Chun-Yuen Teng and Lada A. Adamic from the School of Information at the University of Michigan have just published some interesting research on user retention in the virtual world Second Life ®.
The researchers observed that a high percentage (95.4%) of users who had made some financial investment in SL were likely to remain. From there, they set out to determine which factors were the best predictors of retention. The findings are quite interesting and I'll summarize, but please read the detailed report for the analysis.
Linden Lab provided the research team a dataset on user activity including snapshots of the social network, group affiliations, as well as summary interaction data such as first and most recent login, user-to-user transactions and pairwise chat frequencies. The researchers focused on the slice of data spanning May-June 2009 and evaluated four different facets of the user experience: usage (time spent), networking (number of contacts, groups and social cohesion), interactions (frequency and regularity), and financial transactions (selling and buying).
1) On Usage
The total length of time spent in SL was not a significant predictor, however the intensity (total time spent in world) was a strong predictor.
2) On Networking
While all parameters of networking (# friends, # active friends, % active friends, clustering, # groups, group overlaps) were highly correlated with retention, the number of raw contacts and groups, were key to identifying which users stay. The diversity of those contacts was a positive predictor but not a strong correlation.
3) On Interactions
For this I will quote directly from the report:
We observe that almost all chat parameters are more predictive that the static network measures above. Furthermore, one need not resort to complex metrics because the best predictions are also the simplest, e.g. the number of chat partners (not necessarily friends), or the number of days on which the user chatted.
In other words, talking with people matters.
4) On Financial Transactions
Here, the researchers looked at data on purchases, sales, and transfer of goods as well as proximity within the social graph. The results indicated that while economic activity was correlated with retention, it was less so than chat. Spending money was more highly correlated than making money. Having a high proportion of free transactions was highly predictive. Profits did not improve the predictions of whether a user would stay. The amount of money paid to Linden Lab versus other users was only weakly predictive.
Honestly, I do wish I was physically on my way to Chicago for the BlogHer conference although thanks to the hard work of Queen Tureaud many will have the chance to attend virtually.
Queen has done a heroic job pulling together the in world portion of the conference, you can find the schedule here. (Note that the times listed are local Chicago time CST. The SL times are 2 hours earlier). The festivities kick off tonight at 4PM SL with a mixer and a chance to meet people in world and listen to some live music from Dalien Talbot, Montian Gilruth and me - Grace McDunnough. There are over 120 SL Residents in the BlogHer group and I hope to get the chance to meet everyone over the next 2 days.
In my early discussions about the power of the Second Life platform, I discussed what I called "unmediated conversation". Unmediated, in this case, by the real life factors that influence our face to face human interactions. I argued that in a medium where you could be anything, the infamous three second "first impression" rule had to be violated in some way, allowing for a richer, more meaningful initial engagement that transcended appearance and therefore led to deeper relationships.
After all, in a place where one could be any shape, thing, sex, species, etc. why would we allow ourselves to draw conclusions about the person behind the pixels in a mere three seconds simply based on their virtual manifestation? Did I mention that I *assumed* all of this?
The fact that we can separate the avatar from the behavior allows an exploration of the extent to which this reliance on visible information in the perception process is due to the lack of conscious control and the relative stability of the body. Perceivers know that the avatar is consciously chosen, easy to change, and not stable. Therefore, if people rely more on a person’s behavior than on the visual information (avatar) when online, it is likely that people rely on characteristics of the offline body due to its stability and the fact that it is beyond conscious control. However, if the characteristics of the avatar have a stronger effect on the online person perception process than behavior, this implies that people rely on visual characteristics for some other reason.
I know, read it again .. it will make sense. Where do academics learn to write? We digress.
The researchers conducted a survey and an experiment. The survey was used to determine how people perceive a group of 30 avatars in static context created from 3D models using Poser 5 for human and 3D Studio Max for the non-human avatars; those results were used to base the selection of a stimulus for the experiment. The participants evaluated the avatars in terms of their androgyny, anthropomorphism, credibility, homophily, attraction, and the likelihood they would choose them during an interaction. Here are the avatar mug shots.
As you can see there is a variety of human male and female as well as non-human avatars. It's not quite as diverse as that which we encounter in Second Life, but it representative set.
The results from the report Conclusion:
Avatars that were more anthropomorphic were perceived to be more attractive and credible, and people were more likely to choose to be represented by them. The strongest predictor of these variables, however, was the degree of masculinity or femininity (lack of androgyny) of an avatar. Further, those images with strong gender indications (either more masculine or more feminine) were perceived as more anthropomorphic than images (whether human or not) without strong indications of gender. These results also support the claim that people anthropomorphize anything they encounter (Reeves & Nass, 1996), even bottles and hammers, to some degree.
Further, while all images have some level of anthropomorphism, not all images are either feminine or masculine. Some images are both masculine and feminine and others are neither. All things being equal, more anthropomorphic or less androgynous avatars are more attractive, credible, and homophilous, perhaps because androgyny and low anthropomorphism increase uncertainty.These results are consistent with the suggestion that people have higher expectations of anthropomorphic avatars and that there will be consequences for violating these expectations (Garau et al., 2003; Slater & Steed, 2002). The results suggest that less androgynous (more masculine or feminine) avatars may also carry higher expectations.
Finally, it seems that the characteristics of an avatar may at times provide useful, and relatively accurate, information about the person it represents. Although a small percentage of subjects reported a preference for androgynous avatars, a majority reported a preference for avatars that were 'like' them, at least in terms of gender. This suggests that users may also want to match other characteristics such as hair color and race, perhaps sexual orientation, or even hobbies. This means that designers should continue to provide a wide variety of choices. This would not only increase user satisfaction, but could also provide useful information about people in online interactions. Finally, providing minorities, such as Hispanic and African Americans, choices of avatars that match their ethnicity or race may make them feel more comfortable and may also help to prevent marginalizing minorities and other traditionally disenfranchized groups in online environments by making them obvious, visible participants.
