The Future of Virtual Reality in Retail
By Jim Bask
By Adriana Blum
Virtual reality has many promising applications in the world of retail. From building a brand image to creating virtual experiences for customers that are meant to sell the product purely based on the ‘wow’ factor and the novelty of this particular kind of tech.
Investments into VR technologies are on the rise. However, most of them are not focused on retail, just like the growing niches of AI and machine learning that thrive around bigger companies with more substantial budgets to throw around.
Yet, these investments will eventually trickle down to retail, as technologies become more accessible, VR expertise becomes more available and the overall acceptance of the tech becomes more universal.
Retailers who are interested in investing in a VR experience have to keep a lot of things in mind. It’s important not to break the bank, as retailers chase the VR hype and forget about the budget that they have to strictly adhere to. Setting up clear goals for the initiative is also important. Only invest in VR if you see a viable use case for your company that is affordable.
Overall, the outlook for VR in retail is positive, as technologies move forward, processing power becomes even more available and VR-ready devices are increasing their user base by the minute. Some consumers will definitely give it a try, simply because their devices are ready for it and that offers a pretty good niche to attract customers just by the simple fact of adopting VR. Plus, if you want your brand to be considered ‘forward-thinking’ and ‘modern’, you have to consider VR, as over 70% of consumers associated these exact qualities with brands that adopt VR.