Last Updated on December 17, 2024 by Caesar
Augmented reality is revolutionizing how consumers experience and engage with brands. Here’s what marketers should consider before rising to the challenge. Ever since its debut, AR has captivated user attention. Where is that old Pokémon Go mobile game now? Yeah, exactly. Hyperbolizing breakthrough experiences that transformational technology brings is a common occurrence, but disputing the impact of AR in marketing and advertising is impossible. Today, consumers are increasingly more comfortable with using their mobile devices to access AR experiences, often with the intent of engaging with brand content. So, while the craze may have subsided, the opportunity remains massive. Here are some important considerations marketers should take into account before diving into an AR campaign.
AR Doesn’t Have To Be Digital-Only
As a subject, augmented reality marketing goes hand in hand with experiential marketing. It’s not an alternative to a physical, in-person experience but rather a chance to support it. That said, there are cases where AR can stand alone, especially if it’s tethered to something physical like product packaging or print advertising. Usually, however, an AR experience is stronger when it’s a piece of a broader event or activation. Any AR experience is its own mini event. This means there will need to be event-like qualities associated with each experience, including a beginning, a high point, and an end.
On the other hand, do not think that there cannot be fully digital AR experiences or experiences that involve no physical interactions at all. This is how AR has been utilised by many brands to bring user generated content such as photos and videos into interactive, 3D versions. Think of a 3D photo collage of user posts swirling around in a themed environment that consumers can explore in AR. These types of experiences don’t need an accompanying in-person event or activation, but they do require digital content created by everyday users of the brand.
AR Requires Solid Data And Insights
Unlike traditional marketing, where success is measured based on the outcome of a particular campaign, successful AR campaigns are anchored on data and insights as part of the concept formulation. Why would a brand create an AR experience? What action are they trying to get users to take? The answers often lie within the data. However, many brands still think of AR as a “wow” technology and will jump in without understanding what “wow” their target audience actually wants.
The result is often an expensive misfire that fails to engage or even connect with a user’s emotion or intent. For example, if a millennial audience sees nostalgia as a way to connect emotionally with a brand, perhaps a journey through 90s street culture would be relevant — think music, art, and fashion — presented in an AR gallery where users can move through and interact with various themed pieces. Data and insights will also help marketers determine the best platforms for distribution and even measure the effectiveness of the AR experience itself.
Quality Matters More Than Quantity
Getting AR right is challenging. Although the technology has advanced significantly recently, it still has some limits that could affect the experience. Because of this, it’s always better for brands to produce fewer high-quality AR experiences rather than many mediocre ones. This is also where data comes into play, as it can help inform how complex an experience should be based on user device demographics.
As one example, if the target audience primarily uses high-end hardware like the latest model iPhones and Galaxies, then a campaign can use more complex animations and interactions since these devices will be able to handle them so well. But while quality isn’t just about the technical aspects of an AR experience it also relates to how well the experience is able to connect through the user’s emotions and intentions. If the interaction looks cool but doesn’t really carve a place for the user on some level, then it’s still going to be a flop, no matter how cool it looks.
Prepare To Support Users
AR, therefore, calls for users to engage in actions that they may not be prompted to make when relating to brand content. Although using fingers to click on an icon on a touch screen is a universal concept, guiding users into adopting the right positioning of their mobile device in order to access content can be quite complex. Many users still don’t understand that they may have to move around a physical object or even walk around in their environment for the best results.
Marketers have to embrace this reality and deliver on-screen tips as soon as a consumer interacts with the content — before they really enter the AR world. Smooth entry into the experience will also help eliminate frustration and retain users, at least through the beginning and high point of each mini-event. Furthermore, brands should consider post-AR support as well. Is there an elevated action they want users to take after interacting with the experience? Make that path easy and obvious as well.
Think Long-Term With AR
Marketers should see AR as more than just another shiny object on which to briefly focus their efforts. When done right, it can drive sustained engagement over the long term as users learn they can return to an AR experience multiple times for different results. And if a brand generates the whole series of them, even using the same code base, those users will keep coming back to find new discoveries.
This behavior isn’t so different from what many brands have created with mobile apps, only it’s much easier for users to get started since there’s no download or installation required. However, building this kind of long-term engagement requires a strategy beyond just creating an initial AR campaign and hoping for the best over time. Marketers will need to plan for consistency and evolution within each experience as well as possibly branching out into different but related experiences over time.
Boosting Visibility with AR-Enhanced Follower and View Growth
Marketing through Augmented Reality (AR) is one of the most effective ways to increase engagement, and when combined with the right follower and view acquisition strategy, it can be doubly effective. Paying for followers and views ensures that brands can make more of their AR-driven campaigns go viral as well as credible from the onset. This initial surge guarantees that your content will be out there within the augmented reality realm and draw more people in due to the excitement surrounding such novel content.
For example, an AR try-on option for a product seems engaging when thousands are already engaged with the feature. This process creates more and more traffic, and hence more perceived popularity and credibility while it is gaining actual, sustainable growth. In fact this particular strategy is a twofold of innovation and visibility given the current rapid digital world.
Conclusion
Marketers must realize that augmented reality is not just a fancy technology that will slowly die out, as was the case with most of today’s innovations. When done effectively, it creates long-term perspectives, which focus on repeated visits of the users. This way, brands can maintain the regular, continuous expectation of those interactions—akin to mobile apps, but without downloads from the store. But again, this must be done systematically in a consistent and progressive manner, looking at related experiences over time.
Sourceshttps://www.mixx.com/
