTube but you also should I stream these different games so that's a that's a major revenue out like it's funny because people look at that and they're like well linear TV viewership is declining with the advent of mobile and short form video so would you like all these live raise revenues becoming down and the answer is no we looked at the numbers.
Aggregating when you have an aggregating alive engage audiences are so much value as we discussed that'd be the value of these live rights continues to go up and there's more more buyers because it's not just the traditional TV networks it's all the different technological streamers and even a lot of these new emerging startups like does own for example out of Europe that are buying up these live right. I'm so that's one out and then also on news where there's you know with breaking news and we saw during the recent election that.
Breaking news is driving incredible engagement so while traditional TV networks their advertising revenues have been declining the actual prime time cable news advertising is actually going up I think it's gone up by like 20 to 30 percent year over year. This surprises a lot of people but that speaks to the power of the power of lot. So that's the legacy station of your mouth those are those are the models that people have been working with for you know I guess up to now.
Correct and that's why when people ask what linear TV still exists is because you know when your TV works for sports and it works for news and as they're part of the bundle people are still gonna tune in and watch and there's gonna be plenty of buyers for that content. So then. Let's talk about next in line. So now next in line for thinking about like what's happening in in gaming and the metaverse and some of the like the broader overall dynamics we're seeing here is for legacy alive you want to go watch typical cable like cable news broadcast news or sports we've got a live event that's not necessarily available to the masses right you have to go buy tickets to a specific event or you have to have a cable subscription which most people don't you know let's let people have a particular Gen Z. and millennials.
What's exciting about live action is that this is one widely accessible through the internet broadband internet and on mobile devices. And through that it becomes much more exciting for younger audiences than anything in Next Gen Y.. It's not necessarily going one way broadcast like we just spoke about his legacy models it's very interactive so like let's talk about switch for example on twitch which has a lot of the attributes that we just talked about Mike life you're shopping is that if you want a lot if you want to watch your favorite game or live stream call it ninja or doctor loop or whoever what happened. I'm. You can interview can interact with that stream you can interact with the hosts answer through buying a modes and bits where you can express yourself you can reward the live streamer you can also I think getting access to personalized graphic overlays so that you can actually see the game from a vantage point to your preferred which is what a lot of the new like sports business models are evolving to.
That's very powerful stuff. I'm in the metaverse. It's now take let's take what's working in gaming with like the personalization the graphic overlays emotes and beds and that's going even next level when the metaverse it becomes as next Gen shows social hub. Where you can start to express yourself in different ways in the metaverse because like again hearing the chief revenue officer robust talk about in the metaverse it's aspirational identity you're not limited to what are your like you know what you look like in real life or the or the rules of Dr thank our traditional socio like a condom is these rules in the metaverse are defined by the communities economies are defined by the communities there's different rules different regulation there self moderated and so for you be able to like have different skins.
And a way to create your identity and then also with this new identity interact with others that's really powerful as well and so I think we've seen that the amount of also through different meant like memberships that you can get into which we are paying for subscriptions from your favorite streamers access to exclusive content and then buying different different skins and ways to express your avatar this is that these micro transactions are adding up to billions of dollars of revenues for these platforms and even robots which does some of this money back to his community roadblocks as a platform where you can go in and program a game for yourself or for your peers very easily and you can access those games as well and then the place to play those games and to reward the programmers you can spend money on them and so this is all like virtual currency interaction that's happening. So this is all very exciting but we're also seeing a lot of these platforms like roadblocks like animal crossing and.
