Augmented reality campaigns are probably the biggest and hardest trend to implement successful into your brand for 2020. So, before you start developing AR content there is a few things to consider surrounding your campaign.
1: Your Audience AR campaigns must be approached in the same way as all your brands content is. It must be viewed as an opportunity to enhance customer experience and not just as a gimmick. Treat AR as an opportunity to improve your key customer touchpoints. Audiences will lean towards interactive content, but it must be meaningful and provide your customer with something to allow them to connect with your products on a deeper level. When thinking about your AR content put yourself in the audience’s shoes to evaluate your content effectively.
2: What Are Your Key Objectives? These can range from driving more traffic to your site, to more brand engagement leading to sales. It’s important to outline these before you develop your AR strategy to create the most effective content for your brand.
3: What Is Your Physical Target/ Targets? Your physical target is what or where the content will be activated. E.G. a billboard to your product packaging. You also need to consider how many target images you will need as more target images equals more production time/ tests and can increase costs. These targets will also have limitations or benefits depending on their context so you will have to consider that throughout your development. Once you have decided those key elements you can decide if your content will be
Tracked: Appears stuck to the page which is scanned.
The digital content won’t work unless the correct surface is recognised and during the experience it will stay ‘stuck’ to this surface.
Or
Triggered: Which is activated and screen relative. This is where the object is scanned and
‘triggers’ a hands-on experience. This element requires a physical object and often is one that has been put into a database to recognise the marker. For example, this AR element can recognise a table as input and place a 3D version of your product on it for the viewer to explore digitally as a ‘try before you buy’ experience. *It can be both if required
Context: Your audience needs to be interested in your product or place as the tech alone can’t engage them. To draw them in there needs to be something in the physical world for them to connect with. At this step you need to consider the needs of your audience and whether it is suitable for the situation.
Elements to Consider for Context: Is the WIFI or network connectivity strong enough for the user to use the AR feature correctly? Will the users have a hand free to successfully connect E.G by a till isn’t best as they are at the end of their shopping journey and could potential have their hands full with products to purchase. Consider the physical environment: Lighting, acoustics, distance the user has to be to scan target image. All these elements can affect the scanability of the content and can hinder the delivery of the content. E.G if the light is hitting the image badly the image might not scan into the user’s smartphone correctly and the viewing experience is lost.
If you control the context of your AR content, you will deliver a more relevant experience.
Call to Action: Augmented reality is still a new tech development for many consumers so a clear call to action can guide users to interact with your content. You need to clearly tell people on your physical content the steps they need to follow to unlock the extra content. This normally includes informing them to download an app and to point their phone at the given object. (whether it be a poster or packaging to unlock the digital content). To make it compelling you can also add information about what they will receive. For eaxample, discounts to additional unseen content can drive interest. To ensure this step is done right its best to assume that no one knows or cares about AR and they are waiting for you as a brand to given them a reason to scan.
Content: With AR being a new form of interaction, you need to ensure your content is new and isn’t something that can be found on other social platforms to give you the best success rate. Since AR does require user engagement, they need to be rewarded for spending their time to scan. If the content has been seen before you can risk disappointment from potential customers which can damage your reputation. Furthermore, always make sure your content understands your context. For example, if you want your customers to interact with your content instore, say a promotional video, It needs to stay under 60 seconds before the viewer will lose interest. Keeping your content ‘snackable’ in small pieces is more likely to be successful as the upcoming consumerist generation attention span has shortened.
What should the content be? Your content can be whatever you want it to be from a short promotional video to your product as an animated 3D object for the user to test in their own home before purchase. As a brand you need to ensure is that your content is relevant to you and serves a purpose for your customer. Don’t use AR for the sake of it make sure your strategies have meaning and purpose. As without it your customers and active users will notice and disconnect.
Key Takeaways: Context: Is your setting controlled enough for a positive AR experience – try control it as much as possible. Call to action: Treat AR as an unknown advancement, make sure it’s clear what the audience needs to do Call to action: Give the viewer an incentive to scan E.G scan for 20% discount code Content: Keep your content ‘snackable’ to ensure full engagement Content: Your content must have substance and be relevant.
Connection partner: What connection point do you want to use? Do you want to integrate Augmented Reality into your own existing app, create a new scanning app or use a third-party app as your connection? You need to consider the costs of each option and which one is best for you as a brand as well as consider where you want the customers to go as part of your brand experience. Also consider what’s more important to you is it driving people to your app to generate sales or to increase brand awareness,for example.
Commercial Model: When it comes to this area and ROI there are two things to consider.
1: Upfront costs Setting up an AR infrastructure will come with inevitable costs from app updating to potentially hiring new employees, training existing one or outsourcing to a company. To develop AR content. You need to be ready for them. AR will not change your revenue overnight it’s a long-term investment and will have an effect over time if done correctly.
2: You need to set KPIs for AR specifically It is important to understand your KPIs for AR campaigns and how it can differ from your existing ones to help meet your goals. Having a framework in place beforehand allows you to monitor the success of the campaign strategy effectively and make changes if needed.
Recommended KPIs or AR: -App downloads -Session time -Social shares -Sign ups -Point redemption -Purchases through content
Cross Functional Collaboration: The implementation of AR technology within a business has tended to come from a senior leader that has seen the opportunity and championed it within the company. Who then often gets put within the marketing team to implement. However, its impact can affect any team within a business so making it a cross team collaboration can have huge benefits. It has the potential to be a huge interface for the future of digital discovery. So getting all teams in your business involved from the software development to the marketing department can prepare your business for the future rise of AR technology.
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