The Role of XR in Polish Finance

Financial institutions face ongoing pressures from digitalization, forcing them to enhance service efficiency. This, of course, has to happen without sacrificing compliance with rigorous regulations that remain unflinching. 

Unsurprisingly, this has created a niche for innovative training methods that can help companies in the financial sector address these challenges. Thanks to technological advancements and human ingenuity, immersive 360° VR solutions are becoming more popular and widely used to improve training efforts across various sectors.

Mazerspace: Equipping Financial Institutions with VR Training Options

Mazer has proudly answered the call from one of Poland’s largest financial institutions, PKO Bank Polski, to help the bank explore the possibilities of metaverse spaces for both internal training and customer interactions. Using state-of-the-art Mazer technology, we’ve constructed virtual training centers to simulate real-world financial scenarios such as complex customer service interactions, loan processing, or cybersecurity drills. This innovation has empowered the bank to:

• Equip employees with essential new skills,
• Assess their performance in challenging, unexpected situations,
• Pinpoint vulnerabilities in cybersecurity practices, where employees may exhibit lapses in diligence

However, establishing a metaverse presence has not just created an opportunity for PKO Bank Polski to utilize VR for upskilling their employees. Facilitating the training and onboarding of new hires has also become more efficient due to the superiority of immersive VR training over traditional methods. We cover its benefits in detail in the next section.

Why Financial Institutions Turn to VR Training

Virtual Reality (VR) and the benefits of VR training are many, including:

• Learning in a risk-free environment:  Mistakes can be costly in the financial sector, especially when dealing with high-value transactions, regulatory compliance, or working directly on customer accounts. VR allows employees to learn and make mistakes in a safe environment without consequences. This simultaneously reduces the learning curve while equipping them with better knowledge to handle such situations in the real world later on.
• Hands-on training for complex tasks: Customer service is an inseparable part of the banking industry. Sometimes, clients come in with extremely convoluted scenarios that no pen-and-paper training session could ever prepare CS representatives for adequately. Through immersive VR, employees can practice their soft skills in such scenarios and learn to deal with difficult clients.
• Improved learning retention:  Immersive learning environments enhance the trainee’s knowledge retention much better compared to the usual solutions like PowerPoint presentations, lectures, or reading process documentation.
• Cost-effectiveness and scalability: Traditional training methods in the financial sector are often costly and time-consuming. VR training provides a cost-effective alternative, as the technology can be scaled across different departments and locations globally. In addition, once the modules have been developed, they can be used repeatedly without the need for further resources.

The Takeaway

As a critical sector standing at the crux of private and public interest, virtual training in the financial sector plays a pivotal role in preparing employees to handle increasingly complex challenges. The collaboration between Mazer and PKO Bank Polski exemplifies how extended reality technologies can revolutionize training in critical areas like cybersecurity or compliance.

If you’re ready to take your financial institution’s training efforts to the next level, Mazer can help you harness the power of extended reality. Get in touch today to learn how we can bring magic to your business and implement innovative VR training solutions in your organization.

Beyond digitization

Like many industries, banking has benefited greatly from the digital era. Banks have been able to take advantage of internet and mobile services to offer their customers far more convenient ways of storing and moving their money, as well as introducing all sorts of tools for budgeting and saving that simply weren’t available to ordinary customers just a few years ago. The introduction of blockchain technology has taken this to the next level, providing added security on top of faster, borderless transactions. However, it has also brought challenges for traditional banks. They have had to figure out how to adapt to decentralized technologies such as cryptocurrencies and NFTs, which have allowed people to circumnavigate the mainstream banking system and build their own economies, many of which play out in the metaverse. This is why some large corporations are beginning to turn their attentions towards this new virtual frontier.

Early experiments

The metaverse is still very much in its infancy, so some organisations are investing in the developing virtual universe early in order to get ahead of the competition. Even before the metaverse was such a hot topic, some banks were working on virtual reality experiences which were a clear precursor to banking in the metaverse. One such financial institution is BNP Paribas. As far back as 2017, they released a VR app that provided customers with a virtual suite in which they could carry out tasks such as checking transaction histories and opening new accounts. They even offered customers an engaging VR experience called Mobile Protect VR, which aimed to raise awareness about the importance of getting your devices insured.

