Sunday, April 28, 2013

AR adds value to your firms' marketing campaigns

Hello again!

Today let's get more function specific, and briefly discuss Augmented Reality from a Marketer's perspective as one can not underestimate the impact of the use of AR on marketing campaigns.

Brands are increasingly using Augmented Reality in their marketing campaigns. Although the widely used QR codes are relatively inexpensive and offer a very practical way to deliver relevant content to potential consumers, AR is a step ahead in terms of generating excitement and providing them with an unique and memorable interactive experience.

For consumers, AR does not only offer a playful element  into everyday product, it is also easier as there is no need to download a reader for interacting with the physical world.

Below are a few examples of successful AR marketing campaigns.

In 2011, KIA Motors wanted to use the Australian Open to change consumers' perception of its brand in order to effectively launch the KIA Optima. To do this, SMG Red launched an AR  app that allowed viewers that captured the KIA logo during the match to explore the car’s features. The AR app recorded  over 12,000 downloads and is said  to have led to an increase in Optima searches of around 58%. Kia  January sales of the Optima exceeded expected levels by 57 percent as a result.[1]

Nuts Magazine has partnered with mobile augmented reality platform Blippar in order to develop an interactive print edition. The magazine's first print edition of 2012 included 20 augmented pieces of content that readers could interact with by using their smartphones and the free Blippar application. The AR app recorded 15,000 unique users and over 200,000 interactions in a week, meaning that on average each user interacted with the content 13 times - a very impressive interaction level for a single app campaign that no doubt led to an increase in % of retained customers and to a higher level of brand awareness.[2]

In order to target a younger crowd for the release of its S60, Volvo created a You Tube masthead experience that allowed users to drive a virtual car round a track by turning their mobile phones right and left. The masterhead ad reported 192,319 clicks, with an interaction rate of 192,319 clicks. Volvo believes the AR experience resulted in a traffic increase of 293% on volvocars.com.[3]

TeamOgres

[1] http://mobileawards.com.au/MA2011/entry_details.asp?ID=10094&Category_ID=4624
[2] http://econsultancy.com/es/nma-archive/54637-ipc-reports-unprecedented-interactions-with-nuts-ar-campaign
[3] http://www.augmentedplanet.com/2012/10/from-gimmick-to-given-augmented-reality-and-the-future-of-marketing/

Saturday, April 20, 2013

What can AR do for your firm?

Dear Loyal Readers,

we've already established that Augmented Reality looks like real fun. We have shown the multitude of benefits for users of AR applications: AR can provide relevant, updated information in an innovative way which ties physical reality to virtual reality. Users enjoy an additional "layer" of helpful information, embedded over their actual view of the world.

But the question which begs to be asked is – where is the money? 
What are the main business value propositions that Augmented Reality offers for firms?

In order to talk about a technology's value proposition, we need to explore and compare it to its predecessors. Which technologies or applications can AR improve, or completely replace? What might become obsolete if AR becomes a reality (pun intended)?

The first obvious answer to this question is that AR can replace all traditional ways of displaying information which is tied to a specific context or physical place. AR's main value is displaying information exactly where and when it is needed, in a much more focused way than classic ways of displaying information:
  • Driving or walking directions are better read and understood when blended with reality, showing relevant directions "on" relevant streets and turns.
  • Relevant surgery related drawings, reminders and steps can be shown to medical students and inexperienced doctors during surgery or studies, embedded on the relevant body parts, instead of using classic medical books
  • Advertising can be shown next to certain objects, embedded in customers' reality in arbitrary places, instead of putting ads in predetermined locations such as billboards, bus stations and newspapers

Therefore, we can say that the main business value proposition for AR is getting relevant information to customers in a much more focused manner. Firms can utilize this in a few ways:
  1. Improve customers' satisfaction by giving them information they need, in the right place and time – for example, driving safety tips and instructions
  2. Provide customers with additional information (not what the customer directly asked for) which is of value to the firm – an additional channel of information between firms and customers. An example would be context-relevant advertising. 
  3. Cut costs by more efficiently conveying information to customers, thus reducing the need for sales and support representatives. For example, AR instruction manuals, or product information) might help customers solve problems on their own instead of using firms' support staff
That being said, we must acknowledge the fact that AR has still not gained real, massive traction in the world – and therefore, we cannot say for certain what would be the customers' reaction to it. How would ordinary users adapt to this non-stop, always-present flow of information, embedded onto reality? Might it just make users insensitive to information, thus decreasing the core value proposition of AR?

The move from reality to augmented reality might not be as easy as AR advocates want us to believe… but as time goes on, and more applications and devices (such as Google Glass) gain traction, AR will hopefully adjust itself to serve consumers' needs in a non-obtrusive way.

Until next time,
Your friends @ Augmentacious

Friday, April 12, 2013

So, why aren’t we all augmenting reality yet?!


Hello again beloved readers! So far, we’ve been showing you just how awesome AR is and the amazing augmented future to come. But as with everything, it’s not all sunshine and rainbows. There are some significant hurdles for AR, and today we’ll discuss a couple of the most problematic technological aspects. But, we will also talk about how these challenges can be overcome!

The very first question to ask about AR is, do we have the technology to implement it? Despite the seemingly unstoppable advancement of technology, there are still some capabilities that AR needs that we just haven’t figured out how to develop yet.

First up, miniaturization. Let’s take a look at Google Glass again.