They're starting to bring in a lot more brands into their platforms because they're just seeing the incredible audience that they're aggregating. Brands and marketers spend money when they can have incredible reach and so because these platforms are growing to hundreds of millions of like monthly active users and bill and billions of St. Of ours that brands like Wendy's and KFC and the NFL are activating in these environments to access new customers engaging them in different ways so they're starting to look at this advertising models looking how these legacy live models have monetized on the converse you're then also starting to see some like legacy companies like Turner sports or the an NBA and they're saying okay what can we learn from gaming and the metaverse the NBA has partnered with Microsoft to think about how can we give personalized graphic overlays different camera angles we can watch different players or different aspects of the game and how much are you willing to pay for that can we choke can we chalk up those experiences and have people pay for it also speaks to what we're talking about with buzzer before which is you just want to watch the last quarter or the opening quarter or a certain touchdown and you just you know you just pay to watch that part give the fans like what we've learned from Gen Z. millennials as they want to watch interact in the ways that they want to and if you empower that you support that and you nurture it you will make money because you will get the engagement and you'll get you'll be catered to behavior that is happening if you resist you'll get left by the wayside. Very interesting yes definitely not just just for people who may not be really familiar with the term metaverse. Let's describe what it means. Very simply it is an alternative digital world. Where are. It's not VR. It is not necessarily VR but it can integrate into VR right but it yeah it is an alternate digital world where you can create an avatar okay which is your user identity you can design based on the platform in any way that you want and then in this world you can enter into rats with other people's people things places and transact with these with these different elements in a variety of different ways. And a lot of the rules and economies of these communities are self moderated self governed okay right you basically build your own ideal personality yeah.
No limitations and I think half life or the second life that we got all of this like really in a big way started. In the early 2 thousands right yes yeah second life was a precursor to a lot of these new metaverse platforms like Fortnite like roadblocks like many others that we're going to say right. The other thing that's really interesting is how these different monetization types like you know the legacy and then next Gen. Is they need to merge I'm gonna be like almost like water you know like they need to be have to do it so as as a content owner or creator you need to be it be like really open to working with different models and if you if you are just like really rigid about one way of charging for your content you probably won't capitalize the optimum yeah not totally right and you got to be created where you can do it say like as a brand now increasingly also at their Craon creator marketer as well there's an example from I think Wendy's it went on for night and then streamed their game on to twitch I think this speaks to that these brands and publishers is not necessarily about all paid placements which you can do and get featured placement within the platforms but it's also act like a native creator and I think Wendy's was in a certain I think like game mode within Fortnite where they created 2 teams and they came up with these like funny names of the teams and one was representing I think like their burgers which are like fresh not frozen this is another team which represented like the frozen burgers of their competitors and and they like each team's against like one another and they were like it down talking to you know like the frozen Burger King that's like a really fun like engaging playful way to express your brand your brand's values and promote your promote your business that's very native to the platform I think that's a that's a smart way to do it if you do it with a heavy hand it's gonna feel awkward or some people are gonna pick up on that yeah yes Sir so that's like the really the opening of the mindset.
Just being willing to learn even as some of these brands they've been in business for 100 years and now suddenly they have to change the way they think which is very difficult so I give a lot of credit now some of them are really slow and they're fighting but a lot of them are really catching on yeah yeah another example I was reading just before this because I think K. I see that activation of an animal crossing where there is like a KFC store or how they can be visited by different like players in this social simulation and through there you can actually once you've visited the activation you can get like discount codes are like 50 percent off or like you know if it's written off a box of chicken nuggets we're like buy one get one free. Barman and then when you go in you know you go and buy the product I think like you I live in location or maybe even online all the pieces of this brand's world work together which is the right way to think about these all these activations they're not in silos they're all very corny. Yes I actually the name escapes me right now but what was that the option where you people used to go to like in that specific location in streets and. Which was really popular like the workforce.
Very interesting yes definitely not just just for people who may not be really familiar with the term metaverse. Let's describe what it means. Very simply it is an alternative digital world. Where are. It's not VR. It is not necessarily VR but it can integrate into VR right but it yeah it is an alternate digital world where you can create an avatar okay which is your user identity you can design based on the platform in any way that you want and then in this world you can enter into rats with other people's people things places and transact with these with these different elements in a variety of different ways.
