Influence of Augmented Reality on the Ecommerce industry
The Ecommerce industry has come a long way and in today’s digital age, ecommerce is superior to traditional brick-and-mortar retail in several ways that benefit both the retailer and customer. From being a non-existent business model, ecommerce has grown to become one of the fastest growing businesses of the modern era.
Augmented Reality is propelling the ecommerce industry to widen its horizons and enhance customer experience. Ecommerce has rapidly taken over as customers’ preferred way to shop by rising above all the challenges and limitations of the online space.
The last decade witnessed a considerable rise in consumer’s interest and overall participation level. As per Statista, ecommerce sales in the year of 2017 amounted to 2.3 trillion US dollars. This number is projected to grow up to 4.88 trillion US dollars till the year 2021. In a matter of time, ecommerce has transformed into the pinnacle of modern-day retailing and is continuously expanding in new directions under the light of Augmented Reality technology.
The article explains how ecommerce shopping experiences are being enhanced with the use of augmented reality. Ecommerce has experienced a massive tide of good fortunes by leveraging the potential of Augmented Reality (AR) technology. This move has succeeded to overcome the shortcomings of online shopping by bridging the gap between offline and online shopping experiences.
The major concern of online shoppers is ‘uncertainty’. They are usually unsure of whether a particular product is right for them or perfectly meets their specifications. Not all customers have the imagination power to correlate the products available online with the real world space.
With AR-based ecommerce apps, customers are more confident in their purchases and feel that they are making the right choice. Customers like the idea of being able to virtually try different options before making the purchase decision. AR-based ecommerce app makes this possible by transforming user’s smartphone into a useful and ubiquitous AR platform.
The article goes on to say how AR is being integrated into ecommerce websites, with technology giants Apple and Google developing their own AR platforms to make it simpler for developers to build ecommerce apps with AR features.
Practical examples are given of how AR is working in ecommerce including how AR based apps are helping to boost sales. Businesses are seeing benefits such as a significant decrease in the number of returns and goes on to explore how emerging technology will be used in the future of ecommerce.