Augmented Reality – three mobile must-haves

The real trick for any marketing trend is to launch intuitive, brand-engaging experiences. Yet, AR is being employed by brands as quickly as they can think up something to layer on top of something else. The experience of downloading a branded app, only to simply interact with a 3D model that can spin, is almost as bad as trashing the app and realising you’ll never use it again. Ever.

Before you dismiss this article as a whiny anti-AR rant, just hold on. I am actually a fan of AR and its possibilities. There is a silver lining to the current state of AR and we’re on the cusp of gaining access to it. Mobile manufacturers are rushing to make smartphones AR-equipped, while the ‘Tech Giants’ are patenting and innovating the technology (think Google Glass and Apple’s recent AR patent), and a number of brands and marketers are delivering quality experiences.

Of the latter, here are three applications that are fun, informative and effective:

Track My Macca's – McDonald’s

TrackMyMacca’s taps into the McDonald’s supply chain, allowing users to track the actual ingredients that make up their meals. GPS detects the restaurant location while image recognition identifies the food about to be eaten. This information, coupled with date and time, allows the iPhone app to pull all the necessary supply data in real time. The detailed breakdown is then presented to the user through augmented reality as 3D animations.

Laplication – Regional Council of Lapland

I can’t think of a better way to encourage tourism to Lapland (the north of Finland) than to allow users to transform their current location into the Land of the Midnight Sun. Once a potential tourist has the iPhone/iPad app installed, augmented reality alters surroundings into breathtaking 3D panoramas of Lappish natural phenomena, the Midnight Sun, and the Northern Lights. This well-developed AR experience takes aspiration to a whole new level by putting the Lapland experience quite literally at the user’s fingertips. www.onlyinlapland.com

Augment – Augmented Reality for Sales, Communication and eCommerce

Though AR has been applied to make experiences fun, immersive and heavily brand-oriented, its practical application for eCommerce is only on the cusp of being realised. The inability to “try products on” – or in! – before buying is the strongest barrier to online purchase. With Augment, AR allows any retailer to show 3D models of products in real-time, life size, and in the environment of the consumer. Want to see how that couch will actually look in your living room? Augment makes that happen.