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Many brands in the middle east have adopted VR in their marketing strategies. In this article, we discuss 4 use cases of virtual reality marketing in the middle east region to give you a clear understanding of how VR could be leveraged in your brand promotion strategy.
Below are a few exciting statistics about Virtual Reality used in brand marketing.
Many brands have successfully integrated virtual reality marketing into their strategy, and adding it to the marketing channels is something you should think about for the coming quarters.
Let’s now go through four use cases of virtual reality marketing and understand how it created memorable experiences.
Recently, Volkswagen in partnership with New Reality successfully integrated VR as a tool to enhance the showroom experience for potential car purchasers. New Reality’s approach was to replicate the Volkswagen model in VR and develop an interactive tool that would complement the real experience, before the launch of the model in the market. With options to fully-realize a customized version of the vehicle, with all available options, in all possible combinations. Furthermore, experiences would capture the essence of the vehicle, and take drivers on a virtual test drive that definitely couldn’t replace the real thing, but also couldn’t be experienced anywhere outside a Volkswagen dealership.
Sense-R, a virtual reality company in Dubai had created a fully immersive VR experience in partnership with Dubai Water and Electricity Authority (DEWA) to raise brand awareness about their water and energy-saving program, TARSHEED. The goal of this campaign was to develop an engaging yet educational experience focusing on the importance of sustainable living.
Ikea in Kuwait, Jordan, and Morocco partnered with VR developer Takeleap to create an engaging retail experience. The goal of this campaign was to let the users select their room layout, complete the home furnishing, and finally get the price list of all the items used.
The driving factor behind this campaign was the fact that Ikea showrooms in the 3 countries were situated in the city outskirts. Ikea’s brand reach was low and people not only didn’t know about them as a furniture brand but also were unaware of their DIY business model. Hence they decided to partner with TAKELEAP to activate tactical VR Experiences in the shopping malls of Kuwait city, Casablanca, Amman, and Tangier. This marketing campaign was directly responsible for an increase of 20% footfall in Ikea stores across the region.
A Dubai-based Virtual reality developer, SENSE-R had successfully created a fun and intuitive Christmas-themed VR experience for the Beach by MERAAS.
The Beach is one of the most popular go-to places in Dubai, favored by both tourists and locals. It has over 100 retail stores, restaurants, and leisure facilities.
This VR activation aimed to create awareness about the destination and drive footfall during the Festive Season via a new Christmas Themed title. The title was not only an immersive experience for the people but also featured in-title branding for all the MERAAS brands at The Beach.
To enhance the Vr experience, Meraas also added the audience-friendly camera and viewing opportunities that ensured the game was an ultimate attention grabber, attracting a lot of social media mentions.
Virtual Reality might be slow to kick in the marketing mix but don’t ignore it off your strategy just yet. There are plenty of exciting examples of VR hitting the right nerve with the users. But, as with successful campaigns executed by any top digital marketing agency, Virtual reality campaigns should be carefully structured for audience persona.
Here’s a summary of 3 key takeaways we loved from the above examples of virtual reality marketing.
