ComplexLand, a luxury virtual shopping experience Jam3 and Complex
Jam3 won the Chair’s Award at The Drum Awards for Experience, with its work for Complex. It was also highly commended in the ‘Retail/In-Store Experiential Brand Activation of the Year’ category. ComplexLand was a free, weeklong virtual universe featured exclusive drops from coveted brands and an expansive shopping experience. Here, the team behind this winning entry explains how it was brought to life.
ComplexLand was so successful that it led the way for ComplexLand 2.0, a richer and even more exciting experience.
As the pandemic continued to prevent large-scale in person events from happening, Jam3 created new ways to create excitement around formerly live events. For Complex Networks, creating ComplexLand, a free weeklong virtual universe featuring exclusive drops from coveted brands, an expansive shopping experience, musical performances, food delivery, celebrity panel discussions and screenings.
ComplexLand was created to fill the void of a longstanding in-person event, to help Complex Networks reach their global audiences and engage ComplexCon fans during the pandemic.
Inspired by today’s rapidly growing intersection of gaming and street culture, the first ComplexLand was a WebGL-powered, commerce-enabled, three-dimensional theme park available on any desktop or mobile web-enabled device globally, no app or headset required. ComplexLand’s expertly curated galleria featured popular streetwear and luxury brands including Versace, Gucci, Adidas, Atmos, BBC, Rhude, TokiDoki, and more.
Versace’s Chief Creative Officer Donatella Versace made her first-ever virtual appearance, where she unlocked the limited-edition ‘Trigreca’ sneakers for attendees to purchase. Sponsor brands included Head & Shoulders, the CW, Adobe and Showtime.
What transpired was nothing short of astonishing. The reaction was overwhelmingly positive and ComplexLand was the first true ecommerce event that brought over 50 brands and stores into one centralized virtual world. Since December’s event was so successful, we worked together with Complex Networks again to put on ComplexLand 2.0 this past June 16-18.
ComplexLand 2.0 evolved into a richer and more exciting experience due to its strategic brand integrations and technological enhancements. We transformed ComplexLand 2.0 into a gamified 3D world. This included a multiplayer setting, new avatar options and social-sharing features, as well as the gamification element of finding coins around the 3D world to receive exclusive items. Title sponsors for this year included FX and Vistaprint, with even more brands participating this time around-over 70. Even with the hopeful return of ComplexCon in the fall, we along with Complex Networks hope to continue ComplexLand as a cornerstone of the Complex Networks brand.
We recognized a void in the marketplace, and ComplexLand not only solved for the inability to host physical events but also streamlined commerce and entertainment into a single virtual experience that had not existed prior. The event reported 3.2 million minutes of time spent, 1.3 million brand and commerce engagements and over 9 million total engagements from attendees across the five-day experience. Both consumer and brand sentiment were extremely positive.
What sets ComplexLand and ComplexLand 2.0 apart from all other virtual events this past year is that they were actually commercially viable, profitable, business products. With over 10,000 items sold, and over 1 million USD generated, ComplexLand 2.0’s game-ified virtual shopping festival also increased sponsorship revenue by 60% as well. We were able to expand the ComplexCon IRL event with 75,000 attendees to a global audience, reaching attendance numbers ten times the size of the IRL event.
This campaign was a winner at The Drum Awards for Experience. To find out more, including which competitions are currently open for entry, visit The Drum Awards website.