For sales teams, Augmented Reality offers an unprecedented opportunity to deeply engage customers, forge powerful emotional connections with products, and ultimately drive revenue in once unimaginable ways. Before, even a creative idea could have been difficult to realize because of technological limitations. Today, things are different, and there are plenty of ideas for employing Augmented Reality for sales success.
Understanding Augmented Reality for Sales
Augmented Reality leverages the camera on your smartphone, tablet, or specialized AR glasses to overlay digital information in the real world with the help of advanced computer vision and spatial mapping. As e-commerce moves to smartphones, most new-generation customers use them as their first destination to shop for products. It is natural that AR, with its smartphone-centric design, can become a focal point for brands and their sales teams.
The main goal of a sales team is to make an engaging experience and sales pitch that keeps the users engaged, and they listen or interact with the sales pitch themselves, which will increase the chance of turning more potential customers into customers. With AR, there are multiple options for such practices, such as virtual try-ons or AR-based packaging, making AR a perfect and efficient way to promote products.
Why Use Augmented Reality for Sales?
Businesses always seek ways to stand out in a crowded and competitive marketplace. Augmented Reality in retail and other business verticals can provide that advantage by offering unique engagement, interactivity, and visualization capabilities. AR experiences can leave a lasting impression on customers, leading to stronger brand affiliation and sales.
AR can fundamentally change how customers perceive and understand products by granting them a vivid, tangible preview. It is something that static images and videos cannot match. With AR, traditional sales channels’ limitations can disappear, which will pave a new way for businesses to engage with their customers more meaningfully and positively.
8 Most Effective Ways to Leverage AR for Sales
Let us take a look at the eight most effective ways sales teams use Augmented Reality to make their pitching more effective:
1. Virtual Try-On Experience
Trying on clothes in a fitting room is a familiar ritual. With virtual try-on, customers can use smartphone cameras to visualize how different apparel items look on their bodies in real-time. Many brands, like L’Oreal’s Modiface AR app, let users virtually sample different makeup and hair color shades in selfies. Eyewear brands like Warby Parker offer AR try-ons for glasses, while companies like Nike provide AR sneaker visualization.
Lifestyle brands are quickly adopting AR as it not only provides them with a better way to showcase products but also leaves some room for customers to be more free in their choices. This technology isn’t just convenient—it reduces product returns, increases shopper confidence, and enables self-expression through visualization before buying. Data shows that AR-guided purchases have significantly lower return rates.
2. Virtual Showrooms and Stores
Why limit yourself to a physical showroom when AR can transport customers to immersive virtual spaces? When using AR, retailers and brands can construct digital stores and product showrooms that customers can easily explore on their mobile devices.
Ikea has been a pioneer with its Place app, which lets customers visualize how furniture will look in their home’s rooms through AR. Similarly, automakers provide AR vehicle configurators and showrooms to customize and interact with car models at full scale. New startups like Vyking are creating web-based solutions to build AR showrooms easily. As more companies see the advantages of AR showrooms, their popularity will only soar over time, making them another hot commodity in sales.
3. AR-Based Packaging
Product packaging doesn’t have to be a static canvas. AR technology can bring it to life with engaging digital experiences. Customers unlock value-added AR content, such as animations, instructions, games, and more, by scanning the packaging with their smartphones.
Food & beverage brands have used this for marketing campaigns, while consumer packaged goods makers use AR for everything from product assembly instructions to promotional competitions. Toy company AMS used AR packaging to gamify their MakAMO arts & crafts products with mobile app interactions.
4. Interactive Product Demos
Reading a product manual or watching a how-to video might not be enough to explain a product’s features and capabilities. With AR, customers can intuitively grasp even the most complex offerings through interactive, step-by-step demonstrations.
Many industrial companies deploy AR for training and remote expert assistance in heavy machinery maintenance. Tech brands create AR product tours and 3D animations to showcase their electronic devices in rich detail. It not only allows them to showcase their products to the customers without the risk of damaging them but also makes it easy for customers to understand the features they are unaware of.
5. AR Product Catalogs & Customization
Gone are the days of flipping through a static paper catalog. With AR, every product can burst forth in three dimensions, allowing customers to inspect items from every angle. They can zoom, rotate, configure, and customize each offering in real-time.
Major retailers like IKEA and Amazon have invested heavily in AR catalog technology. For IKEA, it’s about visualizing furniture, while Amazon’s app supports AR visualization for countless products. Automotive companies like Cadillac provide AR product configurators to customize vehicle trims, paints, wheels, and options to their customers to make them feel more involved in the design process of their cars.
6. Gamification of Customer Experience
By fusing AR with gameplay mechanics, brands can take a leap of faith with their sales tactics and tap into new customer segments, particularly younger audiences that look for a different experience, even in mundane tasks.
One example is Pepsi’s AR game, which transformed bottle packaging into a playable battleground between the Pepsi mascots. This exercise garnered much interest and is still one of the remarkable AR campaigns.
7. AR-Based Product Marketing & Advertising
Many brands are using augmented reality in marketing and advertising. They’re creating virtual billboards and interactive AR-enabled ads in magazines. Burger King had a clever regional campaign where customers could find “hidden” virtual restaurants using their AR app. Other brands have tried ad inserts in print publications that trigger AR content when scanned. As 5G improves location-based AR tracking over time, we can expect more contextual experiences where AR can be used more freely.
8. Product-Based AR Experiences
Product-based AR experience is one of the sales techniques that has been used for a long time now. Lego uses AR in playsets and instruction manuals. Many learning resources incorporate AR-based activities to boost engagement in educational toys. Even toys like Jurassic World’s Dino Tracker interact with AR content. Electronics and appliance makers may also include visual AR tutorials and overlays in the future.
Key Takeaways
Augmented reality isn’t some far-off fantasy. It’s already transforming how we discover, evaluate, and purchase products across multiple industries. Even famous brands and companies have used AR for sales as a powerful instrument for forging deeper customer relationships, solidifying brand loyalty, and driving conversions.
One thing is sure. Augmented Reality and associated technologies will fundamentally revolutionize how we sell in the coming years. It will be about something other than stark showrooms, lifeless marketing collateral, or complex sales tactics. Instead, brands will attract customers into awe-inspiring augmented worlds where products come alive.
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