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Virtual Shopping

virtual shopping

Definitions

The simulation of a shopping mall environment on the Internet (1)

Virtual shopping is an online consumer shopping activity in a virtual world, where a shoppers’ avatar can see and interact with other avatar shoppers and salespersons while they are shopping in the digital replica of a real world brick-and-mortar store.(2)

Examples

Alibaba Buy+ virtual shopping

Alibaba showcased the Buy+ virtual shopping experience at the Singles Day shopping festival on November 2016.
For about 15 cents, consumers may purchase a cardboard VR headset. They can slip their smartphone into the headset and browse products from handbags to shoes to lingerie, and even have virtual models showcase the apparel and accessories on a catwalk.

Alibaba published a video to demonstrate virtual shopping experience. The video shows how, a Chinese shopper put on a VR headset, and made a virtual trip to New York City. He started his journey at Times Square and then took a yellow cab to Macy’s department store. A virtual by sales personnel were greeting him on the floor. From there, he strolled around the store and bought a handbag for his girlfriend.

Buy+ is integrated with Alipay. So the shopper made a payment without the need to remove the headset to check out.

Alibaba also is trying to create a “Pokemon Go” style augmented reality game to drive mobile online traffic to offline locations.

eBay Virtual Reality Department Store

eBay created a VR department store in Australia. If you want to shop there, you just need download and install the free VR department store application to their iPhone or Android Phone.
Open the application and insert your smartphone phone into Shoptical VR box or other cardboard VR phone box such as Google cardboard. Now you are ready to start your virtual walk through the eBay store.

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References

  1. Virtual Shopping, http://www.dictionary.com/browse/virtual-shopping
  2. What is Virtual Shopping, https://www.igi-global.com/dictionary/virtual-shopping/34720
  3. From Virtual Reality To Personalized Experiences: Alibaba Is Bringing Us The Future Of Retail This Singles Day, https://www.forbes.com/sites/helenwang/2016/11/06/how-alibaba-will-use-the-worlds-biggest-shopping-day-to-transform-retail/#7ab846ed6d4e
  4. Virtual Reality Department Store, https://vr.ebay.com.au/

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