Virgin Media, one of the largest and most influential communications companies in the world, has embarked on a new adventure with augmented reality. Partnering with content agency Redwood, Virgin Media has launched a new bi-monthly magazine whose pages will be filled with augmented reality experience. The magazine is part of a new customer interaction strategy coming from the company in which consumers are encourages to communicate with the company directly and through the use of mobile technology. The magazine works in conjunction with the Blippar augmented reality mobile application.
The magazine will cover a wide gamut of interests, including gardening, politics, pop-culture and even writing. Richard Branson, owner of the Virgin empire, notes that the magazine aims to leverage technology to help consumers experience their interests in a new way. Each publication will bring a new variety of content to readers and will be accompanied by emails containing yet more content that can be found online.
More than 500,000 consumers are expected to receive the first publication when the magazine is officially launched in the coming weeks. These consumers will receive an additional content package from Redwood, which will be distributed via email. Consumers will have the opportunity to continue receiving these emails from Redwood or to opt out of the newsletter.
With Virgin Media’s new venture and a sleuth of other magazine publications looking to adopt mobile technology, 2012 is beginning to look very promising for the world of augmented reality.
