FOMO and Platforms
Thanks for your love and kind wishes send over phone calls, emails and text messages. I am glad to have all of you in my life and look forward to say it in person ASAP. I hope you are getting used to the new “Normal” of distancing from in-person interactions to #FlattenTheCurve. This had fundamentally changed the way we work and learn but even more importantly our social life. FOMO had made us social media addicts ! Waiting for the next like, comment or share become the adrenal pulsating the platform economy to the new frontiers and also make them incredibly rich (5 Trillion Dollars Market Capitalisation for the FAANG). They also cut us off from the real life and connections. How would platforms look after Covid-19 ? Would they evolve ?
Like they say- Never let a crisis go to waste.
See you on the other side.
DTW
During the Week, City of Milan announced a futuristic plan to reimagine the city with considerably less traffic and more pedestrian and cycling zones. Many businesses including platforms businesses are transforming themselves and shedding fat in terms of product-features and at times even entire products from their portfolios. This period may end up altering our collective social consciousness and hence the businesses need to alter their value propositions.
Six weeks of #HomeSheltering measures taken to #FlattenTheCurve have created new paradigms for #StruckatHome Millennials as well as Gen Z. It has dramatically altered their socialisation behaviour and upended life as usual. The saving grace has been that they are digital natives and hence shifting to an online virtual world has been comparatively easier than the older folks.
Attention economy especially mass celebrity fuelled influencer businesses have seen a rapid decline. I mean what’s there to peddle when you are struck at home and your followers also have the same fate. Few of the adventurous ones who dared to post ‘Normal‘ stuff got massively trolled for being ‘Deaf’ and ‘Insensitive’.
Lot of these influencers have seen their income and engagement plummet since Covid-19 started raging across the world. Marketing budgets have been massively slashed and endorsement deals have dropped off. Many of them have kept the engagement levels up through covid- 19 related posts. Some of the most followed accounts relate to travel and with #LockDown in place they are posting their quarantine pictures. You might still be in luck if you are one of the #VanLife instagram celebrities who can still move around but many of them are also parked on roads and even worse in a friend’s garage.
So, what are the regular Attention Economy platforms doing different ? Both Facebook and Google have seen their revenue shrink as travel and hospitality brands have reduced their online advertising spend and other also have shrunken budgets. The battleground has now shifted to Gaming- both playing and watching. Facebook have just announced a new gaming platform to compete with Amazon’s Twitch, Google’s YouTube and Microsoft’s Mixer services. Lot of you might recall FarmVille which make Facebook a household name even before Messenger picked up ! Those obnoxious FarmVille notification made non-players’ lives hell but surely made its creator Zynga a multibillion dollar business. Game hardware including Nintendo Switches are already sold out !
Experience based businesses including dining out, live music concerts and sports events have been drastically impacted and might have to change fundamentally to survive going forward.
We are already hearing plans about a no-crowd IPL matches, Music Concerts on Instagram and of course movies being released directly on streaming services. There are infinitely more in-home entertainment options right now and while even in pre-COVID-19 days, the cinema world had already started adapting to Netflix-and-chilling consumers, there is a renewed urgency in traditional media business. In fact, Netflix in the latest report added 15.77 million new subscribers whereas the analysts were looking for only 8.2 million while Cinema Tickets sales in India have literally scored ZERO . Closure of Disney’s non-streaming business has already put it in doldrums and at the current valuation, there are already rumours about it being an acquisition target for Apple.
Museums, Art Galleries and Zoos have started streaming services for their patrons. Although this might be good for engagement and an occasional PR story but without hard cash coming they might struggle to keep it going as the maintenance would cost money. Travel and Tourism have taken a hit and do not seem to have any recovery in sight. AirBnB had to rush to borrow close to 2 Billion Dollars at high interest rates instead of hitting the IPO that they had planned for this quarter. Indian Travel and Events portal including MakeMyTrip are firefighting daily not for new booking but refunds and failing terribly at it.
In short , Leisure for the internet-connected is being upended for now and seems ripe for innovation and disruption. Post Covid- 19 world might emerge with different expectation from the experience economy service providers including hygiene and contact-less and more exclusivity. And we are not even talking about millions of others who do not even have access to these options as they lack access to power, network connection and many times struggling for work, health, food and shelter. There are smaller initiative like the #ArtBasket launched by Trice Community where you could donate an Art Kit to a child and bring some color to their lives.
OTW
Over the Weekend , I reviewed passages from We Commerce by visionary marketing strategist Billee Howard and thought harder about the Reliance- Facebook 9.99 % deal. (I know you had started wondering how did I miss this earth shattering news.)
Anyways, I think that this Retail- Telecom- Social Media combination is going to upset the plans for not only major e-commerce but even hyperlocal e-commerce platforms. It also means that these players either need to sell out or simply shut shop to prevent any more losses. My intuition for hyper local play going forward is in Passion Economy. Jio-Facebook like platforms can disrupt and take away commoditised non-engaging kind of customer interactions but the market for creative individualistic kind of product would not only remain but actually flourish. After all, technology should provide us freedom and not tether us to a bottomless screen. Billee makes the same point in her book about creating platforms which emphasize quality over quantity and dedicated to art rather than speed. Something like our creative and passionate friends at Jaipur Creative Commune led by Rachna Ghiya who are bringing artists and patrons together. Do check them to understand the evolution of the Hyper-Local community based platform business model .
There is this unending romanticism for things small or even nothing as compared to alternatives and yet being able to make an impact. One of an iconic mafia life book that I have loved is Shantaram by Gregory David Roberts. And the real life lessons come from mysterious Karla who gives this line-
The real trick in life is to want nothing, and to succeed in getting it
In parallel universe, Kanupriya has this observation about Kanha in an epic love poem of the same name by Dharamveer Bharti
इस सम्पूर्ण के लोभी तुम
भला उस प्रणाम मात्र को क्यों स्वीकारते ?
So, take a deep breath , prepare yourself to ignore the cacophony of marketing messages which are going to slam you in a week’s time and visualise your very own “New Normal” with the things that you would like to have in your life to make you happier and proud of yourself.
I Love You.
Shailendra
I love how you introduce us to new terms. I will surely explore more about the passion economy. Thanks for mentioning JaipurCreativeCommune :)
I think this pause has made me do so many things. Sometimes I wonder am I taking it so hard and trying utilizing all the time to grow the community (JaipurCreativeCommune) as this is the time when people are thinking all about pursuing their passion. I certainly see the increase in followers and traction but I also feel that with so many live sessions happening it's getting hard to keep people connected for the whole session. I think getting the attention will always be a task to work on :)