I know what you are thinking "So much for your unmediated conversation, Grace." Not so fast, notice that this study was conducted statically.In other words, there was little context nor was there interaction.
I strongly maintain that the three second first impression is largely influenced by the context of the interaction. For example, suppose you are wandering around Second Life and out of the blue you get an instant message from someone you don't know. "Hi Grace". (Yes, I know you aren't Grace, please play along.) What do you do? Do you respond quickly and openly? Do you check the avatar's profile, quickly scanning for hints? Do you just ignore it?
Now consider the next scenario. You teleport into a crowded live music venue where you know no one. Out of the morass, someone says "Hi Grace". Now what do you do? Do you react differently?
Finally, consider the following; you are wandering through the SL Botanical Gardens and you stumble upon an infinitely peaceful setting that is empty, minus a brightly colored dwarf dangling his feet in the water and whispering to the fish. He looks up and says "Hi Grace". Well?
This goes to the argument of whether virtual worlds have to be 3D. The answer is of course no, unless you want to capitalize on the immersive and contextual experience.
My in box was inundated with emails about the Forbes.com article, Sex, Pranks and Reality. (Yes, it's behind a reg wall. Bugmenot, Luke.) At first I tried to answer each email politely and completely, but I finally crafted a canned note identifying a rebuttal, more Forbes bashing, and my favorite dose of irony, a Philip Rosedale special report on the very same Forbes.com.
I'm not going to decompose and reconstruct the Forbes storytelling menagerie, but it was a stimulus to make me think that there *must* be a simple way to look at what works in a synchronous relationship space, virtual or otherwise, and to put that into the context of why some corporations are truly failing in this space.
Is there some secret sauce to success in the virtual space? Of course there is; it's what makes any and every relationship work -- give and take -- but this is hardly a secret. Why is this so difficult and taking so long to understand? Perhaps the Cluetrain Manifesto was released too early, or the academic treatise of Cultural Convergence ala Jenkins and the Wealth of Networks ala Benkler are just too difficult to grasp. There are also several treatises on marketing in Second Life, but even those seem to be falling on deaf ears.
It's time for me to coin my pitch about this new era of relationship, in terms easier to grasp:
The new market is DIALOGUE, the new currency is INTERACTION and the exchange rate is variable, based on ENGAGEMENT. - Grace McDunnough
Let's break it down to help understand the hurdles presented to large corporations.
Hurdle #1: DIALOGUE To crack the cultural codes of Second Life, you have to engage in conversation. You may actually have to say hello to someone you've never met, you have to be willing to say what you want to say and challenge a point of view in real time, synchronously. Dialogue is critically important to building awareness; it's also the first and most basic part of a relationship.
The power of the Second Life platform is the ability to present and shape the dialogue in many experiential dimensions - spatially, visually and audibly. Why is this hard for large corporate entities? I think the answer is obvious; communication is not a strength of most large organizations internally, and externally there are layers of marketing, communication and public relations specialists that carefully craft the "message" and certainly not in real time.
Dialogue often requires that you actually be present, unlike an asynchronous web presence, and many instances of news about corporate presence in Second Life indicate that they are too devoid of people. If dialogue is a requirement, then just getting in the game presents a challenge for large corporations.
Hurdle #2: INTERACTION Assuming you've cleared the dialogue hurdle, the next question is "Can you walk the talk?". A few large corporate builds in Second Life seem to think that interaction is achieved by putting in a rollercoaster or a ski slope. That may work if you are building an amusement park or a ski resort, but what I mean by interaction is more scientific - like that of a state change. Interaction is the process of employing the artifacts of the dialogue practically to affect change.
An example of this type of interaction was the Starwood Hotels Virtual Aloft project where the results of the community feedback were subsequently incorporated into the next release of the product.
Aloha! We are pleased to announce the reopening of the virtual aloft. Over the past few months, we have actively solicited input from you, the Second Life residents, on such design features as public spaces, guest rooms and exteriors – everything from color palette to space planning. After reviewing all of your comments, several changes to the overall design of aloft are a direct result from your feedback. Not only have these changes been applied to the virtual hotel, they will also be reflected in the “real-life” aloft hotels.
True interaction is not just a public relations stunt, it requires thinking about what you are willing to expose, and it requires that corporations listen to the voice of their consumers. Mostly it requires some accountability to the objective and attendant results which is always a hurdle.
Hurdle #3: ENGAGEMENT Finally, the holy grail of a relationship -- how much does your time *with me* mean to you? Engagement is the new darling topic of the digital media ad sales and marketing world. It is still tough to define absolutely as it hinges on other equally obtuse elements such as "involvement", "experience", "resonance", "relationship", and a throw back to the web days of eyeballs per fortnight, "stickiness".
The real value of relationship is the response it draws from the individual, and that is how we measure engagement. You've heard the phrase "quality time" in relationships; it applies equally well to developing and maintaining a successful virtual presence. The crux of the quality measure is that it is interpreted from a single perspective - what is quality time to me may not be to the next person and therefore the value equation can shift. This makes corporations cringe. It flies in the face of what most, not all, corporations have adopted as the de facto exchange rates for their online presence which is reach and frequency.
So what works? Let's review. Build a relationship by starting a dialogue, stimulate and sponsor interactions, and tap into the emotional response of the person on whom you rely for consideration, brand loyalty including peer promotion, and purchasing.
And if you are more of an visual/audio learner, I think the New Radicals have a good point in "You Get What You Give".