And a lot of the rules and economies of these communities are self moderated self governed okay right you basically build your own ideal personality yeah.
No limitations yeah and I think half life or the second life that we got all of this like really in a big way started.
In the early 2 thousands right yes yeah second life was a precursor to a lot of these new metaverse platforms like Fortnite like roadblocks like many others that we're going to say right. The other thing that's really interesting is how these different monetization types like you know the legacy and then next Gen.
As a content owner or creator you need to be really open to working with different models and if you if you are just like really rigid about one way of charging for your content you probably won't capitalize the optimum yeah totally right and you got to be created where you can do it say like as a brand which now increasingly also at their Craon creator marketer as well there's an example from I think Wendy's it went on for night and then streamed their game on to twitch I think this speaks to that these brands and publishers is not necessarily about all paid placements which you can do and get featured placement within the platforms but it's also act like a native creator and I think Wendy's was in a certain I think like game mode within Fortnite where they created 2 teams and they came up with these like funny names of the teams and one was representing I think like their burgers which are like fresh not frozen versus another team which represented like the frozen burgers of their competitors and and they like each team's against like one another and they were like it down talking to you know like the frozen Burger King that's like a really fun like engaging playful way to express your brand your brand's values and promote your promote your business that's very native to the platform I think that's a that's a smart way to do it if you do it with a heavy hand it's gonna feel awkward or some people are gonna pick up on that yeah yes Sir so that's like the really the opening of the mindset.
Of really just being willing to learn even though I think that some of these brands they've been in business for 100 years and now suddenly they have to change the way they think which is very difficult so I give a lot of credit now some of them are really slow and they're fighting but a lot of them are really catching on yeah yeah another example I was reading just before this call as.
In KFC then activation with an animal crossing where there is like a KFC store or how they can be visited by different like players in this social simulation and through there you can actually once you've visited the activation you can get like discount codes are like 50 percent off or like you know if it's written off a box of chicken nuggets we're like buy one get one free.
Barman and then when you go in you know you go and buy the product I think like you I live in location or maybe even online all the pieces of this brand's world work together which is the right way to think about these all these activations they're not in silos they're all very corny. Yes I actually the name escapes me right now but what was that the option where you people used to go to like in that specific location in streets and. Which was really popular like artwork. No. 4 score yeah that was for checking in I was right yeah I remember you it was an A. R. up it was an A. R. worry you your location would you would have to go like to a location to find the prices are open up like puzzles or I forget the name right now but yeah. Yeah you you went with force where you would go to a location it was like you know through like geo fencing technology or geo sensitivities can tell I can you know what your proximity was and then you would check in and it might unlock like a bachelor reward and maybe a special discount offering so a lot of those dynamics are very similar to what we're seeing in kind of these live environments again it like just like second life what you noted thanks for square was an early precursor to some of this activity right. Very interesting so if we look so now let's take a look at I guess the future right yeah.
I was next on live involving and what we expect in the next hour I don't know I mean how do we even define the future now the next year or next to yours 3 years how 4 ad can even imagine yeah it's it's moving so quickly. And I I think like what we're going to see is I think just anecdotally.
Our company rock water, we are seeing so many different executives and early stage teams that are in the middle of coming up with new business ideas and models or have one and are raising money from investors that are not yet public and this is particularly in the life of your shopping space. And I think a lot of these companies are looking at what exists at. And how can we make where there is more white space and where these different niches or sectors are not yet fulfilled because you're gonna have companies like I think we write about this at the end of the report. It's gonna be like the animal big tech companies, the Amazons and facebooks the youtubers that are going to go after every sector of the remote gaming they're going to want.
