London Retailers use Augmented Reality in a virtual scavenger hunt.

Genius Idea: Buzz has been big around augmented reality, but few companies have figured out a way to turn it into an effective marketing tool. We’ve seen brands invoke everything from Iron Man masks to musical cheese snacks in efforts to incorporate augmented reality into their marketing plans. But none of these ideas exactly created the AdWords of augmented reality.

GoldRun, which launched in November with a campaign for H&M, comes closer to creating a marketing platform that will be useful across multiple industries. The app allows brands to create virtual scavenger hunts. When consumers download the free GoldRun app and sign up to follow a campaign or “run,” they can collect virtual goods from physical locations using their phone’s camera. During the H&M campaign, for instance, users could collect a different virtual item from the brand’s fall/winter collection by snapping a photo of it in front of each of its 10 Manhattan locations. Doing so resulted in an instant 10% discount on any H&M purchase.

The platform’s agility is its greatest strength. AirWalk used the platform to build virtual pop-up stores in locations in Washington Square Park and Venice Beach at which app users could purchase a special edition shoe from its website (VP of Business Development Shailesh Rao calls it “V-Commerce”). The NBC’s Today Show ran a scavenger hunt for virtual items in Rockefeller Plaza. Esquire Magazine is planning a campaign that will virtually place its February cover model, Brooklyn Decker, in more than 700 Barnes and Noble stores. Other planned campaigns range from the Sundance Film Festival to Gwen Stefani’s perfume line.

GoldRun provides a more interactive and customizable approach to location-based advertising than check-in games like Foursquare (foursquare) and Gowalla (Gowalla). Campaigns, in addition to distributing special offers, include an option for users to create interesting photos (items in the H&M campaign, for instance, were positioned in a way in which they could be virtually “tried on”). Users share these photos through their Facebook (Facebook) profiles, which is more valuable for the brand than shared check-in information.

Given how eager brands have been to adopt location-based marketing through check-in apps, it’s not a surprise that many are eager to run campaigns on the GoldRun app. Rao says that more than 40 companies from various industries have approached the as of now self-funded startup about running a campaign. It will be interesting to see if consumers respond with equivalent enthusiasm.



Posted from Mashable