So…does that look sexy? Never mind sexy, will it keep people from pointing and laughing? Google has done its absolute best to make Glass as unobtrusive as possible, but you see the results. I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’m willing to bet if this is the best Google can do, there probably isn’t anyone out there who can do better.

Now here’s the good news. There’s this thing called Moore’s Law, which predicts that the number of transistors you can cram onto a chip will double roughly every two years.* We’ve all seen this action – every year computers get faster and smaller. So someday, Google Glass will probably look just like another pair of glasses.

Miniaturization for cosmetic purposes is one thing. Actual performance requirements are another. For example, let’s say you are on the main strip in Las Vegas, looking around you 360 degrees. Right now, the hardware, software, nor communication protocols exist that can deliver the sheer richness of data that would provide a truly immersive AR experience. Think of how much computational work it would require – sensing the environment around you, figuring out exactly where in the world you are, analyzing the sensor inputs, identifying salient physical features, sending a request to a database (perhaps multiple ones!) to lookup and retrieve the relevant information, receiving the data, and finally displaying it on your screen. It is not a trivial process! But again, it’s not all gloom and doom. The technology might not be there yet to get the optimal experience. But future devices and apps can just be selective in the functionality they provide, so that you get the augmented reality filled with information that is most important to you.

*(As an aside, you may be thinking that I am full of crap – computers 2 years ago were definitely not twice as slow. This is because doubling transistors doesn’t necessarily mean double performance, and that is another Pandora’s Box of mind-numbing technological mumbo-jumbo you don’t want to get into).

Now let’s examine the human/machine interface. Earlier, we showed you an even more futuristic alternative to Google Glass, which is a contact lens that would essentially serve the same function.



To do this, we’re going to need a display material that approximates the flexible nature of a contact lens. On the bright side, this is something that people have been looking into for a long time, all the way back to 1974 at Xerox PARC. Sounds fantastic…except after nearly 40 years the most advanced TVs and smartphones still don’t have flexible displays yet. There is very little doubt that we will be getting flexible displays in the near future – every major TV and smartphone manufacturer is trying to be first to market with this technology. The other problem is related to the first problem I mentioned above, and that is the necessity of cramming a gazillion display transistors into something the size of a contact lens. There’s also the teensy weensy problem of transistors radiating heat, as my lap (and privates) could attest to back in the day when I had a 7-lb behemoth of a laptop. Imagine that on your eyes…we are going to need some crazy advances in nanotechnology and heat management systems to get something as sophisticated as a heads up display on a contact lens. So, flexible displays – not really much of a challenge. Combine it with other issues, and it’s not something we will be solving soon.

These are just a few technological obstacles in the way of AR. Sounds a little daunting, doesn’t it? But, we believe in mankind – more specifically, we believe in the scientists and engineers of the world. Because without them, who will come up with cool gadgets for the rest of us to play with? 

Thursday, April 4, 2013

Health Solutions and Risks




So far, we’ve shown and discussed the wonderful applications and advantages of AR in various industries.
However, today we would like to talk about some of the inherent risks of this technology, and how they can be mitigated.

One of the fields AR can be useful is the healthcare industry. Among other uses, AR can be a useful tool for doctors; the following video demonstrates usage of AR to help explore and learn about various body organs:

If we take the next step in AR technology, it might be used in actual procedures the medicine industry has implemented AR to show alternative views of a patient from various imaging sources. Images from X-Ray, ultrasound, endoscopies and other graphic information that can be helpful in real-time are shown while a doctor is in a surgical procedure. AR aids surgeons to be more accurate when doing their job. AR is more advanced in neurosurgery (brain, spinal cord and peripheral nerves), otolaryngology (ear, mouth and nose) and maxillofacial (face and jaws) operations.

A disadvantage of using AR in medicine is that life and health are at stake and the system can fail, since it has been proved that AR has limitations regarding “high resolution, color depth, luminance, contrast, field of view, and focus depth[1]”. If a doctor perceives wrongly the information, when working with the patient, mistakes can be made that could damage an organ and complicating an operation. AR can project images inaccurate to reality since humans have rigid organs such as bones which are more static and semi-rigid organs such as the liver, which are constantly changing in shape (due to the blood irrigation and the body respiration), a past endoscopy can show how the organ was, but in a medical procedure the current organ’s state could have changed creating perception confusion to the surgeon leading to surgical negative results[2]. Even if AR can be of an advantage for surgery procedures, if the doctors make any surgical mistake, both the doctor and hospital might incur in negligence liabilities. Legal claims could be very costly (apart from the health at stake) for hospitals.

The good news is that people are always willing to improve technology: institutions such as the Technische Universitat München have projects that are targeted to improve and adapt the use of AR in the operation rooms and help the doctors make a better utilization of this instrument as the end users[3]. Another way to mitigate the risk is that surgeons should always trust their senses and complement it with AR as a useful tool. 

If you are more interested in AR used in surgeries, watch the following video: 

Augmented reality in operating rooms: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kifj0ZP4Mos






[1] Van Krevelen, D.W.F and Poelman, R., “A Survey of Augmented Reality Technologies, Applications and Limitations”, The International Journal of Virtual Reality, 2010, 9(2):1-20, p. 14, URL: http://kjcomps.6te.net/upload/paper1%20.pdf.
[2] Shuhaiber, Jeffrey Archer, “Augmented Reality in Surgery” JAMA Surgery, February 1st, 2004, URL: http://archsurg.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=396410.
[3] “Research in Medical Augmented Reality”, Technische Universitat München , URL: http://campar.in.tum.de/Chair/ResearchIssueMedAR.