Engaging existing customers as well as prospecting globally has seen H&M become the latest fashion brand to launch an immersive metaverse experience on Roblox. And with clothing and accessories creation growing on the platform by 25 per cent year-on-year, there’s no doubt there’s plenty more to come.

For a concept no one seems confident to define, the metaverse is proving incredibly costly, with McKinsey estimating in June more than US$177 billion had been sunk into it since 2021.

Building social and metaverse muscle to deliver modern-day marketing and customer obsession have been priorities for The Iconic’s chief customer officer in the first year of the job.

Reframing your approach from brand to community will be critical if marketers are to make the most of the opportunities emerging through the metaverse.

Across technology, media and telecommunications, innovation is being driven by the global pandemic’s economic and societal impacts, resulting in intensifying growth in video, virtual (VR), and cloud technologies, according to the latest Deloitte Australia Technology, Media & Telecommunications (TMT) Predictions report.

Gaming can often point to the future of new technology before we have it in our everyday lives. It often drives innovation in computing through more powerful processors and memory, it can spur advancements in image resolution and even the creation of virtual, multi-player collaborative environments. And so it is the case with the metaverse, an emerging hybrid virtual-physical world, which is innovating gaming and pointing to new realms for marketing and brands.

As we continue to grapple with the shake-up to our lives and work brought on by the pandemic, there’s another era of computing innovation on our doorstep waiting to disrupt us once again: Web 3.0.

While 2020 might have been the year of accelerated digital transformation, marketers will have a host of other technologies on their radar in 2021. From artificial intelligence (AI) and IoT to mixed reality (MR) and robotic process automation, marketing leaders will increasingly tap technology to make informed, responsive decisions with tightened budgets and changing consumer behaviour.

The age of customer centricity is here, and as experience increasingly becomes the biggest driver of digital transformation and marketing strategy, 2018 will be about moving the customer relationship to an even deeper and more dynamic level of personalised engagement.

The launch of Microsoft’s Hololens holographic technology and accompanying headset in early 2015 was proclaimed by industry pundits as a technology for marketers to watch because of its ability to change the way consumers interact with brands and products.