Like it or not, the metaverse is coming. You don't have the luxury of having feelings about it if you are a business that hopes to do business in the new age. It is time to pivot. You are going to have to try and find a foothold in a land where avatars have no feet, or legs for that matter. Sure, the tech is a bit early. But early is exactly when you want to get in on a paradigm shift. When a new social media platform pops up, you don't want to wait to see if it becomes popular before registering your name. You want to do it while you can get a good username. If it doesn't make it, there is no loss.

The problem with the early metaverse is that it is ill-defined. No one knows exactly what it is and what it is going to become. But it is almost certain that it will become something. And those businesses that are there first will have a definite first-mover advantage. Mark Zuckerberg has rebranded Facebook as Meta, short for the "Metaverse." He has the vision and the technology to push it to the next level. The question is how your business will respond. Here are a few ways for your real-world business to carve out some metaverse territory.

Food Delivery

Avatars don't have to eat. But the people behind those avatars do have to eat. Initially, there will be a lot of people wandering around the new cartoon land for hours. And they are not going to want to leave it just because they have the munchies. Expect your competitors to take full advantage of ghost kitchens where they do nothing but prepare a select portion of their menus for rapid delivery without any front-of-house concerns.

In the metaverse, expect food services to be among the first to appear in large numbers. People will be able to stroll up to a restaurant and select from a menu. They might even be able to speak to a real person at the restaurant and place an order. On the backend, the order will be processed just like it is today. The food will be delivered to the person's location. Further, that food and delivery will be visually represented in the metaverse. Even now, one's computer they are working on can be represented in the metaverse. So food representation is just around the corner. Make sure your foodservice is also represented.

Retail

The next big thing for retailers is getting their inventory scanned with 3D tech so that it can be viewed on all sides and handled in the metaverse. Imagine going to a digital store and having the full shopping experience of wandering around a space and examining items. In the real world, only one person can pick up an item at a time. In the metaverse, there would be no such limitation. People could still have the experience of serendipitous discovery.

Clothes shopping could be less frustrating because people can just put in the sizes they are looking for and get a representation of all the inventory you have that would work for them. Not only can you dress up your avatar, but you could also press a button and order those fashions to be delivered to your home in the sizes you need. The opportunities for clothiers in the metaverse are huge.

Real Estate

The metaverse will eventually be filled with houses, business spaces, and other construction projects just like the real world. You can place your real-world real estate inventory in the metaverse and allow people to view that inventory inside and out at any time of the day or night, with or without a guide. This will make selling real estate much easier than it is today. It will also provide opportunities for architects to show off new designs and show you your dream home before a single brick is laid. The cost savings possibilities for the real estate industry are staggering. If you are in real estate, now is the time to get into the metaverse.

Do you cringe when you see articles about the metaverse? Get over it and smell the opportunity. It is there for the taking if you are a restaurant, a retailer, or in real estate at any level.