The Reality Virtuality Continuum2 [Fig. 2] shows the continuous scale ranging from reality to virtuality, which explains the relationship of many kind of realities. It starts from the left side, real environment, to the right side, virtual environment, which is also the side for immersive technology. Augmented reality (AR), is where the virtual augments the real environment, in the technology that digital content is displayed in the real world. Augmented virtuality (AV) is real world content put in an immersive environment, for example 360º video is augmented virtuality. Virtual reality (VR), which is in virtual environment, is the environment with computer generated imagery (CGI). The continuum between real environment and virtual environment is somewhere defined as mixed reality (MR), sometimes phrased as extended reality (XR).
Immersive technology provides novel ways for people to experience different content, blurring the line between the virtual and physical world. It consists of artificial content with environment, providing interaction and making people feel like they are in the reality. Immersive technology covers the range of mixed reality. With the maturity of immersive technology combined with huge dollar investments from big tech companies, there is no doubt that immersive tech is going to be part of our daily lives. This new medium has will have impact on many different branding related fields including marketing, advertising and enhancing the retail experience.
There are three main features of an immersive experience: immersion, presence, and interaction. These features are something that traditional mediums cannot achieve. Immersion means bringing the audience to a completely different environment with no distraction from other activities. Presence makes the audience part of the environment, and increases the emotional connection to the virtual place. Interaction allows the audience freedom to play with the medium, to create their own ways--ultimately making the experience active.
Immersive Technology Can Benefit Brand Promotion
The brands and retailers have been trying many different ways and technologies to advertise and showcase their product. The main purpose is to gain consumer interest and convince the consumer they need the product or even feel the brand could reflect and enhance their lifestyle or social value. Immersive technology can bring something new to the brand experience that has never been seen before. Among different types of immersive mediums, VR would be the one with most potential to bring huge changes to the industry.
The features of immersive technology, including immersion, presence and interaction, make it different from traditional medium and tools of marketing like image, audio, video or physical event. Immersive experiences are not going to replace the present physical experience, instead, they will build upon it. Many industries, including the streetwear and sneaker industry, could benefit from immersive technology. The reason why immersive technology could work well in the streetwear and sneaker industry is because of the unique cultural characteristics. The culture of this industry is diverse, always changing, always looking for something new, and more willing to accept and embrace new technology.
Existing Immersive Brand Experiences
Some of the brands and retailers have already tried to use immersive technology as a medium for advertising, and showcasing their products. There are some existing examples for brands using immersive technology for retailing and advertising. They are trying to provide audiences with more emotional connections compared with traditional techniques.
For footwear companies, in order to promote the new release of a signature soccer shoes, Nike made a VR video showing Brazilian soccer superstar Neymar scoring a goal. Nike has also used the SNKRS app combined with AR technology to create a scavenger hunt gaming experience for selling sneakers in New York City. Adidas took advantage with 360º video and created an experience of 360º shopping and created a style-guide at the Adidas Stockholm store. Merrell designed “Trailscape”, which is a virtual hiking experience for promoting its new hiking boot. TOMS 360º video brought people to Peru to see them bringing shoes to the local children.
Other examples of using immersive technology for advertising and retailing included "Teleporter" presented by Marriott Hotels, a VR experience for traveling to other vacation resorts, Oreo’s 360° video with a world filled up by cupcakes flavored cookies, Mercedes-Benz’s 360° video for experiencing driving along the California coastline, and Charlotte Tilbury’s 360° video featuring Kate Moss for their new fragrance.
Some brands combined immersive technology with the actual events for promotion. One good example is Westfield's virtual reality shopping Pop-Up “Future Fashion”. In 2015, Westfield London built an immersive, interactive fashion installation for people to experience a virtual fashion journey. The installation consisted of multiple experiences, including VR head-mounted displays (HMD), and an interactive gesture tracking video wall. They aimed at combining fashion with technology, providing digital experiences in the physical mall, creating a unique retail theatre experience, and making consumers more engaged with the fashion.
Another event example is The Macallan mixed reality gallery experience. In 2017, The Macallan launched a Pop-Up event “Gallery 12” for promoting The Macallan Sherry Oak 12 Year Old and The Macallan Double Cask 12 Year Old whisky. The gallery installation provided an immersive AR experience with Microsoft’s HoloLens. With the AR glasses, the attendees could walk through the installation and view the whisky making process in holograms. Another experience in Gallery 12, guests could download The Macallan mobile app and play with more AR experiences, showing them more whisky’s information, like color, flavor, and maturation processes. It was another great example of a retailer using technology to promote the product; in the Gallery 12 event, guests played with AR, learning more stories about Macallan’s whisky, and were able to taste the whisky at the same time.
Learning from those existing and influenced technologies, we can clearly see that in the industry, some of retailers and marketers are already trying to use immersive technology as a good way to promote and extend the emotional connection while at the same time showcasing their products or brands. However there are still some issues about designing this kind of brand experience with immersive technology.
The Issues With Building Immersive Brand Experience
Issues With Technology
Immersive technology like VR is not a new idea. In the history of technology, since 90’s, every round of VR hype was not successful. The issues included low quality graphics, motion sickness problems, high cost of equipment, the computers not being powerful enough, and creatives still figuring out the applications and features behind the medium of VR. Those issues are still present today. The VR experience is being improved upon and solved for more creatively, thanks to the investments from tech companies like Facebook, Google, Microsoft, HTC, Samsung and now Apple.
With the advance of technology, VR is once again getting hype and attention, and this time people have put more anticipation on it than past releases of the technology. The cost of equipment is more affordable and friendly, and the laptop has become cheaper and more powerful. As more and more people are exposed to VR development, there is potential for great applications to be developed and designed. If we are looking forward to seeing VR replace traditional mediums like TV, that might not be possible, but if we see VR as a new medium that brings us the experience other medium don’t have the ability to, VR could become a really powerful tool with endless potential. As for creating the immersive experience for marketing and retail, how to overcome the technical issues and come up with our own new ways for navigating this medium are critical to its development in the brand space.
2. Issues With Design