Can technology become more realistic and interactive without growing more intrusive?
It seems every aspect of modern life is being integrated with technology, and with it, people are losing privacy and human interaction.
In public relations, this next technological step is augmented reality, which is the use of computer-generated data to reflect real-world images. AR allows consumers to learn more about a place, object or brand simply by holding a smartphone or tablet above it. For example:
So far, augmented reality has mostly been used for mobile apps but has had success in a variety of campaigns this year. The World Wildlife Foundation and Coca-Cola allowed European museum visitors to see the effects of the melting ice caps and President Obama virtually high-fived voters during his campaign.
AR changes the constraints regarding where and how customers can consume messages and interact with brands. It allows for deeper, more realistic relationships between brands, campaigns, products and consumers.
The goal of public relations is to build a relationship between brands and consumers. In my opinion, the ability to bring brands to life and create interactions with consumers is thus a great opportunity.
Augmented reality changes public relations only by make interactions more life-like. I don’t think there is any or much fear of intrusion with augmented reality because it is projecting a message and creating a consumer experience that gives the consumers control of where to access this augmented reality and when to end the engagement.
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I network a lot. I’ve even given three presentations on how to network. I always recommend that meeting people in-person will bring you more success than meeting online. Of course, I supplement my networking through social media tools like LinkedIn and Twitter, but nothing beats face-to-face interaction.