At the beginning of September Samsung announced that its new Galaxy Note 4, that will be released before the end of the year, will entail new powerful virtual reality features. This will be possible thanks to the revolutionary “Gear VR”: a headset powered by Oculus (acquired by Facebook for $2 billion last July) featuring an immersive three dimensional technology. It will provide the customers with the possibility of living a 360 degree adventure in a virtual world, being able to simulate a motion experience by reacting to eyes’ movements. The VR technology will be mainly used by Samsung for gaming purposes and it will surely turn the entire videogame world upside-down.

                      Looking through the new Samsung Gear VR

However, marketers can’t and won’t let this new incredible opportunity slip. To a watchful eye, the VR technology is a perfect mean to considerably improve the digital marketing efforts. Exploiting it, companies will be able to provide their target audience with virtual reality experiences of what they are advertising. Moreover, ads could become something exciting, enjoyable and desirable, rather than interruptive and annoying as it is now in most of the cases. The dream of marketing people of creating an advertising campaign perceived by the audience as something that truly meets their desires and needs could be finally fulfilled.

The marketing possibilities are infinite and the technology could be helpfully used in all the business sectors. By simply wearing a pair of virtual glasses, people could visit places far away to decide where to go on holiday, walk around a virtual store for some online shopping, take a look at hotel rooms before booking, try how it is to drive a new car and so on. Customers will be able to directly interact with products and services offered by a company, and this will stimulate their engagement and interaction in a way that traditional techniques could never do. Someone has already started to exploit this new technology, as it is the case of the Marriot Hotels chain, that has tried to supply even a 4D virtual travel experience to its customers:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AWxSOjfqMvI

In a close future, the way in which customers interact with brands will dramatically change, so be prepared to be part of this new thrilling (virtual) reality.

Sources:
http://adage.com/article/digitalnext/samsung-s-vr-technology-big-step-ad-revolution/295118/

http://blog.appnova.com/oculus-vr-future-digital-marketing/
http://www.samsung.com/global/microsite/gearvr/