Building a new universe
Building a new universe
NAVER Z I Service & Business I Chae Eun-seok, Sim Kwang-sub
The word “metaverse” is surely one of the world’s biggest buzzwords in 2022. And NAVER Z’s ZEPETO is at the heart of this megatrend. Chae Eun-seok and Sim Kwang-sub from NAVER Z are in charge of building ZEPETO, a virtual world. While the product team, where Kwang-sub works in, is in charge of building a more stable service structure and system, the content team, which Eun-seok is part of, fills the virtual world with abundant content and manages the service. The two teams are closely connected and intertwined in their line of work. Eun-seok and Kwang-sub have both been working for 10 to 11 years now, but their background and experiences are quite different. Eun-seok majored in design in college and founded a startup with a developer as soon as he graduated. He first joined NAVER when his company was recognized for its value and acquired by LINE. Since then he has taken on the roles of designer, service planner, and sometimes project manager depending on which project he was working on - ranging from the camera project to the SNOW project. On the other hand, Kwang-sub first joined NAVER as an intern and has been a developer for 10 years since then. PC services began migrating onto mobile services when he first began his career, which gave him chances to work on product planning for mobile apps, such as the SNOW and Sticker.ly projects. What Eun-seok and Kwang-sub both emphasized on creating ZEPETO was that the users on ZEPETO never fail to surprise them by always going beyond their expectations. They both say that this kind of surprise is what makes their job as service planners both exciting and challenging at the same time. Even at this moment, they are building ZEPETO’s universe with the users that continue to surprise them, one step at a time.
The term “metaverse” has been garnering much attention these days.
Chae Eun-seok | They say the metaverse is the next evolution of the Internet. Many big names in tech will surely be launching services based on the metaverse now. We are trying very hard to find ways for ZEPETO to stay on as a competitive player in this field.
What sets ZEPETO apart from other services based on the metaverse?
Chae Eun-seok | One of our biggest strengths is that we offer attractive characters. Avatars that look really good. Avatars were actually our starting point. When users can customize their own avatars, their attitude completely changes. They begin to think of their avatars as another version of themselves, their other persona, or someone they have to take care of.
ZEPETO is showing rapid growth right now. What was the most important moment in its growth curve?
Sim Kwang-sub | I first saw ZEPETO’s potential as a platform when I joined and planned the “ZEPETO Studio” project, which is a platform for creators. ZEPETO users can use this platform to go beyond simply customizing their avatar. They can create their own content such as clothes and accessories, turn them into product and monetize them. We initially thought we would see around 100 items being uploaded monthly, but an astonishing number of approximately 1,000 items were uploaded when we launched the service. The content created by users were beyond our expectations, both in terms of quality and quantity. That’s when we realized that this platform has a huge potential. I think this is a project that became the first stepping stone for ZEPETO to grow as a platform.
What was the biggest challenge you have had to face as a service planner?
Sim Kwang-sub | There are, in fact, so many challenges every step of the way. What’s most difficult for me is that it is almost impossible to consider every possibility. We don’t fully know what kind of content our third-party developers or creators want to make, but we still have to prepare the platform or the right environment in advance. Most of the projects I worked on before were platforms that had their own internal content. That meant you could predict what kind of content was going to be created and that the platform could be planned in accordance with such content, so I didn’t have to go through the challenges that I’m facing here with ZEPETO. ZEPETO is an open platform, but at the same time our users should not be exposed to any random content or service, which means that a monitoring system must be designed ahead. We also need operational policies that can protect our users’ intellectual property or privacy, along with operational strategies for maintaining our community safe. Working on all of these inevitably makes us go through trials and errors, but we are making efforts to minimize them.
How do you overcome such challenges?
Sim Kwang-sub | I’m working with great colleagues here. Most of the time I would get their feedback to make revisions or to decide on the order of priorities in deployment. I think this kind of work cannot be done on your own. What I actually value the most in my work is working with great colleagues. Regardless of whether you are a service planner or a designer, I think that is the way for all of us to grow. In this regard, I don't think it’s me who overcomes these challenges - I think it’s my colleagues.
Chae Eun-seok | There are so many talented people on our ZEPETO team. I started off my career by founding a startup, and I think our company is actually really similar to startups in terms of how fast work gets done, or just how work gets done in general. Many people I work with have a startup-like mindset, and I was really surprised to see that. I also learned a lot from them, too.
What does it mean to be good at your job?
Chae Eun-seok | Whether it be development, design, or service planning, I think you need to have a keen eye for detail because this can affect your overall work life. For instance, when you are writing an email, it would make a whole lot of difference if you are considerate enough to look at your email from the recipient’s point of view and write your message in a concise manner; or if you can get straight to the point and provide better solutions when someone raises a question about a product. As such, if you work with someone who has a sharp eye and is attentive, your work efficiency will increase in any case.
Sim Kwang-sub | Good question. I think being good at your job means to succeed at work. Service planners are people who work to find ways to make a product successful and to achieve set goals. In that sense, anyone can become a service planner, but it is difficult to become a great service planner. You also need to be a good decision maker in order to make your product successful. Smart choices can make a product more successful, although that isn’t always the case. But I do think that successful products are a result of good decisions.
