Second Life Started It And Now It’s Mainstream

Inc. Magazine has a great column about augmented reality and how it is changing the way we are/ and will buy.

The virtual assistants we know and love, Alexa, Siri, Google Assistant are the beginnings of new technologies that are starting to change our shopping experiences, in stores.

Pepper who we have reported about before started out in restaurants and has expanded to a few shops in California. Pepper was charged with greeting customers and answering their questions. One of the Pepper-equipped shops reported a 70 percent increase in foot traffic, a 13 percent increase in revenue, and six times the average sales of a featured product. At a custom print apparel store, Pepper generated 20 percent more foot traffic--and tripled revenue. That's because, like all digital associates, Pepper isn't just a transactional device. It's a system that truly knows the customer, thanks to its technical ability to recognize and interpret human emotion.

Inc magazine reports that MAC cosmetics stores have installed augmented-reality mirrors so customers can try out different makeup looks without worrying about sharing lipsticks and mascaras with strangers. Japanese clothing retailer Uniqlo deploys an AR mirror that lets customers see a full range of colors for various articles of clothing, simply by swiping through options on a screen. SenseMi Technology Solutions' virtual fitting-room mirror shows how clothing will move once it's on, thus helping a customer determine whether a dress is too short or low-cut without ever having to put it on. 

Amazon patented an AR mirror that allows customers to try on clothing virtually and see themselves dressed for different occasions: walking on a beach, dancing at a gala, interviewing with a potential boss. 

Inc predicts that within the next five years, half of all interactions we have with machines will be in the form of a conversation--and companies will soon have the chance to develop their own synthetic voices. 

How will we use this technology in our grocery stores?