With a projected CAGR of 4% for 2020-2024, the Do-It-Yourself (DIY) industry has been on the rise as of late. Although creating innovative and stylish projects has been in vogue for a long while, the advent of the Covid-19 pandemic made many people turn to DIY solutions for decorating and enhancing the look of their homes. That being said, an undeniable factor that is largely responsible for accelerating the industryâs growth is augmented reality (AR).
The home decor market is now increasingly digitizing, and for ease and convenience, consumers are opting for online shopping. However, despite the high availability of decor materials and options online, customers are often hesitant to shop for home decor goods on the internet. This is where AR comes in, offering a plethora of innovative solutions to help shoppers imagine how certain colors, patterns, and objects of interior would look in their place.
Letâs take a closer look into the growing demand for augmented reality in home decor, why non-AR solutions were insufficient, how this technology is changing the industry, and the intriguing invention that is the AR visualizer.
The Problematic Part of Decor Shopping Online
29% of the respondents in a study by Usurv, a UK-based market research company, admitted that they delayed home decor purchases to avoid making the wrong choice. Similarly, 40% of the consumers put off home improvements because of the so-called âimagination gapâ, that is not being able to visualize how a certain product would look like in their home.
With an endless range of options to choose from, choosing gets tough. This includes color, size, shape, and other product features every shopper has to consider and getting it wrong often leads to buyerâs remorse. For instance, it is common to buy furniture online only to find it a few inches too small or large. Likewise, sometimes an object of a particular color looks particularly attractive in professionally staged photos but does not seem the right fit when placed in a room or office. Similarly, a product might appear suitable online, but when actually set against a certain background, its appeal quickly wears off. Another problem is the lack of visualization options whereby a consumer can change and experiment with different styles and patterns to gauge what piece of home decor looks the best specifically in their already unique space.
These situations are not only highly inconvenient and frustrating but expensive as well. If you have ever tried returning a sofa or seven packs of decking tiles you know itâs a hassle.
What Was Tried and Failed to Solve the Problem
Multiple attempts have been made to resolve this problem through technology and otherwise. There have even been impressive solutions like online 3D planners that allow designing a room online and trying furniture or finishing materials. Although tried by many, such solutions seemed to fall short.
There are several significant reasons why these solutions have not been successful. These include a lack of refined retail technology to visualize wallpapers, stickers, and other finishing materials. Although there have been attempts at solutions that try flooring and tiles, these do not implement augmented reality in retail. Such technology requires a high level of tech literacy along with powerful third-party tools.
Furthermore, in order to create room layouts or generate rendering in 3D and even 5D planners, a client needs to be acquainted with the basic design concepts. This takes a lot of time but doesnât provide sufficient results - images that might appear like the userâs design are not customized enough to bridge the imagination gap.
AR is a Game-Changer
With the onset of augmented reality, there has been a visible shift in the home decor industry. Although many consumers are not utilizing this technology â some are completely unaware of its existence â it is largely transforming the experience of those customers and retailers who know how to make the most of it.
AR is facilitating online shopping for home decor in a variety of interesting ways:
- The need for consumer guesswork when shopping online is eliminated. You donât have to guess whether a certain piece of furniture would fit in your selected area.
- To remove any problems related to the size and measurements, users can simply upload the picture of their space to the AR application. These applications have the measurements of different items stored in their databases. Thus, you can visualize how a particular object would look in your space and if it would even fit right there.
- With this innovative retail technology, it is even possible to visualize an item from all sides and angles.
- Users can play around with different colors, styles, and designs. There cannot be a more realistic home decor shopping experience, next to stepping foot into a brick-and-mortar store.
With AR visualizers, You can completely redesign your entire space. From changing the flooring and painting the walls to shifting around furniture and experimenting with innovative designs, it is not just possible but very easy to model and design oneâs dream space.
To fully understand how augmented reality ecommerce works, letâs consider a few examples.
Wizart
Wizart.ai has been bringing finishing materials to life on millions of screens for over three years. It provides the option to combine materials such as wallpapers, tiles, paints, and flooring to redesign the entire space or only a part of it.
Additionally, it offers a seamless and quick experience to the end-user. All that a user has to do is take or upload a picture of a room, choose their desired material from the catalog, and apply that material to their space.
From a business perspective, such interior design technology can increase profit. In fact, Wizart.ai have observed the following improvements:
- Up to x5 online sales conversion growth
- An average 10% increase in revenue
- Up to x4 shortened customer transaction cycle
- Improved customer engagement
- Decreased loss due to returns.
Amazon
Amazon has also recently tapped into the DIY market with its AR tool, which lets users visualize furniture to get an exact idea of the final look once everything is assembled and styled. This feature is available for thousands of items for sale on Amazon. When a user is looking at a furniture item on Amazon, they are offered the option to âview in your room.â This launches the tool to place the item and also displays complimentary items.
CGI Global
With the vision to inspire, create, and experience, CGI Global focuses not just on the products that a consumer is offered but the overall shopping experience as well. This is where its range of 3D services and technologies comes in, allowing customers to visually mix and match products and customize home decor to their liking. GGI Global also stands out because of its wide variety of items that can be fed to its visualization tool. These include upholstery, rugs, coatings, gift papers, packaging, textiles, and apparel.
AR Visualizers Are Easier Than You Think
We have seen how AR room visualizers can simplify the shopping decisions of consumers and allow them more control over their online shopping experience. While customers are clearly benefiting from this technology, business owners and marketers can also easily evaluate the competitive edge such technology provides.
Interestingly, augmented reality tech in home decor is gaining momentum despite how difficult and expensive AR visualizers are to develop. Building such a tool from scratch requires extensive technical expertise, huge investments, and a lot of time and human resources. Thatâs why businesses prefer using pre-built sophisticated AR tools. Not only are these far more economical but they usually go through rigorous rounds of testing and are regularly updated, which requires no efforts on the retailerâs or manufacturerâs side.
Moreover, as businesses keep utilizing this technology, its integration and support are becoming easier, faster, and more cost-effective. Couple this with the fact that retail and markets can highly benefit from this feature by increasing their customer engagement, reducing the monetary loss and complaints received, boosting the conversion rates, and enhancing sales. Therefore, the more rapidly the home decor industry adopts this technology, the quicker both consumers and businesses can reap benefits.
Takeaway
With the advancement in technology, choosing the right design for your space is a matter of a few clicks and taps only now. The advent of Covid-19 and the resulting pandemic led to increasing profitability of previously underutilized online sales pipeline, giving AR-based home decor technologies a huge boost. The trend is expected to keep developing in the future, as the DIY market digitizes, which will lead to even more advanced tools that save customersâ time, facilitate online shopping, and, as a result, drive higher sales.
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