In June last year, people logging-in to SL and who hung around while the progress bar was displayed caught a rather unusual Message of the Day (MOTD), thus:
(with thanks to Ciaran Laval for this image)
At the time it caused a mix of teeth gnashing and speculation. When pressed, there were mutters from some inside the Lab that the Azure MOTD was a “pilot” (or “beta” or some such), and that others would get the opportunity in “the future”.
Well – it seems the future has arrived.
On the surface, it comes across as a reasonable idea – those running businesses in SL can have the opportunity to reach a wider audience by having their very own Message of the Day displayed on people’s Viewer log-in screens. Of course, there have been the inevitable howls about “more advertising” in response to this post – but lets be honest here; LL have taken something of a shellacking of late for the manner in which they’ve used the MOTD to promote their own in-world content (vis-a-vis Linden Homes, etc.) – so one might argue that this is an attempt to redress the balance and put residents on the same footing.
Well yes. Apart from one small detail. Anyone wanting to use this “service” is going to have to shell out a minimum of $1500 for each 11.5 hour block of advertising space they want to book – with the “peak” rate (07:00-18:30 PST) being hawked by the Lab at a staggering $4500 per 11.5 hour block.
(Technically, each block is 12 hours – but LL “reserve” 30 mins in each block for “administrative purposes” – which suggests your MOTD may not be actually displayed during this period.)
Ciaran Laval has rightly called out Linden Lab over these charges from the perspective of the more modest estate owners in SL – as it is fairly obvious that the rates are only likely to be within the reach of the largest land barons. However, and while acknowledging Ciaran’s call on behalf of the smaller estate owners, I’d say the matter goes further than just the ability of estate owners to use the MOTD as a channel to market – the pricing structure virtually excludes all content creators from any participation.
Given this, one can only assume one of three things; either:
- LL is increasingly playing to a minority within SL, or
- LL is indeed in financial difficulties, and this is an act of desperation to generate income, or
- The offer has been skewed by LL’s continued belief that the future of the platform is inevitably tied to the use of the platform by “big business”, and as such, the rates have been set in a belief that they’ll be seen as a “serious” “opportunity” for “big business”.
Inevitably, most will go with (1.). But the FIC theory is all too often rolled out in response to LL’s actions whether or not they make sense. (3.) has merit in that those who consider themselves “serious” businesses (aka the GSP group) pushing for the ability to market themselves “professionally”, and LL seem to determined to tie aspects of activities on the large grid into their SLE offering.
(2.) Is also possible – and certainly, if one leaves out (1.) and (3.), the “offer” does have more than a whiff of desperation about it.
As I’ve said elsewhere, I’m going to be very interested to see just who takes up the offer.
Inara Pey: Living in a Modemworld 
This surely isn’t aimed at any inworld business, even those spending absurd amounts on classifieds won’t be that tempted by this. This is for RL business to get a quick advert across.
There’s potential in this scheme, but it needs to be richer for RL business to spend that sort of money and really, they’d be better just contacting me and asking me to put up a 24/7 ad on one of my sims.
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Yep…hence my option (3). I’m convinced the idea *is* aimed at external businesses; and while it may have merit, LL have again appeared to somewhat shot themselves in the foot in that they have admitted they currently have no way of gauging how effective advertising in this way might be, and will only be able to supply trail advertisers with a bareest minimum of data after the fact. Worse, they promise that the kind of metrics that would make the opportunity more attractive will only be developed *if* the programme works – and then only at some unspecified point the the future.
This really makes the idea less an advertising opportunity and more a matter of speculative gambling on the part of the advertiser. In this respect, the sum of $4,500 may be pitched in an attempt to make the “opportunity” more attractive to advertisers – but the fact remains that a much fairer way of initiating a trail would have been to work on a CPC system (balanced by a smaller up-front fee) which would split the risk involved in an untried advertising medium more fairly between LL and potential advertisers.
As it is, the up-front fee simply comes across as asking the advertiser to shoulder the risk (i.e. encountering very little interest from SL users and thus losing money on the venture) while LL gains financially with little or no effort. No amount of excuse-making or suggestions from Liana that LL were somehow arm-twisted into pushing the scheme out now, rather than waiting until they could offer a more equitable means of sharing the risk is going to change this – and as such, her words frankly ring hollow.
The question also needs to be asked that – given the pitch is aimed at “external” advertisers – why even dress it up in terms that suggest it is something for the in-world business community in the first place? Again, the initial trumpeting of the move smacks of a familiar duality. Of course, simply saying “we’re doing this for companies out there in the real world” wouldn’t have gone down any better among residents – but between these two extremes lies a middle ground wherein in a more – dare I say – “honest” appoach could have been taken by LL, along the lines of, “We’re trying this idea, OK? Initially, it will be primarily for businesses external to SL. However, if it is successful and you guys like what you see, we’ll look at ways and means of structuring it so more of you can join the programme if you wish…”. It wouldn’t win everyone over – but it would probably go down a lot better than it is currently.
What *is* going to be interesting is seeing if anyone *out there* does take up the opportunity; while SL may appear to be a captive audience, and LL can play around a lot with figures (average daily log-ins, average hourly log-ins, translations to potential click-throughs, etc.) – the fact remains that SL is, I’d venture to suggest, simply far too parochial and limited for marketing suits to take seriously, and the 30-second use of a static strapline is hardly the most compelling means of broadcasting a message, for advertiser and resident alike!
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Does any of you know if you can pay with L$ at all? I assume not, which means it is purely aimed at big/external advertisers.
Soon we will probably see “rich media” login screens.
And I speculate that 3rd party viewers will be forced to display them as well.
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I’d be really surprised. As per speculatiion above, this whole “opportunity” seems geared at attracting what some in LL might well regard as “real” business, and not in-world “businesses”. As such, I suspect LL will want cheques for “real” money. I’d further suggest than L$ payments will only be offered if a) the “trail” fails to attract the kind of advertising revenue LL are hoping for; b) they flip the charging method to a more fitting CPC system; c) they structure the pricing to make it genuinely attractive to in-world businesses.
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There’s certainly a lot to know about this subject. I love all the points you’ve made.
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