3-Social Media Operations

“Unlike the traditional approach, Nexon makes its games free to download to personal computers and to play. The company makes money by charging customers anywhere from 30 cents to $25 each for virtual “items” to enhance their game experiences, including everything from souped-up vehicles to wacky hairstyles for in-game characters.” Nick Wingfield, journalist | Wall St. Journal, 23 May 2008

“Nexon’s biggest hit in the U.S. so far is MapleStory, an online role-playing game popular with teenagers in which players assume the identities of warriors, magicians and thieves and collectively fight monsters. The game has 85 million users globally, of which 5.9 million are registered in the U.S.” Nick Wingfield | Wall St. Journal, 23 May 2008

“The in-game purchases add up to a big, fast-growing business. Prepaid cards used to buy Nexon game items are now the second best-selling entertainment gift card at Target Corp. stores in the U.S., after cards for Apple Inc.’s iTunes Store, Target says.” Nick Wingfield, journalist | Wall St. Journal, 23 May 2008

“These games are as much Facebook as they are raw video games.” Evan Wilson, Analyst, Pacific Crest Securities | Wall St. Journal, 23 May 2008

“We sell social experiences, not packaged products.” Min Kim, VP Marketing, Nexus | Wall St. Journal, 23 May 2008

“I think we’re going to become television to their film…there will always be room for big blockbusters, but there will be less and less of them. I think we’ll reach a much, much broader audience.” Steve Rechtschaffner, CCO, Nexon Publishing North America | Wall St. Journal, 23 May 2008

“There’s a conversation going on now about your company, good, bad, or otherwise. A company like ours, poolcenter.com, is trying to gently steer it in a positive direction. And when members need a product, they’re just a couple of clicks away.” Rob Cox, Founder of the Pool Community at PoolCenter.com | Inc Magazine, July 2008

“The fans own this team, and when you loose sight of that you’re in trouble.” Derrick Daye, Online Marketing Analyst, Utah Jazz | Customer Relationship Management, June 2008

“One of the challenges in professional sports is that there’s an offseason. There’s one magical day where there are no more tickets to sell and everything gets quiet. With social media, the conversation … continues around the brand, year-round … Now more than ever, the fan wants to be involved.“ Derrick Daye, Online Marketing Analyst, Utah Jazz | Customer Relationship Management, June 2008

“We have created … [for the] Utah Jazz … a fan portal called Jazzbots.com … built and co-branded with [partners]: Yahoo, MyBlogLog, and Flickr. We [created] two new revenue streams: 1) through advertising on the blog; 2) through advertising on MyLifeBrand. We also sell sponsorships of an interactive widget that … delivers real-time news about the Jazz [to our members]. Derrick Daye, Online Marketing Analyst, Utah Jazz | Customer Relationship Management, June 2008

“No one else has the capability of doing what MyLifeBrand does … a social networking platform that … aggregates all other social networking sites [that our fans use]. If one of our fans has a MySpace page with 100 friends, has a Facebook account with 200 friends, and may even a Match.com account, they can easily and free of charge sign up to be a part of the Jazz community, [importing], all of their friends from all of their social sites … they can manage their online life from our special Jazz-branded community.” Derrick Daye, Online Marketing Analyst, Utah Jazz | Customer Relationship Management, June 2008

“Another thing that comes with MyLifeBrand … a revenue share … [where] advertising is served in MyLifeBrand and [the] revenue split with the community.” Derrick Daye, Online Marketing Analyst, Utah Jazz | Customer Relationship Management, June 2008

“We see our reach using social media … for everything we do online. Right now, fans can submit videos … [that] express loyalty to the team. We’re holding video contests … [and] building offline, real-world events. Derrick Daye, Online Marketing Analyst, Utah Jazz | Customer Relationship Management, June 2008

“I think the basic economic benefits associated with technology usually drive adoption. And I think there’s a basic economic benefit in having meetings. That means there we be a competitive imperative created by companies using virtual worlds to collaborate; this will give them a slide edge that will cause adoption by their competitors. I think that competition at a very small scale will drive adoption and use overall. 

“[With respect the benefit of anonymity in virtual worlds] I think one of the biggest is that you do feel more comfortable talking in a meeting. The feeling of presence is very high but it doesn’t have quite the intimidation that a real meeting does.

“Some people people are willing to express ideas or call thing into question where they wouldn’t in a normal meeting. And that small difference is a significant economic benefit to a company.

“Once you get a small work group into Second Life and there comfortable with it, they might be separated by great distances but working together in a space that is 10 times more compelling than being on the telephone, or worse yet, being on a conference call.

“The ability to sit down and have a ‘face-to-face’ meeting - I know it seems strange but it really does feel like that [in Second Life] - is a very obvious cost-saving for business. Businesses willing to push and get a few work groups going will immediately see the benefits - and the hard costs can be realized in travel cost reduction and improvement in collaborative efficiencies.

Philip Rosedale, Founder, Second Life | 18 June 2008 Financial Times