The promise of Web3 might just save the marketing universe

Back in Web1, in the late 90's and early naughties, the web offered something entirely unique for brands and marketing folk.

We could finally build places for our customers and potential customers to hang out, to find out about us, to learn more about us outside of an ad spot. Back then it was a website, possibly a forum, maybe a blog, if you were really outrageous. This drove things like flash and immersive web experiences, true new world entertainment.

Then Web2 came along, mid naughties, the explosion of the social (or participatory ??) platforms. Since that explosion; Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, TikTok, Snap, +++ have become the norm for marketers.

Everyone handed over their audience, then their cash, then their brands, and in some cases, their products. And here we are today, marketers have given up nearly everything thats important to them, that makes them a marketer, that makes a brand, a brand.

And now, as we accelerate through the ever changing paid media world, where the big things that always used to work are starting to falter, where what the whole industry holds dear and sacred starts to unravel at the hands of normal, everyday humans behaviour. We to have to look forward, to find a sustainable way to give brands their oxygen back.

Web3, the love/hate term that wraps up a set of technologies and ideologies that create the metaverse platform that you are all reading so much about.

Not going to talk about my views on Web3, the metaverse or the holy grail that everyone thinks they are building. Thats for another day. (sneak peak; I love the philosophy, as always, reality will be much more human)

But..

The promise of Web3, even if at it's core, the return to community and ownership is real, it will restart the heart of marketing and make us all work harder.

And..

More than that, the idea of building platforms, either in your own virtual space, or on top of a metalike platform (decentraland et al) is getting us back to what the web did for brands in the late 90's. To build a home, to be entertaining and to give back to the people we rely on so much.

And..

The standard is super high, we see luxury, fashion and lifestyle brand taking the lead and building things that are defining human expectation. Like immersive web, way back when, setting expectations, we are in the same space again. You customers will have seen or will soon see the likes of Gucci, Nike, Adidas and more within this new world, brands and marketers have to level up.

And that's what might just save the marketing universe, the levelling up to build really entertaining and useful ecosystems that have community ownership at the core.

Sound scary?

Good, that's where magic happens.