THIS WEEK SUMMED UP We appreciate you being here as we’ve figured some things out together this year. Stick around as we take on ‘24 with the same attitude 🥳. Today, we’re talking Fortnite, Nike’s OG feedback loops, and whether AI can decide what’s fashionable.
Read time: 2 minutes and 26 seconds
THREE PARTS THAT MATTER
Marketing One of the world’s most popular video games, Fortnite (with a cool 70M monthly users) added three new game modes this week - LEGO Fortnite, Rocket Racing, and Fortnite Festival. These fresh formats are just the start of Epic’s long planned strategy to turn Fortnite into a metaverse.
As our gaming and growth expert Connor Richmond explains, “Picture this: overnight your favorite gym added an indoor ski facility, an amusement park, and a recording studio. For Fortnite, this kind of expansion brings in new audiences while keeping pre-existing audiences engaged for longer. And on top of that, in-game purchases get an added value now that they can flex over a dynamic ecosystem.”
A lot to watch in this space: If you’re a CMO or brand marketer… the recently released game modes are built in collaboration with brands and identities: Lego x Fortnite, Lewis Hamilton x Rocket Racing, The Weeknd x Fortnight Festival. Opportunities for brand promotion similar to the world of Roblox await. If you’re a growth marketer… the rise of this in-game marketplace means the ability for advertisers to place ads in one of the biggest games of all time may be just around the corner.
Culture Jose Chiriboga, a Part and Sum growth marketer, has been enjoying Shoe Dog: A Memoir by the Creator of Nike. In particular, he recognizes the connection between a deep understanding of customers and the success achieved by Phil Knight's megabrand, Nike.
“This guy really understood his customers because he was one of them. By adding tight feedback loops with his customers, he was able to improve on the shoe that he was selling and eventually ventured out to create many iterations of his own shoes. Just by understanding the consumer really well: what they wanted, what they needed, and what ultimately they wanted to achieve [in his shoes].”
Technology In the fashion industry, AI is already playing a helpful role in demand forecasting, particularly for reordering popular styles. The big question is whether AI can and will be an arbiter of taste, becoming not just the trend enabler but the trend forecaster. Currently, fashion is very opinion based – somebody wears a pair of pants, then a celebrity wears them and then, they go viral - this cycle is hard to predict. AI isn’t dressing us yet but fingers crossed AI likes high-waisted jeans and athleisure.
PARTS THAT MATTER [TO US] Merry wrapped-mas - each wrapped season, our team shares their top songs and we play a guessing game to match the songs to the listener. It’s always chuckle-worthy to guess whose kids took over their account this year or who is the secret Broadway musical fanatic. We compiled our team’s top songs of 2023 into a fun, eclectic playlist.
Cue them up as the soundtrack to some trend report browsing. You'll see some trends you're ahead of surely and maybe even a few that call for a frantic googling. What better way to spend the holidays? Read one (or all 157) here.
WHAT ELSE WE ARE READING
We’ll say see ya later with Scott Galloway’s predictions for what’s to come next year. Cue googling GLP-1s…