More recently, in mid-2021, Italian Bank Widiba created a VR platform called Widiba Home for their customers. It offers all of the functionalities of the traditional banking experience, but in an immersive virtual world, with virtual AI advisors able to direct and assist customers where necessary. Such virtual banks could help to bring more sophisticated banking services to remote regions which would otherwise not be able to access them.

Some companies have used VR for banking to improve their internal processes as well. Bank of America and Accenture have used VR to train employees, hire new staff members, and even boost team morale during the pandemic with fun experiences such as a virtual snowball fight. These early developments no doubt inspired others to start designing virtual and augmented reality experiences for their customers which have already begun to form the basis of the metaverse for banking.

Metaverse banking is already here

As described in our Mazer blog post on metaverse real estate, many companies are already getting involved in the metaverse. Building on these early forays into VR, several companies are already in the process of establishing themselves in the metaverse for banking. In early 2022, JP Morgan released their metaverse solution, the Onyx lounge, which offers a number of Ethereum-based services. They also acknowledged that decentralised finance will be a big part of the metaverse, suggesting that there could be significant changes ahead. In order to help companies get a good handle on the situation, they also offered a raft of advice to their business customers on how to get set up in the metaverse, an indicator of how important they think it will be in the future.

Regularly ahead of the curve on tech developments, several Korean companies have also released metaverse innovations for banking. At the end of 2021, Industrial Bank of Korea announced its plans to bring a number of products to customers in Cyworld Hancom Town, the metaverse world held on the Cyworld platform. Customers opening a bank account with the company in the metaverse will benefit from rewards based on the number of acorn purchases they make within the world. This gamification is something that is becoming more popular on metaverse platforms, helping more traditional companies appeal to younger generations as well.

Another Korean institution, Kookmin Bank, also entered the metaverse for banking last year. They constructed a virtual bank complete with a VIP lounge and a main hall where customers can look over their banking information. The bank hopes to build more metaverse functionalities to appeal to younger generations before the competition and, to that end, aims to provide financial education and training within its metaverse space. On top of this, they will be able to give consultations through the metaverse, facilitating easier customer-employee interactions and bringing a more personalized service back into the industry.

Indeed, this is one of the big advantages of the metaverse for banking. Before the age of digital banking, customers would go into branches and deal directly with staff face-to-face. Inconvenient it may have been, but it was also personal and a more pleasant experience for many. Although this facility still exists, it is used far less, meaning that customers often have to ring busy call centres where they end up dealing with recorded messages and long waiting times. Metaverse banks give us the best of both worlds: a more direct, face-to-face experience with the convenience of being able to visit the bank without leaving the comfort of your own home.

XR Wizards has already started to help metaverse businesses build such virtual branches through its Mazer platform. Banks can insert their employees into a virtual space where they can interact directly with customers from around the world. Both the customer and the employee can view account data together, while eye-tracking and facial recognition technology provide real-time feedback so that they can interact just like they would in the real world, but without their environment even looking like a physical branch. Banks can create any environment they want, potentially making the experience of visiting your bank something far more appealing and even something you might get excited about. This kind of easily accessible, engaging experience has the potential to improve existing banking services to the point that call centres may become a thing of the past.

Decentralized Finance

We have already seen that one of the largest banks in the world, JP Morgan, has accepted that banking will become more decentralized in the metaverse, and it’s likely that they are correct, with many metaverse experts talking about decentralized finance (Defi). One aspect of this will be the democratization of data, where individuals will be fully in charge of their own personal information. Banks and other companies will no longer hold huge amounts of their customers’ private data, which may make some feel much more secure. Bankers will use a range of cryptocurrencies rather than a central bank currency, and fewer people will be involved in transactions since blockchain technology will allow buyers and sellers to use smart contracts to cut out intermediaries (see our Mazer blog post on the role of blockchain in the metaverse). This could facilitate peer to peer lending and more direct interactions between individuals during transactions, with the blockchain providing the trust and security that would normally have come from a bank.

