Today’s markets need to be customized by the needs and desires of customers. As new technologies are developed, customer’s wishes and desires are on track with that. Augmented reality (AR) is one of the most common marketing strategies used in many companies.
The usage of this technology is constantly changing and evolving into new ideas and opportunities. Based on that, marketing strategies are varied, and new strategy ideas are developed. So, let’s see why augmented reality is one of the most used technologies nowadays.
Why Is AR Popular
Augmented reality represents an overlapping between data generated by a computer and the real world. Users can easily use their smartphones to explore new possibilities when it comes to AR. Because of its popularity among different target groups, it has excellent market potential.
According to researches on this topic, it’s concluded that the AR has made a market volume of 150 million dollars at the end of last year. Moreover, the usage of AR can be divided into many fields such as marketing, hardware, eCommerce, cosmetic industry, virtual tours, changing rooms, and much more.
Using AR technology in these fields of an enterprise can increase a company’s overall income. For example, customers can try out makeup or clothing items and interact with a wide range of home-related products without the need to interact with them.
Therefore, AR negates the need for actual physical interaction with objects and enables customers to try out products and items and see if it meets their needs. In addition, augmented reality offers excellent potential for all types of businesses and companies.
Advantages of AR Strategies
Implementation of AR in marketing strategies offers many advantages and opportunities to establish a better connection between a brand and a customer. This connection grows stronger links between products where customers get to explore the product in real-time.
Some of these advantages are:
- Improvement of brand awareness – it will give your brand a better link between customers and optimize your sales process
- Physical experience – thanks to AR, you don’t have to experience another marketing campaign because all of your products will be available to explore via virtual reality
- Stand out – such technology will increase your overall brand creativity and different marketing campaigns. However, with AR, you have an opportunity to promote your brand and stand out from the crowd in the same field
- Surprise the customers – you can surprise and attract more customers by making the brand stay in the customer’s mind, which leads to business growth and avoiding creating traditional campaigns
Requirements for Using AR
It seems easy to implement the augmented reality into your business; however, there are several procedures and recommendations that you should check first:
- Providing added value to a client – one of the most used types of AR is in online catalogs and 3D item showing. This will only work if you offer your customers added values, which means that the customers must perceive that the tools they’re using are unique and necessary for that type of product viewing
- Keep in mind customer’s geolocation – the brand or a company that’s using AR technology must have in mind where customers are coming from. Thus, geolocation is an essential part since some of the customer’s locations might need additional installations of specific applications
- Important information – one of the most important procedures you should pay attention to is allowing customers to interact with third parties to exceed users’ expectations, which helps customers decide on your product vs. someone else’s
Implementation of AR Strategies in Marketing
Augmented reality tools can significantly improve your brand and provide the customers exactly what they want. In addition, the AR approach offers the possibility of making customer service more interactive and exciting.
Information Superposition
The thing that attracts most customers is the possibility to explore space and discover additional information just by watching an object or a place.
Currently, museums are taking advantage of this tool, and they even partner up with a tech company to deliver a high-quality application for their visitors. Such an approach is unique and provides a “different” offer.
Virtual Objects
The second strategies that are widely used are objects and items in augmented reality. This strategy allows better communication among customers and companies. Moreover, such a strategy is incredibly successful when customers can experience the product or thing they’re offered.
One of the most successful strategies of this kind is implemented in Ikea. The company implemented the AR approach so that customers get to “see” the objects they want to buy. Customers have lots of possibilities with AR, such as rescale the dimensions of things to fit their home, check the AR catalog of objects, and even check how an object would look in their home. Now that they can check all the things they want before buying, customers trust the brand and the company.
Customer’s Trust
Another strategy approach is to deliver customers high-quality products to see and check if it suits them. When customers are buying online, the problem is that they can’t try the object’s design and see if it fits them.
However, with the AR approach, customers can try out anything they like from anywhere in the world. Augmented reality implementation gives customers a sense of security, making the customers trust the brand even more.
Conclusion
We can indeed say that augmented reality offers a new way of creating a company’s marketing strategies. It stands to be one of the driving forces behind sales and overall marketing innovations.
With the active usage of AR, many companies and brands will upgrade the whole user experience, which will lead to increased business sales and opportunities.