Individualized AR will change how you connect with customers

Everyone loves when things are personalized just for them. Think about how many things that the modern world has enabled us to personalize:

• Backgrounds, colors, and fonts on every device
• Ringtones and alarm tones
• Themes, colors, and widgets on web browsers
• Activity and health goals and tracking
• Focus modes, digital wellbeing, and notification settings

Not to mention what is personalized for us all behind-the-scenes by the almighty algorithms…

And that’s just the digital stuff! We’ve been personalizing clothes, shoes, make-up, decor, and everything else we possibly can for as long as we’ve been here!

As personalized and individualized as our world has become, it’s just the tip of the iceberg. And if your company is ready for what’s coming, you’ll be able to deliver the most incredibly individualized content that customers have ever seen.

So let’s talk about Augmented Reality filters.

At some point in the near future, we will have headsets with such a small form factor, people will no longer be embarrassed to wear them in certain public settings. They’ll be integrated into glasses, sunglasses, etc.

As soon as that is a reality, we will all have individualized worlds available to us! It may sound off to think of it as a “world.” But let’s review what Augmented Reality Filters really are.

An augmented reality filter is generally talked about in two ways:

Effects:

Specific items you look at have a specific effect applied. For example, if you turned on a “bunny ears” effect (or filter), all humans you look at will automatically have bunny ears.

Experiences:

A scenario that plays out (most often in a designated location) for the user when they trigger it. Here is a great example:

Soon, instead of looking at yourself on your phone screen with those funny cat ears and whiskers… you’ll put on a headset and look around the world through powerful filters.

Think of all the possibilities when the range is this wide…

• Fantastic murals across an entire city block
• 3D artwork that you can dive “into”
• Historical facts right where they actually happened
• Personalized advertisements that are actually relevant to you
• Or… advertisements that are blocked! Just like you can install an ad blocker on your web browser, imagine being able to look around the world with the same power.
• And of course… the entertainment

Imagine looking over at your favorite Chinese restaurant while it’s the year of the dragon. Moments later, a massive dragon launches from the rooftop, flies around, does some awesome stunts… you’re in a micro-Marvel movie! Maybe you even find yourself with an Ironman repulsor cannon and get to take down the dragon!

Companies will create these awesome entertainment experiences, creating enjoyable value as a brand new form of high-quality advertising.

Let’s talk through how this will all work, so you can begin thinking about how your business can be an early adopter in this space.

So as I said before, we’ve got these two types of Augmented Reality: effects and experiences.

The experiences, specifically, will be created at two different scales:

Small scale:

created by individuals or small collaborations of creators, only occurring at a single spot or exactly the same way every time.

World scale:

created by companies or a large number of individual creators, often changing and evolving based on where you go

To make all of this magic happen, there will need to be a way to host all of the content, make sure it is anchored to the right spot, and that everyone can access it at the same time and interact with it together. In short, it will take a lot of work.

There are a few companies that already have a huge head start on this undertaking. Niantic Lightship/8th wall, Google, Mapbox, Microsoft, etc. They all have various components that are needed to make the individualized world a reality.

What will this mean for your business?

Obviously, we’re talking about a future reality with sleek headsets that reach mainstream adoption. It’s not as far off as you may think, but it’s not happening tomorrow.

But an XR-savvy company is not built overnight, and it’s not built once the tech is already mainstream.

All the foundational tech is already here — it’s just still stuck on that trusty little phone screen.

Your company can begin building the internal personnel and tech infrastructure to create these kinds of virtual experiences right now. That’s how you’ll be ready to be first to the space as it breaks round the bend of that adoption bell curve.

Got a storefront business and an app?

Get an AR interactive mural up and running and advertise that to drive app downloads.

Need people to see and try on more things than you have in stock?

Give them in-store personalized recommendations that they can virtually try on via a smart dressing room mirror.

Need to drive foot traffic and get people talking about your brand?

Create a short and sweet AR game, where the final piece to the puzzle or special equipment needed to kill the final boss is hidden inside your store, so they have to physically show up.

Whatever you do, don’t wait for the idyllic future: jump in and start making or saving money with XR tech in your business strategy right now.

Do you need further guidance on how to navigate XR for your business? DM me on LinkedIn and we can chat!