Immersive advertising will become the next form of computing. The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) on Monday took a major step to increase adoption with the introduction of a guide focusing on augmented reality (AR).

Contributors to the buyer’s guide, written for mid-to-senior level marketers, include representatives from Facebook, Google, Snap, TikTok, Unity, and Verizon, among other companies that create consumer AR products and experiences.

The Buyers’ Guide aims to help marketers at brands and agencies understand where to start and how much budget to allocate.

The guide aims to demystify AR for marketers and provide a sense of why, what, and how, highlighting the benefits of AR in marketing and outlining how to get started, types of available AR experiences, and recommendations for measuring success.

The number of AR users in the U.S. this year is estimated to reach 85 million, according to Statista.  

Social distancing and contact-free interactions accelerated the pace of mobile phones being used to access additional information. For example, restaurants, hotels and other businesses are using QR codes to provide menus and additional information on services.

The guide suggests that advertisers can gain and measure benefits from discovery, engagement rates and shares, and outcomes such as purchases and sign-ups. It provides guidelines on how to measure each.

For example, the increase in engagement influences actions further down the funnel.

Campaigns that see a high number of interactions and increased dwell time are likely to see a boost in purchase intent and sales, with significantly more purchase conversions compared to non-AR campaigns, according results from early campaigns using the technology.

Mucinex is one CPG brand that experienced high engagement rates during a campaign. The company tapped into TikTok’s entire suite of ad products to create a 360-degree campaign built on native user behaviors to inspire a younger community to #BeatTheZombieFunk!, which resulted in more than a 42.7% lift in purchase intent. Other examples in the report suggest similar findings.

AR is set to become the next frontier of advertising, with 97% of brands on the Forbes Most Valuable Brands list having used or currently using the technology.

The camera lens through a laptop, phone or glasses will become the newest way for consumers to interact with brands, the group said during a virtual presentation at the IAB Brand Disruption Summit in November 2020.

Brands need a camera strategy, said Carolina Arguelles, Snapchat global product marketing of augmented reality, during the summit, calling GenZ the “camera generation.” She said the 40 million people who engage with Snapchat also engage with AR daily. “We’ve seen an 85% increase in the volume of session and time spent [on Snapchat in 2020,] compared with this time last year,” Arguelles said, during the summit.  

The working group also developed definitions and a taxonomy of immersive brand experiences for all screens, which are intended to be prescriptive. The definitions and taxonomy can be found in the report.