Technology is pushing different business sectors to make significant changes in their operational methods. While businesses offer multiple products/services to their customers, the changing lifestyle and technological advancement, their expectation to experience the way of shopping has also changed. That is why augmented reality and virtual reality are so essential these days.
But with marketing, which is better - AR or VR? We want to say both are beneficial for brand marketing purposes.
If you want to know how, let’s explore their applications in marketing and find out which is essential for enhancing today’s organizations providing different products, services and SEO-based marketing.
What Is Augmented Reality?
AR refers to a technology that transforms the sound, graphics, text, etc., over the real world. It means that you are not required to transport anything to any dimension. Instead, you bring different aspects of the same to the existing world.
Simply put, AR can be enjoyed by navigating through an app and nothing else. For example, you can hold your phone and see how a specific product would look in your room or house.
Using such advanced technology can drive more traffic and create a revolution in the marketing world, making the marketing process simple and easy to understand.
What Is Virtual Reality?
Whether you practice several SEO optimization techniques or not, VR is another significant factor to try when it comes to marketing. It means you cannot listen to or see anything else, and an artificial environment replaces your entire virtual world. The environment can be anything. You can see tennis courts and a movie theater, and you can also see a fantasy world where animals are frolicking around.
VR involves you in three dimensions, making you feel you are a part of a different universe. You can navigate through different experiences and manipulate various objects.
Applications of Augmented Reality
AR is one of the slowly and steadily growing technologies of all time. Various organizations have been opting for AR to grow their business. But how can any enterprise incorporate AR for marketing? Here are some of the simple examples of that:
- Display of Products
Home decoration sounds fun and exciting. But when you start doing it all by yourself, you will see the actual difficulty in the process. You need to imagine where furniture should be placed, where a sofa set should be placed. You also need to take a measurement tape and exhaust yourself by calculating how much space a specific piece of furniture would cover in a room. It is time-consuming, making it a more tiring activity than anyone can imagine.
But thanks to AR, imagining and measuring a furniture’s proper place is no longer difficult. An app called Ikea offers a great experience to its consumers by using AR while displaying its products. The users can scroll through a catalog offered by Ikea. This catalog offers more than 2,000 products. Once a user holds the phone, its camera can place the digital furniture around the home. You can see which angle would be better for installing the sofa.
It helps the customers to get a clear idea about the product and how it can enhance the look of the entire home.
- Virtual Try on
Virtual try-on refers to the process where customers try specific products, like clothing, jewelry, makeup items, etc., before making any purchase. Thanks to AR, Virtual Try-on is now a reality for various applications. Some of the best examples of Virtual try-ons are Sephora and L’Oreal.
- Sephora
Sephora offers a great user experience to its users. Its virtual artist tools are the most significant part of the application. Since 2016, it has been one of the most famous features of any application offering beauty products.
With its application of AR, Sephora allows consumers to see how a specific makeup product would look on a face. Whether it is an eye shadow, lipstick, or anything else, this application offers a great experience to the customers while choosing them. Like the most user-friendly SEOs, Sephora offers the most organized platform to choose makeup from.
- L’Oreal
Every significant organization is racing to incorporate virtual try-ons using AR. Facebook has recently partnered with L’Oreal’s company, ModiFace, to get assistance in providing virtual try-on facilities on various online shopping platforms.
Various brands from L’Oreal, like Decay, NYX, Maybelline New York, and Urban Decay, now utilize AR-based virtual try-ons. It is considered an intelligent idea as users can search for various beauty products and purchase the right ones. Like the specialized SEO tactics, the application of AR has changed the way people used to enjoy shopping.
- Interactive Ads
Ads are one of the most used methods of gaining organic traffic. That is why various brands focus on creating interactive ads.
- Reebok
Reebok, one of the world's most recognized brands, always tries to create ads that can generate customers’ interest. It installed a shoe display speed cam in the center of town. It also offered people to run past the display as fast as possible. It will help the runner to get free Reebok shoes. It could generate a lot more traffic than any other ads.
- Spotify
Spotify has millions of users listening to songs offered by this platform. Spotify made a wise decision in taking advantage of the then-ongoing Presidential election in the US. They took advantage of the slogan ‘move to Canada’ and used the word ‘Candify’ to help the users recommend their favorite Canadian singers.
Application of Virtual Reality
VR is one of the most significant marketing and brand story-telling aspects. Its applications are simple yet impressive. By telling various short stories, it can create an artificial world in front of the users, which, in return, assists different brands in promoting or launching their products:
- TOMS
TOMS is a well-known shoe company primarily known for donating shoes to a needy child whenever a customer buys something. This company incorporated VR into its marketing strategy. It provides the consumers with a virtual giving trip, allowing viewers to follow a large team of TOMS to Peru by playing a 4-minute-long VR-based film.
It also offers virtual visits to various schools that will receive new shoes within a few days. After the set up of this Virtual experience in various trunk and retail shops, it became a huge hit, allowing the brand to touch people’s emotions.
- Oreo
One of the best applications of VR can be seen in Oreo. It used Google’s cardboard headset, allowing users to dive into a vault famously known as the Wonder Vault. During this experience, the user travels through cocoa mountains, milk rivers, and life-sized Oreos to enjoy making the filled cupcake-flavored Oreos. This fantastic campaign’s primary purpose was to launch a new product. But the experience was so real that the potential consumers enjoyed and appreciated it.
Conclusion
If you think about marketing, some of the best SEO tactics exist. However, the application of AR and VR in marketing has a different fan base. It has revolutionized the entire marketing world, making consumers enjoy the purchasing experience more than ever.