Why the Focus of Metaverse Retail is on Consumer Experience
Retail Tech Insights | Friday, November 04, 2022
In the last decade, technological advancements have reshaped how retail companies do business.
FREMONT, CA: Technology developments have changed how retail organisations conduct business over the past ten years. Following COVID-19, cutting-edge immersive technologies are altering customer behaviour, staff expectations, and the retail experience. Examples include virtual reality (VR), extended reality (XR), and mixed reality (MR). Moving to the metaverse is retail.
These immersive technologies were previously exclusively depicted in science fiction literature and films. Then they started to enter the gaming sector. The metaverse is powered by immersive technologies, which now impact both large and small retail businesses. A 2022 Raydiant consumer behaviour study found that 56.6 per cent of survey participants preferred online shopping over in-person shopping, a rise of over 10 per cent from 2020. According to a different PwC survey, in the first half of 2022, roughly 32 per cent of VR users made purchases on VR platforms.
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The Social Media Trends 2023 research by Talkwater and Khoros quotes Betsy Morse Rohtbart, VP of global web and ecommerce at Vonage, as saying that the market size for online shopping is set to surpass that of traditional brick-and-mortar stores. Online retailers are breaking through bricks and mortar and directly connecting with customers both reactively and proactively by using communications technology through social and messaging platforms, and by doing so, moving beyond one-time transactions to two-way conversations and ongoing engagement for more meaningful relationships.
While physical retail has surpassed expectations, the pandemic has permanently changed how organisations shop in person, according to Lauren Mathews, a retail reporter who covered it for Shopify. Customers anticipate digital-first retailers who prioritise community, speed, and convenience. Retailers will need to adjust their shop strategy to meet changing client expectations as they navigate the future of physical retail.
According to Bigcommerce, ecommerce revenues are predicted to surpass USD 740 billion in the U.S. alone by 2023, in part due to the increasing use of smartphones and mobile purchasing, social media and social commerce, and disruptive technology, among other things.
Retail Looks to the Metaverse to Craft Engaging Customer Experiences
According to the data, this tendency will persist, therefore, companies must improve their omnichannel strategies and seek new marketing channels to provide seamless shopping experiences. At least three more large providers of collaboration platforms think Zoom, Slack, Webex, or Google applications, will add 3D metaverse-style features, reaching tens of millions of potential users.
The trajectory is clear: Companies that prioritise customer experience are more likely to succeed than those that don't, even in metaverse retail. Forrester further predicts that consumers' tolerance for poor brand experiences will fall for the first time in three years, adding that businesses should expect to ramp up customer support and social care teams in 2023 to handle a harder-to-please customer.
For businesses to increase sales, Eran Galil, co-founder and CTO of the Israeli retail technology company ByondXR, told VentureBeat that compelling user experiences are essential. This is why ByondXR created a unique ecommerce platform that offers scalable immersive solutions to assist retailers in setting up and managing virtual stores and showrooms that boost client engagement and revenue.
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