VMSD - August 2011 - (Page 18)

NS NEX T STORE By Jim Crawford The New Digital Window Augmented reality plus a mobile phone can mean a personal portal to store design. THE MOBILE PHONE INDUSTRY is filled with buzz- words, many of them hurled confusingly at retailers in the hopes of convincing them that this widget or that whatchamacallit will revolutionize their business. “Checking in.” Local “deal of the day.” Mobile payments. SMS short codes. Over and over, we’ve been told about the “mobile revolution,” each time with a little more hyperbole and a little less actual proof. But one mobile technology that does have the power to redefine, or at least dramatically enhance, the shopping experience of tomorrow is augmented Above Want to see this image come to life through the magic of augmented reality? Go to http://bit.ly/vmsd-ar with your iPhone 4 or iPad 2. reality (a.k.a. “AR”). Augmented reality simply means using the phone as a “window” to the environment around it and displaying digital information superimposed on that real-world view. There are two primary types of augmented reality, each one offering retailers some fascinating opportunities: 1. Geolocation-based AR: Here, the phone uses two embedded technologies to know what’s showing up on the viewscreen through the camera. First, GPS lets the phone know its location (realistically within about 32 feet using current technology). Second, the accellerometer in the phone identifies which direction the phone is pointing. By combining these two pieces of information, the phone can display digital content that’s coded to a specific place overlaid on an image. For example, pointing the phone at the Eiffel Tower in Paris could show the Tower itself, but also (as one recent promotion did) a 3-D cow balloon pro- moting a French cheese. Or, since the phone knows where it is in relation to other locations, a shopper could see turn-by-turn directions to a nearby store overlaid on a view of the streets. 2. Symbol-based AR: With this technology, the phone uses the camera to recognize a specific shape and use this as a reference point over which digital content is displayed. Since this offers a higher degree of precision than geolocation-based AR, it allows for a more intricate or compelling experience. One great real-world example allows consumers interested in a Panasonic flatscreen to see how different models would look in their own homes. It’s very simple to use: first you print out the specific symbol (called a “glyph”) on letter-sized paper. Then you place it on the surface where the base of the TV would go. Viewing the space using a downloaded app on your phone, you can then select a model and see exactly how it would look in the room from different angles. Both of these types of AR are well established, with several platforms and service capabilities that retailers can use to develop and deploy augmented reality into their own mobile strategies. This realworld technology is well supported across all the major smartphone platforms and can be integrated into retailer branded applications, as well. Consumers react incredibly favorably to the “wow” factor of AR and, with established tools so easily at hand, the cost of creating AR applications is relatively low. So why haven’t retailers been at the forefront of developing this exciting new capability? There are a few retailers experimenting with augmented reality. Tommy Hilfiger’s “GoldRun” application lets shoppers track down digital objects in a virtual treasure hunt. Both the Android and iPhone platforms feature several “virtual dressing room” applications for assisting fashion shoppers with clothes buying. But on the whole, retail has been slow to embrace the potential for augmented reality for three reasons: 1. Lack of vision. Let’s face it, retail isn’t exactly known for rapidly embracing technology, and AR is at the leading edge of mobile these days. As a tool to create a shopping experience, it needs to be integrated with store design and multichannel retailing and used to express the nuance of the retail brand, 18 AUGUST 2011 | vmsd.com http://www.bit.ly/vmsd-ar http://www.vmsd.com

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of VMSD - August 2011

VMSD - August 2011
Table of Contents
From the Editor
VMSD Editorial Advisory Board
The Goods
Design Detail
Next Store
Betting on Three
Europe Still Surprises
After the Flood
Cowboy Paradise
The Art of Technology
Showroom
Ad Index
Checking Out

VMSD - August 2011