How AR on a smart phone can ease the path to purchase

Augmented Reality on mobile is a great way of allowing companies to track the behaviour of their customers when they are interacting with traditional printed materials. If you are new to AR, a great place to start is to create experiences which include a click-thru to purchase a product. Analytics tools can then be used to monitor how many customers scan and subsequently click.

Whilst major websites have traditionally struggled to convert their traffic into an equivalent numbers of click-throughs (CTRs), in my experience AR can regularly achieve CTRs of 30%+. However, there are factors to consider that will help increase the likelihood that the user will click-through, because despite customers having scanned the printed image CTR success is not guaranteed. There are 2 considerations I will cover which will help you to increase the number of click-thru's from your AR experiences:

1. Use AR to show off your products

2. Make it easy for customers to purchase your products

Use AR to show off your products, increasing the value of the experience

Augmented reality can help highlight your products, without requiring the customer to physically have them available, and ultimately allows the customer to get a feel for the product before they click-through to purchase.

In my experience, some of the most engaging AR content uses 3D models because they allow the customer to use their mobile device or headset to fully explore the object, ultimately helping customers make a more informed decision before deciding to CTR.

For companies just starting out with AR the easiest and most common way is to use videos, for example, adverts, or instructional videos. If you are going down this route, just remember to use videos that can’t be easily found elsewhere on the internet because this will help the AR experience feel more exclusive, and therefore increase the value of the experience.

AR also allows your customers to experience what your product would look like in their home or on their person. Using a device’s rear facing camera you can position a TV on your wall or try on a watch, and using the front facing camera you can try things on your head (headphones, earrings, necklace etc.). This is both fun and useful, and if users can then take a picture this can lead to social sharing, resulting in greater awareness and hopefully more people scanning. More traffic means more opportunity for click-through's

Make it easy for customers to purchase your products

Although AR should enhance the customer experience visually, this needs to be complimented by a path to purchase your products which is made as easy as possible. This can be achieved in two ways:

A button presented at the right time in the user journey

The most common approach I’ve seen is to make a button appear simultaneously with the rest of the AR content, allowing a user to click-thru straight away. However, although presenting the button this way is making it easy, the more exciting AR content in the experience can distract the customer’s attention away from the button.

The customer’s decision to tap the button can therefore be made even easier by presenting the button at a pre-determined stage of the experience. For example, presenting an animated button only once a video or 3D animation has been playing for a set period makes its appearance more obvious, and therefore more enticing.

Using existing customer information to aid the customer journey

When using a vendor AR app, a 'buy now' button will drive the customer to your mCommerce site where they are still required to login or provide other personal information each and every time before they can purchase anything – this can be frustrating for a repeat customer. Consequently, for those companies who are more serious about unifying AR with the rest of their digital portfolio I would recommend integrating a vendor’s SDK into an existing app.

Using an SDK will allow your AR experiences to tap into information provided by the customer during the app login process, for example deep links can result in the user tapping to purchase without being required to re-login. This makes for an easier path to purchase and makes the AR feel more personal, whilst the SDK simultaneously achieves a seamless brand experience.

AR on a smart phone can create a better customer experience

It’s important to be aware that AR won’t magically sell more items for you; it is simply a different communication medium (albeit an exciting and engaging one), to move your audience to the next stage in the conversion funnel. Once the user has scanned your printed materials, you have the opportunity to increase the likelihood that customers will click-through to a location where they can purchase.

1. Give customers a visual and interactive experience by using 3D models to offer hands-on insights into the products you want them to buy

2. Add an animated ‘buy now’ button at the right time in the user journey to make it more enticing for customers to click-through

3. Use a vendor SDK as the glue to hold your physical and digital portfolio together, whilst offering a more favourable user journey for returning customers

If done right, AR on a smart phone can create a better customer experience than simply browsing through a mobile browser. If you are considering incorporating augmented reality to increase the utility of your printed materials, remember that although AR can increase your mCommerce traffic, getting customers to this stage requires your AR experiences to offer them a reason to buy, whilst making it easy for them to get to the stage where they can purchase.