Technology
4 essentials for creating high-quality retail metaverse experiences
The metaverse is here and for retailers it’s real.
November 17, 2022 by Adonis Celestine — Director, Automation Engineering, Applause
The metaverse is here — and for retailers, it's real. The retail industry has already been using many of the technologies that comprise the metaverse — augmented and virtual reality and personalization for instance — with success, and the industry as a whole faces significant changes.
Nike has already hauled in more than $25 million in metaverse sales. Luxury brands like Dolce and Gabbana and Gucci have also had success while experimenting with the metaverse in its infancy. Gartner forecasts that one-quarter of people will spend at least one hour per day working and shopping in the metaverse by 2026.
The metaverse is a free and open space that brings various realities together in a way that we haven't seen before to create a digital space that blurs the boundaries between online and real life. With multiple touchpoints, retailers must consider what the metaverse means to them and their businesses. Shoppers will expect in-store experiences that rely on augmented realityand that their online experiences are rich with virtual reality. Hyper-personalization is a must in the metaverse world — and retailers will need to go well beyond the trial-and-error efforts we see today.
As retailers consider how to build immersive shopping experiences, success hinges on the relationship between the shopper and the brand — and delivering high-quality experiences shoppers expect. In order to do this, there are four considerations every metaverse development and testing strategy should include.
Creating frictionless experiences
The last thing you want to do when investing in a metaverse strategy is to build an experience that will be quickly abandoned.
When users become frustrated by experiences that are confusing, don't work the way they expect, or are too slow, they are more likely to abandon a shopping experience. With mobile app cart abandonment rates around 80% (depending on the study), retailers need to avoid any friction points that will increase the odds of a customer abandoning the shop. It's essential that the entire experience — from account set up to delivery — works seamlessly.
Retailers need to ensure that every customer interaction counts. They can do so by creating a map of customer personas and testing every possible user behavior and journey. This brings a challenge. In physical, web and mobile platforms, shoppers are used to a predictable pattern of choosing a product, customizing it and finally buying it. In the metaverse, consumers are free to navigate and explore non-traditional paths.
It is often not possible for a single person or a team to think about all possibilities and behavioral traits of users. A metaverse testing strategy is never complete without using AI and involving customers at a large scale through crowdtesting.
Taking an iterative approach
Software and hardware for the metaverse is hitting the market at rapid-fire speeds You'll need time to determine how — or if — they fit in the experience you are creating for your customers. You'll also need to address the metaverse experience you want to create and how shoppers are responding to it. You should be looking at what's working, what's not, what integrations are needed, what devices your customers prefer, where potential flaws exist. The list is constantly changing because this technology is constantly evolving.
Who determines the success of your experience? Your customers. Their behaviors will tell you if they like the experience or if they don't. Conducting pulse checks and surveys on new experiences will help you to learn how they like the experience now, and how they would like it to evolve based on what they are experiencing elsewhere. Maintaining the quality of the experience every single time with software upgrades and releases is vital for customer loyalty. Effective automated tests and faster feedback are essential to speed up software delivery and help retailers to win the metaverse race.
Designing, building and testing with a wide audience in mind
Although some metaverse experiences may be intended for a very specific audience, most retail experiences should be geared to a wide audience. At any given time, you may be creating experiences for anyone of any age, sexual orientation, ethnicity, or ability, in locations all over the globe. Within that broad demographic, your experiences need to be accessible and inclusive. Because of that, you'll need to broaden usability testing efforts to include different demographics to identify valuable insights that help deliver more relevant experiences for everyone.
Localization testing, mixed in with some usability testing, can help you validate many aspects of the in-market experience, but it comes with many nuances. It's an area retailers struggle within the mobile landscape. In a study recently conducted by my company which examines the quality of digital retail experiences, we found that the most typical localization flaw is poor translation. Besides being problematic because translation issues can prevent shoppers from completing their purchases, this may cause shoppers to feel uneasy about the experience and the brand, overall. In fact, a recent CSA Research study on global shopping preferences found 40% of online shoppers will never buy from websites in languages other than their preferred language. Consider the market share you are leaving behind, and the potential damage to your brand's reputation as a result.
Additionally, organizations that prioritize inclusive design have a very real opportunity to deliver improved real-world experiences for persons with disabilities. In terms of metaverse experience, retailers have the opportunity to start from scratch and can design for accessibility from the very beginning, as opposed to other channels in which they've had to force-fit accessibility into their strategies. For example, a person with a visual impairment might need a salesperson's help in a physical retail store to locate an item, but a metaverse-enabled experience might allow them to use a phone or other AR-enabled devices to receive an audio prompt for directions to an item, and again to find it on the shelf.
The metaverse presents a very real opportunity for retailers to differentiate on accessibility design.
Considering the variables
Given the potential variables in metaverse retail experiences — locations of shoppers, devices and browsers they use, languages they speak, level of technology savvy, and preferred payment sources — quality testing can be challenging. To understand how real shoppers will interact with your experiences, it's crucial to test using real people in actual shopping scenarios. This can not only help you locate flaws and friction points in the customer experience, but also helps to understand the challenges in educating and onboarding new users to the metaverse world.
Launching a metaverse experience is a huge undertaking. Because it's in its infancy, getting the metaverse right will have your customers clamoring for more. Get it wrong? They may quickly abandon it and, worse yet, turn to a competitor who's doing it better.
About Adonis Celestine
