When Spanish conquistador Francisco Coronado first stumbled into the southern Great Plains of the United States in 1541, he described it as a great and endless sea of grass, without a single landmark in sight. In many ways, the swaths of investable, but empty, land in the metaverse is kind of the same situation, depending on where you're buying. Endless nothing as far as the eye can see is a great place for dreaming of what can be, but it's really the most basic unit of virtual real estate investment.
Many metaverse real estate investors want to go beyond a simple land purchase and create something truly worthy of investment. What that is will depend on the investor's goals and the land in question, but knowing what you want to create long before you create it can also help inform the parcel of land that makes the most sense for your long-term outlook. Your possibilities are endless, but there are some interesting options that investors are considering now.
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1. Metaverse event space can bring in a diverse crowd
Event space is a great opportunity for booking short-term rentals on your metaverse property. If your structure is large enough to accommodate events like virtual concerts or shows, you'll be able to attract musicians and other performers who are looking for a new way to reach audiences that may have not been willing or able to attend events in person.
Make sure to provide retail space for event-related swag sales. Who doesn't want to pick up a (virtual) band T-shirt on the way out of the venue?
2. Virtual billboards are just as useful as real ones
Long live the billboard, the giant roadside advertisement that never seems to die. Metaverse platforms also have roads and traffic, though you can think of it more as pedestrian traffic. Even so, billboards are valuable platforms to reach diverse audiences who occupy and visit the metaverse. Just like with real-life billboards, your income stream comes from renting the space out to companies who want to share their messages with passersby.
Look to both real-life and virtual companies as potential billboard customers. After all, just because someone is active in the metaverse doesn't mean they know there's a new virtual shop by a big brand going into an area they don't regularly frequent.
3. Experiences can be totally wild in the metaverse
Forget amusement parks -- they can't hold a candle to what's possible in the metaverse. Just because there's no gravity (or physical bodies) doesn't mean that a virtual experience can't be interesting and fun for visitors. You'll need ample space and a huge imagination (or several on the payroll) to create something that will generate ticket sales, but the whole point of the metaverse is social experiences, and this is no different.
Bonus points for being able to update, change, or remodel your experience space for pennies on the dollar compared to a real-life amusement park or similar facility. Don't let the constraints of the real world get you down when you're dreaming big.
4. Traditional malls and shopping centers are still needed
Just because it's not the real world doesn't mean that people aren't looking for stuff to populate their virtual life. Retail has a strong place in the metaverse, and brands will need plenty of room for showrooms and shops. Even small brands may find cult followings in the metaverse, so don't be shy about reaching out to potential tenants when setting up your well-planned rental spaces for commercial businesses.
Many brands have already seen great success with promoting and selling NFT versions of their real-world products to metaverse denizens. Custom sneakers, high-end bags, and other difficult-to-attain objects can help customers express themselves.
5. Office space is just as useful in the virtual world
With workplace returns continuing to be pushed out indefinitely, companies are looking for ways to bring their teams together in communal space. Rather than relying on dedicated metaverse platforms for this job, metaverse office space on bigger platforms can add another element of the real world into the virtual one. Team builders are way more interesting in the metaverse.
Don't forget that virtual architects, designers, Realtors, and others vital to the development of the metaverse may also seek spaces within the platforms where they work. These people already exist and are reaching into the virtual world to make a living in the real one.
