On the stage at Shoptalk Barcelona 2024, Obsess CEO and Founder Neha Singh joined leaders from Microsoft and Deloitte to discuss how retailers can create Engaging Digital Shopping Technologies that capture and retain customers.
The panel delved into new technologies that offer retailers the ability to create immersive and seamless customer experiences, like virtual stores. Obsess showcased our interactive solutions for memorable brand experiences, enabling brands and retailers to create shoppable, 3D branded worlds on Web, Roblox and Apple Vision Pro.
Evolution of E-Commerce to Interactive Shopping
The panelists were asked to provide some insight on how immersive experiences were impacting traditional e-commerce elements—and whether or not they will remain foundational or become obsolete.
As retail technology continues to advance, it is increasingly becoming easier for brands to adopt innovative solutions that enhance the customer experience online. Retailers and brands are embracing engaging digital technologies and interactive shopping solutions, such as virtual stores, to offer customers a more immersive and personalized shopping journey. However, it is also important to keep traditional elements to provide a familiar framework that increases guidance and information.
Traditional elements in e-commerce, such as navigational cues and Product Listing Pages, remain foundational as retail technology evolves, helping to make the advancements more intuitive and interactive. For virtual stores, navigational elements empower shoppers to explore a new discovery-driven environment, appearing in a variety of forms to guide the user in their journey, such as interactive maps, directional arrows and welcoming tooltips. Immersive environments more closely resemble the real life shopping experience, bringing intuitive context to a digital space.
Product Listing Pages have also persisted in interactive shopping interfaces. Obsess-powered virtual experiences have an e-commerce integration feature for brands and retailers to pull up-to-date product information, such as inventory, and attach it to products displayed in the virtual storefront. In immersive online shopping experiences, including familiar e-commerce elements empowers brands to create new, dynamic interfaces that are easy for shoppers to adapt to.
Measuring the Success of Immersive Virtual Shops
The panelists agreed: it is necessary for brands and retailers to revolutionize their e-commerce strategy due to the shortened consumer attention span, and that content produced has to be more grandiose and strategic in order to capture shoppers’ attention and loyalty.
By leveraging technologies such as virtual reality and augmented reality, brands can capture and retain customers with exclusive content in a unique format. When measuring the success of their immersive virtual storefronts, brands and retailers can use a variety of metrics, including brand recall and customer lifetime value.
Innovative Brand Marketing to Capture Shoppers’ Attention
Virtual reality technology can be used to uplevel brand marketing strategies, and help brands differentiate themselves in a highly competitive market. For example, hair care brand, K18, partnered with Obsess to create their virtual Magic Science Bus, transforming their traditional 3D e-commerce assets into a memorable, interactive experience that spanned web, mobile and virtual reality through Meta Quest. The highly visual and gamified experience provided an extra layer of immersion and memorability for the brand’s live events. Download the case study to learn more about how K18 differentiated themselves in a saturated hair care market.
Reinforcing Customer Loyalty and Building Deeper Connections
In the long run, a successful investment in engaging digital shopping technology can be measured by customer lifetime value, a long-time emotional connection with the buyer. There are also a few short-term loyalty metrics that can be tracked in virtual stores, such as email and SMS opt-in rate (for brands that integrate their CMS), return rate and brand affinity. A global beauty brand, for example, used their virtual store to reinforce retention and improve brand loyalty by providing VIP customers with exclusive content and brand experiences, resulting in a 164% uptick in daily visitors for VIP Launches. Download the case study to learn more.
The discussion at Shoptalk Europe 2024 highlighted the importance for retailers to adopt Engaging Digital Shopping Technologies in order to capture and retain customers, and push the boundaries of e-commerce as we know it today with inspirational, immersive and seamless customer experiences. Email us at contact@obsessvr.com or book a demo to see what Obsess can do for your brand.
