Social media is image-obsessed. With mobile phones becoming an integral part of our lives, social media platforms are helping consumers interact with the product and brand through visuals. The digital experience has got most of the users to believe “A picture is worth a thousand words”, giving birth to social commerce.
Social commerce is a part of e-commerce that involves social media and online media that not only supports social interactions but also assists the potential user with online buying and selling of products and services.
Social commerce started in China (known as the powerhouse of social commerce) and saw a drastic rise in sales. Sales generated from Chinese social commerce platforms are projected to reach $363 billion by the end of 2021.
The success of social commerce is now being replicated outside China. According to the researchers, in the year 2018–2019, the average time spent by users on digital media was 6% in the US and 8% in China, but in 2019–2020, the trend was reinforced by COVID-19 and the average time spent by users on digital media was increased to 12% in the US and 10% in China. (Source: World Economic Forum)
It’s proven that images and videos are grasped more easily, processed quickly, and retained better in the memory of the user than texts. Before a potential customer invests in a product online, they would want to see what they’re buying. Visual product configuration helps the user experiment with the colors, materials, looks, and shapes. AR helps in the digital placement of the product in any given environment. This helps the customer know exactly how it will look in that given space and can help them customize it if they want.
Augmented Reality is the future. This level of imagination and visualization allows the companies/brands to show the product and customize it in a customer-friendly way. The 3D experience helps better to draw in a potential customer over a simple product image. AR certainly offers opportunities to have a better user experience, thus bringing immense scope to e-commerce.
Cameraah has created AR experiences for over 100 brands and we are now launching a platform for other brands to build and deploy their own AR Commerce experiences.
