DXA Finalists Spotlight – Addreality

This year we’re welcoming a record number of companies to the UK Digital Experience Awards. It’s an opportunity to see how far the industry has come in a year, and to share insights on how the digital experience can continue to improve. 

Addreality are entering the Awards for the first time this year. A global solution provider headquartered in Moscow, they will be presenting an AI-based platform introducing Digital Intelligence for omnichannel retail business.

I recently caught up with Lina Arhipova to discuss Addreality’s upcoming involvement in the Awards as part of our Finalists Spotlight series.

What lies in store?

In Lina’s words, Addreality ‘offers smart digital services for immersive in-store customer experience. Combining AI, Analytics and Internet of Things we provide real-time intelligent audience insights.’

At the Awards, they’ll be focusing on their initiative with the leading beauty retailer in Eastern Europe – Rive Gauche – where they have been using AI-enabled facial recognition to provide consumers with personalised promotions.

‘On top of our smart digital signage system,’ Lina explains, ‘we have developed our own face recognition technology that identifies and tracks customer behaviour to provide intelligent analytics and targeted advertising. This technology works remotely, offline and in real time.’

So how does it work?

‘There are 15+ customer attributes: age, gender, emotions, features and so on – that can be analysed to enable deep audience analytics, actionable merchandising insights and targeted promotions. For instance, a young woman looking at the sign would see an advert for Chanel Mademoiselle, whereas an older man walking past later would see a promotion for Paco Rabanne 1 Million.’

The process behind this software is completely depersonalised and GDPR compliant. It can be installed on any in-store surfaces: window screens, interactive kiosks and laptops, LED screens and customer displays.

Making it work

As Lina explained, this was a truly comprehensive initiative. But greater detail meant ‘more opportunities and more challenges.’ 

Refining the underlying tech was the first challenge. Addreality eventually decided to use 2-3 cameras at the same time, improving the accuracy of the image analysis. Another hurdle to overcome was the client’s requirement ‘to use custom-format LED screens that were not of a regular size or type. That was something we had to work around.’

Once the smart digital signage was successfully installed in store, I was keen to evaluate the impact on Rive Gauche’s business.

‘Although the ultimate business benefits are still yet to be estimated in the long run, we can see how the Average Transaction Value (ATV) has already increased by approximately 7%,’ says Lina. ‘At the same time the store traffic has jumped by 20%. And it is not just the footfall – we increased the engagement as well! Before introducing customised ads, people spent no more that ~1.5 seconds in front of a sign – now it is 3-4 seconds.’

Going forward, this technology has huge potential in the long run. It brings the digital and physical together, breathing fresh life into the in-store shopping experience. As the retail sector seeks to define its identity post-ecommerce, omnichannel technologies are vital. 

Ongoing Progress

Lina explained that Addreality have big plans for their digital systems in the future: ‘We are currently doing lots of experiments: one of them is the Adaptive Store concept. We can change the design of the whole store depending on the real-time customer cohorts characteristics. For example, people are more susceptible to stress during the rush hour. Therefore, in this period, we reduce the velocity of content on our screens, adding to customers’ comfort and keeping their focus and engagement’

As Addreality continues to develop, Lina says that entering the Digital Experience Awards is ‘an important step for us. We are truly global and consider DXA a confirmation of our achievements on the international arena driving our way forward!’

We’d like to wish Addreality the best of luck at the UK Digital Experience Awards on the 12th July!

If you haven’t booked your seats yet, click here!