1. 1 Ravi Vatrapu vatrapu@cbs.dk Avatar Based Marketing Hemp, P. (2006). Avatar-based marketing. Harvard Business Review, 84(6), 48-57. Course Portal: http://www.itu.dk/~rkva/2011-Spring-EB22http://www.itu.dk/~rkva/2011-Spring-EB22 Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=133258548012http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=133258548012 Etherpad: http://ietherpad.com/7y3drhMCnqhttp://ietherpad.com/7y3drhMCnq Thursday, 14-Apr-2011 EB22: Online Marketing: Lecture 39 Auditorium 4, ITU, Copenhagen, Denmark

2. T ARGETING IN V IRTUAL W ORLDS “Whom do your marketing efforts target? The flesh-and-blood Second Life members who gave their credit card numbers to register for the game– or their Second Life avatars residing in the virtual world?” (p.48) 2

3. T ARGETING IN V IRTUAL W ORLDS 3

4. L IFE ON THE S CREEN 4 http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/f/f8/Internet_dog.jpg

5. A VATAR  From the Sanskrit word about the incarnations of the Hindu God, Vishnu  “Popularized by Neal Stephenson in his 1992 cult novel Snow Crash”  “Broadly defined, “avatar”encompasses not only complex beings created for use in a shared virtual reality but any visual representation of a user in an online community” 5

6. A VATAR  From the Sanskrit word about the incarnations of the Hindu God, Vishnu  “Popularized by Neal Stephenson in his 1992 cult novel Snow Crash”  “Broadly defined, “avatar” encompasses not only complex beings created for use in a shared virtual reality but any visual representation of a user in an online community” 6

7. M ARKETING IN V IRTUAL W ORLDS 7

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10. M ARKETING TO A VATARS 10 “Advertising has always targeted a powerful consumer alter ego: that hip, attractive, incredibly popular person just waiting to emerge (with the help of the advertised product) from an all-too normal self.” (p. 52)

11. M ARKETING A PPROACHES IN THE V IRTUAL W ORLDS “Each virtual world has a different culture and people come to these worlds for a variety of reasons, so a single marketing approach won’t work.” (p. 56) 11

12. D ISCUSSION 12