Helping GE Lead The Way In Virtual Appliance Experiences
I love innovation, digital and learning and implementing new technologies. So getting to lead the charge for my agency to bring GE Appliances into the Virtual Showroom space was one of the most fun and fulfilling experiences of my career. I helped concept, write, manage, test and implement the interactive, AR/VR, media and social experiences you see here.
The Problem: The rise of eCommerce and a global pandemic made customers want better online experiences for appliance shopping. They wanted to be able to bring the appliances into their homes virtually to try before they would buy.
The Solution: Leverage 3D and CG technology to craft virtual appliances and kitchens that could facilitate innovative AR, VR and web experiences that allow customers to experience products without leaving their homes.
What We Did: I identified and helped strategize and conceptualize ideas for GE projects where we could innovate and test our virtual experiences. Methodically over a year, I helped set the stage for opportunities on projects and then concepted ideas that utilized this new technology to support projects, media plans, social and interactive needs.
The Results: I helped uncover, concept and execute a variety of AR, VR and interactive web experiences for paid media, social, and GE’s DTC and partner websites. We crafted AR filters that allowed customers to drop appliances right into their kitchen, interactive web experiences that allowed customers to stand in a virtual kitchen and get information about products as they viewed them, and many other virtual experiences. In paid social and organic social, our innovative media placements outperformed other units by sometimes 50% or more in terms of engagement and leads to the site. We were working with GE to test AR and VR interactive experiences on their D2C sites when I left for my new CCO role.
From Wireframes To Virtual
We’d start by designing the kitchens or spaces in a way that were stylistically right for the brand and the targets across the different GE brands. We’d build mood boards for textures, props and colors first and then create simple line drawings to show intent and placement. From there, we’d work with our CG artists to craft and refine the spaces. Once the spaces were complete, my CG/3D team would take the CADs for the specific products and convert them to finished high poly products.
Virtual Showroom Experiences
One of the most interesting uses for the assets we’d create would be to create virtual experiences. I had weekly meetings with my interactive team lead, Max Hartz, and our creative technologist, Brandon Clements, to think about new ways to innovate for GE and concept ways to bring these assets to life in paid media, social and on GE’s DTC and partner sites. We crafted AR experiences that allowed customers to drop products into their home via social. We created interactive experiences online where customers could drop themselves into our scenes virtually and get up close and personal with the products. We helped customers try out the products by dropping them in their homes in a variety of finishes to see what might look best. Some of my favorite experiences are below.
Star Wars Partnership
As part of GE’s partnership with Star Wars The Rise of Skywalker, we crafted a one-of-a-kind social/AR experience that allowed customers to visit a Star Wars themed kitchen through a portal and then test features of the products in a very “star Wars” kind of way. Like using the force to fill up a pitcher with the wave of your hand. This showed off the GE fridge’s real feature that used motion sensor technology to automatically fill different containers without spilling all with the wave of a hand. Cool stuff.
This AR/social activation was one of the top performing pieces of media in the entire campaign exceeding KPIs and conversions by a large margin.
Using AR Technology To Create Unique Social and Paid Media
Meta’s Spark AR tool was a game changer for my social team and our full-funnel paid media buys. We leveraged Spark AR on numerous occasions to create interactive ads that allowed our fans and customers to place refrigerators, coffee makers, dish washers and more into their spaces to get a real feel for how they might look in their home. These new units had huge engagements and became the most successful parts of our paid social media plans. We saw engagement rates increase wel above our benchmarks while directing more traffic to GE sites than any prior paid social units we used at that time.
Check out some of the examples below of how we created Virtual kitchens and assets and then used those assets to create interactive experiences for GE’s various sites, media plans and social channels.
GE Cafe Assets
We created a variety of custom virtual kitchens for Cafe that were meticulously designed and fashioned to match the latest kitchen trends and the brand. We could change the props to refresh the kitchen at any time. Change colors and textures. And change the finishes and features on the products to show a wide aesthetic range. We used the virtual builds in paid media, social and to test and create new interactive web and AR experiences too. It was a blast virtually directing some of the scenes and helping concept the different ways to bring VR and AR into the shopping experience.
Exploring A Virtual Laundry Room
Working with our lead CG technologist and lead developer, I got the chance to brainstorm and execute some unique experiences that allowed customers to drop themselves into a virtual laundry room we created. This allowed customers to experience and see the products up close while learning about the features.
