The reality of VR/AR trial






If you haven’t heard about VR/AR by now, your desert island must not have Wi-Fi. But there are millions of folks who know about VR/AR who haven’t seen it yet. User trial is on the critical path for VR/AR to go mass market. So what are the lessons from previous digital platforms about moving mass consumers from awareness to trial..            
AKQA



founding chairman Tom Bedecarre gets right to the point. “New technology follows a familiar adoption curve, and it’s easier to attract your first customers, innovators and early adopters. It’s very hard to cross the chasm and attract the early majority and beyond.”
The challenge is particularly acute for VR/AR, where even 360-degree videos can’t completely translate the surprise and delight that users get from the best VR/AR apps. For the full experience you need to have it on your face. To paraphrase, “It’s the stereoscopic vision, stupid.”
So how are VR/AR companies getting mass consumers to try it beyond early adopters

Free is a pretty good price point 

The New York Times has given away more than a million Goggle Cardboards to its reader. McDonald's ''Happy Goggle'' turn a Happy meal box into a vr headset,and coca-cola has experimented with a similar approach using its multi-pack containers..


 Moving up in quality from Cardboard, Samsung has bundled its Gear VR headset for free with Compatiable phones,which together with sales has delivered “millions of people with a Gear VR, and over a million monthly active users” according to a Samsung spokesperson. Samsung has also enabled location-based trial, with “15,000 retail locations in the US.” verizon gave away Goggle's Daydream View VR headset with pre-orders of Pixel phones, and China’s OnePlus gave away 30,000 VR HEADSETS WITH  its phones...

Comments