This is a good little article from InformationWeek that sums up what most residents have always said about doing business in Second Life, you have to interact with the community, get involved, you can’t just through up all of your information and what for avatars to wonder into it. You have to create a community and be involved, they give Cisco as an example. When they first created their islands, they built all kinds of static displays where people could grab their content and learn about their products and offerings, and, of course, no one was interested in that. Now, they have rebuilt and made it meeting rooms and coffee shops where they hold weekly tech chats and more, they even hold interviews there now and have gone from one amphitheater to three, because of the number of meetings and such going on there now.

InformationWeek has been doing business in Second Life for seven months. Our sister publication, Dr. Dobb’s Journal, has been doing business in Second Life since October. And we’ve spent a lot of time talking to the business leaders of Second Life.
One thing we’ve learned: When doing business in Second Life, you can’t just lecture people with your marketing message. You have to connect with them. Engage.

Cisco Systems(CSCO) has a big presence in Second Life, including a recent forum on mobility solutions.

“If you want to avoid people, get on the World Wide Web. That’s solitary,” said Christian Renaud, chief architect of networked virtual environments for Cisco, who heads up that company’s virtual worlds strategy. “If you want to interact with people, go into Second Life.” Source: Five Rules For Bringing Your Real-Life Business Into Second Life

Build a community, get involved with it, and they will come.

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