They're gonna want commerce they're gonna want traveled in one at all but you're gonna see specialization as well right it's like wavy are going after concerts caffeine going after live stream rap rap battles. Topshop that's going on you're creating these like Turkey creek Turkey live stream channels currently seems to be like it D. I. D.I.Y.I. anime focused products. There's a certain verticals for sports like with what we're seeing in buzzer and I think both big and his knees players can win so I think you're gonna see more more new specialization as every single part of this economy starts to grow you see much more investor capital flowing into the space and you have one that we just saw this week for example it's worth highlighting is complex land so complex is fully diversified media company that started as a print magazine back in 2000 through marc echo and now has so many different business lines it has accomplished on offense. It has no complex land bird like a virgin metaverse type event. It's got. It sells food food products through hot ones hot sauce that doesn't think over 10 to 12 me available revenues.
It's got like E. learning partnerships with puma and the Parsons school of design in F. I. T. just like a fully diversified business. Just I think just yesterday we went live where complex con can happen. So what we want to create a separate environment I think also what was inspired by what they saw with marshmallow and Travis gonna work night really that's a really cool virtual entertainment experience why is there not more commerce and shopping that is integrated and they saw the success of because at ComplexCon every year they move like 30 to 40000000 of products in their long beach destination is the largest contributor to the Long Beach economy every single year.
Is there any other interesting product collaborations? It brings the other interesting food vendors interesting experiments and they're like we're gonna put this into a virtual environment where everything shut down over it. But they will also went out with a pretty like I think a different experience where it's just kind of like a like a like a a role playing game where you control an individual like avatar it goes through it could pop up into here's an educational talk here's where you can buy some unique product here's a virtual food truck where you can actually place an order from a like a local restaurant that that partners with like an uber eats or door - and men will actually send that order it's wherever you you know your base.
And I think it's really fun I have enjoyed speaking to the complex team like Christian basically who are close to me that I think this is not going to replace ComplexCon this is also going to be just another another manifestation of how they create a great experience for their brands and for their users and for the different. Product providers if they collaborate with every year and I think I got I I played with it a little bit I want more time to go into it but I think complex and is a very cool thing to keep track interesting yeah yeah this is like also almost like the conference business number conferences are pretty much gone now we're now at least yeah but they are going into virtual conferences yeah and what they're doing is that what what I I mean we all probably saw this over the last 1015 years all every time you went to a conference they had. Another really M. perfect Oct to connect people in the conference. I'm nobody use it.
They spend a lot of money building these ops and really nobody uses it now yeah but in the matter of like 3 to 4 months these apps are becoming a lot better in connecting people I just went through this a conference at which shop talk which they did a really good job and. The future of it I think it's going to be even better than what it was before so when the pandemic is over we're gonna have to live conferences plus we're gonna have these virtual conferences which is going to be interesting is how do they actually monetize and optimize that experience so people will go to both.
Yeah I think I I forget which publishers was whether it was like the Wall Street journal or Tribune or fortune that I think they've seen their offense revenue actually because they have a lot lately launched so many virtual events and webinars thoughtfully during Kobe that they've actually seen their offense at tendons and I think even revenues grow this year versus decline. And yeah I I think you're right like I think. In real life events they're not going to go away and they're gonna come back with a vengeance after cobit but I think what you just touched on there is that's important is people are realizing I like the virtual events just had they needed so much more improvement and your mobile app experience for how you connect with others like I remember dealing with this. That's what you want they'll tell you to log into the app in advance and use it and then like it's a it's a poor experience no one uses it that's all gonna change going forward and I think one of my team members just sent me an article that there's a new virtual advanced platform that just raised over $130000000 that's going to help bring traditional event organizer's into the virtual work into like this new virtual environment in a much better exciting and compelling way. Yeah I mean there's just so many changes it it's the the world that's why I don't even think too far ahead like you know people talk about 2030 I I can't even think that far ahead of me right now even 2025 it's kind of like.
