There is a real hype about virtual reality in the marketing world at the moment. And no wonder. Companies such as Sony, HTC and Google are at the forefront of this field. And companies like HBO and Mercedes are also thinking about how they can incorporate virtual reality into their concept.
All of these companies have caused quite a stir with their VR marketing campaigns, but they won’t be able to impress the press forever.
We ask ourselves the question: How much is VR worth in future marketing?
Virtual reality in the near future
It is estimated that $4.6 billion USD will be generated this year with the help of virtual reality. Record revenues, which would actually mean that VR is perfect for marketing purposes. However, much of the revenue comes from the video game industry and it is doubtful that the NYT or Lowe’s will actually do VR in-game advertising.
We believe that expectations cannot be met.
Worldwide, 26% of all CMOs think that virtual reality will have the biggest impact on the marketing sector by 2020. No wonder, given the effusive praise the technology is receiving in the media. However, the companies that are going all in on VR technology are good at twisting the facts and keeping the media happy.
Although most of them admit that the technology is not yet as up and coming as it was predicted a few years ago, they still talk as enthusiastically and hopefully as ever in interviews. For example, last year revenues were 30% lower than estimated. The company Tech Crunch wants to blame Samsung for this, claiming that the Galaxy Note 7 damaged the virtual reality business due to the risk of it exploding.
In the meantime, Facebook has even announced the closure of its Oculus Story Studio. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that this is due to the slow integration of VR. Only a few years ago, Facebook invested around $2 billion in the company.
Augmented reality technology is on the move
But an alternative is already on the way: Augmented reality. It brings most of the advantages of VR to the marketing sector. However, it saves the annoying, unsightly and expensive equipment.
You can imagine augmented reality like an eye implant from science fiction films, only not as a terrifying implant, but as an app on your smartphone.
However, the scope of augmented reality possibilities is similarly broad: for example, it would be possible to display information such as Google reviews or newspaper articles in the “reality window”.
Augmented reality research is not only being conducted by Google. Many apps have already been launched on the market for promotional and gaming purposes.
Another advantage of augmented reality is that, unlike virtual reality, it cannot only be used on consoles or in games. Any smartphone user can download an augmented reality app without any problems. This limits AR much less than VR. This means that a much larger, more diversified mass of people can be reached via augmented reality, whereas virtual reality is mainly limited to gamers.
