What Really Drives Sales in Virtual Reality Shopping?

A growing number of retailers are building immersive 3D virtual stores, allowing customers to browse and interact with products from their living rooms. But as this new frontier of e-commerce expands, a critical question emerges: what makes a VR shopping experience not just novel and fun, but actually effective at driving sales? Researchers have noted that the impact of 3D VR on purchase outcomes has been inconsistent, with some studies showing it has no real advantage over conventional 2D images or videos.

A study by Jeong Kang et. al. [1] delves into this very question. By analyzing customer reviews and conducting a detailed experiment, they uncovered two crucial dimensions that shape consumer decisions in VR:

Informativeness and playfulness. They found that while many current VR apps are seen as playful, they often lack the detailed information needed to make consumers confident enough to buy.

The Building Blocks of a VR Store. To understand what makes a virtual store tick, the researchers focused on three key interface features: interactivity, visual-spatial cues, and graphics quality. Interactivity refers to the ability to freely manipulate products, such as rotating them or placing them in a virtual room. Visual-spatial cues are about perceiving an object’s true size and dimensions, something that stereoscopic VR headsets are uniquely good at providing. Finally, graphics quality refers to the visual realism of the products.

The study confirmed that high levels of interactivity and the presence of strong visual-spatial cues (like those in a VR headset) significantly boosted both how playful and how informative the shopping experience felt. An interesting discovery was related to graphics quality. While important, its impact was much more critical on 2D desktop displays than within the immersive 3D VR environment. For users in a VR headset, being able to accurately judge a product's size and fit seemed to be more important than photorealistic graphics.

Liking vs. Buying: The Two Halves of a Decision

The most significant insight from the research is the distinct roles that playfulness and informativeness have in the decision-making process. The researchers separated the consumer journey into two stages: product evaluation (forming a preference for an item) and purchase intention (the final decision to buy). They found that a playful interface has a powerful effect on the first stage. When the shopping experience was fun, engaging, and escapist, consumers were more likely to value and prefer products with hedonic attributes, such as a stylish design or luxurious appeal. The immersive and enjoyable nature of a playful interface makes it easier for a shopper to imagine the pleasure of owning a beautiful product. However, when it came to the final decision to click "buy," informativeness was the deciding factor. A playful experience might make you fall in love with a stylish chair, but it’s the rich, detailed information that reduces the perceived risks of online shopping and gives you the confidence to actually spend your money. The study clearly showed that informativeness was a much stronger predictor of purchase intention than playfulness. An interface that is only playful but not informative is unlikely to convert a browser into a buyer.

Enhancing VR Shopping for Partial Visual Impairment

While the original study focused on fully visual interfaces, its core findings provide a powerful framework for designing accessible VR shopping applications for people with partial visual impairments. The central principle remains the need to balance an engaging, playful experience with confidence-building, informative elements. For users with partial vision, "informativeness" is achieved by enhancing and supplementing visual information, not replacing it. This means creating a highly adaptable visual environment with features like magnification, high-contrast color modes, and bold object outlining to make products stand out clearly from their background. These enhanced visuals can then be reinforced with rich, multi-sensory feedback. For instance, descriptive spatial audio can confirm the size and dimensions of a desk that may be difficult to perceive fully, while advanced haptics can convey the texture of a fabric, adding a layer of detail that visuals alone might not provide. This combination builds the confidence needed to make a purchase. "Playfulness" is achieved by making this multi-sensory exploration interactive and enjoyable, turning it into more than just a functional task. The goal is to create an immersive environment that leverages adaptable visuals supported by auditory and tactile cues. This creates both a fun, recreational space to explore and a powerful, informative tool that empowers users with partial visual impairments to shop with complete confidence.

Reference

1. Kang, H.J., Shin, J.H. and Ponto, K., 2020. How 3D virtual reality stores can shape consumer purchase decisions: The roles of informativeness and playfulness. Journal of Interactive Marketing, 49(1), pp.70-85.