I think whatever the pace of change stays like this whatever you think about we're going to be like off so it's like so let's do this now let's go in and finish off with talking more about that shoppable live streaming is this. So we we actually have a version of shoppable live streaming which is different from that one too many format yeah thank you you see and I was alive and Instagram live in all of these other companies which is a one on one like what we called V. I. P. type experience where you for example you get the full attention of a sales person for what you are looking for and if the region and like almost like an intimate. Really high touch experience of walking somebody in a store for example and answering every one of the questions on demand right there and shopping while you're doing that and I'm like really interested to see what your thoughts about that kind of in this experience.
Yes for the one on one experience that your you're right that a lot of like the many apps that are out there been designed for kind of like one to many but I think for for the one to one experiences I think it again speaks to what is like the type of shopper that you're targeting which might be like a premium high end shopper that wants exclusive white glove service that's going to have much more discretionary income to spend in a in a single shopping session maybe going up for like a more premium good where they need more personalized like education. And maybe I can demonstrate the ability of the product.
I think it also speaks to the specific types of products for this premium shopper because there might be certain items that really work well on this 1 to 1 format where others that maybe might not be as effective and are better for 11 too many so curious like what what what are you seeing in your in your platform for the types of products that work well with this 1 to 1 what what experience so what we're seeing is that the what's called the considered purchases purchases were people actually have to do war evaluation to make a decision are a lot better fit let's say for example furniture. Jewelry watches high end fashion a lot of different even type of fashion or even like a type of you know if you know the concept of the personal shopping or personal stylist which puts a collection together yeah things like that like even automotive we've tested with real states so all of these different products actually land really well to the one to one. X. experience and.
You know what I think that I've seen like when you go to Amazon live right now if you just go to Amazon live our lives are not as on.com you're going to see a lot of really low price items and it's almost like becoming like . The boys are that you're you've gone too and there are 100 people yelling at you.
And you go to one of you by $5 things here and find out you know $10 things over there and I don't know if that's by design or what's the point I mean how it's come to that point. At that kind of a you know product selection but that's one to many types. Experience caters better to bad kind of a in like a product it seems I mean even like QVC if you go to QVC they do a great job but you rarely see really high and. Exclusive like a really high end products that are sold at that level so yeah that's interesting things to think about it like what you're touching on Amazon too as you know we break down the different business models for companies that want to get in the life you're shopping Amazon started as a commerce destination. Entertainment and content was not part of their original pro like you know their digital original mandate by any means.
They have a whole separate division with Amazon prime video which is just driving users and traffic but also just giving Amazon prime members access to another service that makes them stickier and more retain a shopping platform but when you go to Amazon to shop it's very utilitarian and intentional shopping your product I want to read some like I wanna read user reviews but it feels like it was built like you know Craig says like late late 19 nineties early 2 thousands and that's a that's a that's a major challenge for them
I think it's an advantage is that they are very commerce native so when you see product and how you can click through that product reviews and just purchased immediately they're good at that but that involvement is not entertaining it's not exciting it doesn't showcase the personality well and that's got to change to make it work where in contrast when you go to the content first destinations think of Facebook Instagram really smart experience a you know a news feed curated from your friend groups in your social networks in any you know pages that you follow that you like Hi Siri algorithm that's surfacing content that you like think about 2 cops content discovery algorithm which is world class right best in the business everyone replicates.
In your ability to scroll through the contents cruelty the personality it's super fun but then you know like you she was a great example is for you to check on an ecommerce over a decade ago we wrote about this and because it just wasn't you know there are primarily focused on making money from programmatic advertising didn't necessarily staff up to focus on ecommerce transactions they never really figured out in recently you too has made some moves to start having users tag products so they can show carousels at the bottom the videos but that's a very janky transaction experience relative to Amazon watching the video you know watching the video in the feet and having like click out elsewhere it's awkward so the best companies are gonna be the ones that combine and get that get that right this real like hybridization which speaks to the ones that we seem like you know pop shopping network and elsewhere the ticket to your point about where you know where one on one works with these higher end items.
I agree for sure high end fashion or jewelry or more premium experience is king you just have to make sure that that one that price point is high enough to cover those cos