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TagsBY MIKE OLIVA
NEWJERSEYNEWSROOM.COM
3-D computer simulations of product designs and store layouts with eye-tracking technology may be the future of our day-to-day shopping experience.
Some companies such as Proctor &Gamble Co., Unilever PLC, and Kimberley-Clark Corp. have taken advantage of this new technology, allowing them to put out products faster and create designs that will improve sales.
Consumer-product companies are eager to use technology to learn what shoppers really think. Academic research has shown that focus-groups are unreliable and oftentimes overestimate their interest in products to make testers happy, according to the Wall Street Journal.
Kimberly-Clark’s researchers used computer screens fitted with retina-tracking cameras to test its newest packaging for it Viva paper towels in 2009, says Kim Greenwood, senior manager in the company’s Virtual Reality Group.
The new Technology can tell a company which designs gets noticed in the first 10 seconds a shopper looked at the shelf, and if the preferences held up on different packaging, Greenwood explained.
"Combining these factors helped us select a 'wave' design over a 'splash' design," Greenwood said.
Psychology and marketing professors have weighed in over the years sayings that people oftentimes don’t realize what draws their eyes or how they feel about a product. Vastly improved technology has allowed computers to track retinas to get a true fix on where people are looking and for how long.
Unilever used a virtual 3-D environment and had testers wear specially made glassed with sensors to create the new design of Axe body wash, says Joanne Crudele, Unilever’s director of global skin consumer technical insight.
The test also recommended that retailers use angled shelves to allow products to slide forward and constantly face front. At one retailer, sales of the deodorant category have increased 3.5 percent, according to the Wall Street Journal.
"With a virtual shelf set, in a few seconds, with a click of the mouse, you can modify your product, your pack, your display, and really co-create it with the consumer almost in real time," Crudele said.
