Kiwi Property and 99 teamed up to deliver shoppers some fashion inspiration in the form of a 360-degree virtual reality runway show at shopping centres across the country.
While most VR games ask users to lose themselves in the experience, FCB’s latest creation for NZ Fire Service makes doing so a life or death situation. We talk to FCB’s Matt Barnes, lead creative for the Escape My House project on how the technology’s immersive realism can help change behaviour for good.
After launching in Australia more than five years ago, global experiential marketing agency Because has landed on New Zealand shores.
360-degree video, which has been described as the next big thing in tech for 2016, is slowly gaining traction in New Zealand as brands begin experimenting with it in creative ways. Here’s a rundown of how a few of them have been using it so far. PLUS: a first-hand account of Augusto’s experience with the technology.
Those working in marketing, advertising and media are generally suckers for a new trend and live in constant fear that are somehow behind the times. Like magpies, they swoop around, find shiny things to take back to their nests and regularly attack cyclists. Many are betting big on virtual reality being the next big platform and a range of brands—from Samsung’s live-streamed birth to Jaguar NZ’s recent ‘actual reality’ stunt—have jumped on that bandwagon recently. The New York Times has also embraced it (with the help of Google Cardboard) and sees it a nascent form of storytelling, but The New Yorker is slightly less convinced the technology will be able to improve the reading experience, as the very funny video about its ‘mind-blowing virtual reality experience’ shows.
When we think about going on holiday often our imagination kicks in. We might picture ourselves on some luscious tropical island, lying on the beach, pina colada in hand, listening to the soothing sound of rolling waves or maybe even off on some big adventure, backpacking across Europe or Asia perhaps. Well, now Contiki is giving prospective travellers the opportunity to truly envision a travel adventure, with the use of virtual reality technology.
While there’s plenty of excitement about the possibilities of immersive virtual reality headsets like Oculus Rift and Samsung Gear VR at the moment, sometimes the simplest innovations are the best and Google Cardboard, which combines mobile phones and the act of folding to create inexpensive virtual reality goggles, is definitely in that category. Google has made its design open source and while Kellogg’s and shopper marketing and digital activation agency Geometry Global NZ have taken inspiration from this technology and, in what it says is a first for the New Zealand grocery market, turned a box of Nutri-Grain into a virtual reality experience.
As part of a promotional activation for Visa Wellington on a Plate I was very lucky to head to Westfield Downtown Shopping Centre in Auckland this morning and don an Oculus Rift virtual reality headset. And while it did make me look like a storm trooper part way through a costume change, it was a fun and enthralling experience. Here’s what it was like.
Virtual reality is something Facebook bet big on with its acquisition of Oculus Rift for $2 billion. Google has also entered the fray with its very clever, low-cost solution Cardboard. And Samsung is also onboard with its Gear VR, which it’s showing off with a clip showing a dad experiencing the birth of his third child from afar and a bunch of Aussies diving with sharks in an unexpected location.
Bruce Murray, the executive digital producer at Y&R in Auckland, questions whether it’s the right time for agencies to start looking into how virtual reality could be integrated into their comms strategies.
Facebook has said it needs to sell 50-100 million Oculus Rift headsets to make it meaningful. But Dos Equis is getting in early and offering fans a dose of virtual reality.
At over $400, the Oculus Rift headset isn’t exactly something that most Kiwis would be willing to splash out on. Fortunately, there is an alternative option for those who want the virtual reality experience without the hefty pricetag attached. For the sum of US$24.95, those who don’t want to incur credit card debt can get the virtual reality experience via the DodoCase, a virtual reality headset made almost entirely out of cardboard.
PETA never shies away from controversy to get its point across—an approach that has even seen the organisation launch a porn site, in an effort to show that animals and humans share some body parts. And while the organisation’s latest campaign does include POV camera angles, it isn’t quite as salacious as what was done before.
Understanding what gets consumers buying is a core marketing skill, but in the world of retail, experimentation is often limited to a few variables—and expensive. So Colmar Brunton has launched a new product called CXS, or Customer Xperience Simulation, to solve those issues by allowing products and shopper marketing campaigns to be tested virtually.