However, while decentralized borrowing may occur, as the metaverse grows and more brands get involved, it is likely that larger corporations will be required to facilitate secure and reliable payments. In March 2022, digital banking provider Signzy Technologies announced that it had been given a US patent allowing the company to offer financial services to customers in the metaverse. These include customer sign ups, loans, commercial banking, and insurance services, as well as seamless financial transactions, with the technology also supporting cryptocurrencies and other metaverse-based financial tools. This metaverse solution will also allow scalability in the future, enabling multiple users to exist in the metaverse across many virtual branches at the same time. This announcement has truly opened up the metaverse to the world of finance, no doubt marking the start of a new era for banking.

Final Thoughts

While many corporations have already experimented with the metaverse for banking, there is still huge scope for development, and early adopters could give themselves a serious advantage if the metaverse turns out to be the future for all industries, not just banking, as some predict. Either way, we could see huge changes in the way banking is conducted, both for customers and for the banks themselves. Ultimately, banks wanting to get the most out of future metaverse developments would be wise to establish a presence now or risk getting left behind.

Read also: Find Out How Virtual Reality Can Enhance B2B And B2C Communication

One area where this technology is set to grow is the banking industry. Attempts have been made to introduce VR into banking over the past few years but many applications, such as Wells Fargo’s Virtual Maze Community Marketing, where users had to travel through a virtual maze collecting gold coins, have been gimmicky at best and there is yet to be any truly functional VR application in the banking industry.

With Mazer’s breakthrough VR technology, this is set to change. This cutting-edge tool will take online communication to the next level, allowing users to connect in an online, virtual space anywhere there is a VR headset. Gone are the days of expensive headsets available only to the wealthy. Affordable headsets from companies such as Google and Samsung have opened up the market to many more consumers, making it easy to access virtual spaces from virtually any location.

Transport your customers to a unique virtual location

Once the customer puts the headset on, they are taken to a virtual branch where they can interact directly with an avatar or hologram of the bank’s employee. But this space does not have to be a regular office. It could be any location you choose, even a calm waterfall, making the customer’s experience truly unique. The bank’s employee only needs a 3D camera to appear in any location where the customer may be.

Make the most of Mazer’s extensive experience in the financial sector

Mazer’s technology was built on the back of extensive experience, with everything geared towards making life easier for both business and customers. One example of this is the monitoring of customer responses, where eye tracking and facial expression data can be fed back to the bank’s employee, giving them key measurements of client engagement and satisfaction in real-time.

Another useful feature is over-the-air updates, which mean that services can continue to function while devices are remotely updated with no fuss and seamless transitions. On top of this, VR spaces seamlessly integrate existing browsers and apps used by banks and all customer data is secured using the best encryption technology.

Expand beyond your physical horizons

The increasing cost of office space makes it difficult for companies to expand into new physical spaces, but there is no limit to the world of extended reality. Virtual offices can be set up in just a few hours and accessed from all over the world. What is more, headsets can be available at physical offices to move available employees to busy locations and optimize workforce management. Setup and maintenance costs are extremely low, making the whole process convenient, affordable and good for your bottom line.

Go further with Mazer’s extended reality spaces

Mazer’s flexible platform can open up a world of possibilities for any financial institution. Being on the cutting edge of such revolutionary technologies is a must in today’s ever more competitive marketplace and any business hoping to stay relevant and competitive should seriously consider exploring the possibilities of Mazer’s unique extended reality service.

VR and AR in the industry sector

From personal health to corporate security, the insurance sector struggles with a wide array of possible risks. The industry has to do mainly with complex processes related to each other. On top of that, there are numerous critical situations that may arise unexpectedly. The current situation has changed the experience of customers, agencies, and brokers so insurance carriers were forced to work on new ways of operating their businesses. It turns out that a significant role will be played by Augmented and Virtual Reality. The pandemic has accelerated the use of these technologies – they enabled remote risk assessments in a cost-effective way and resulted in reduced loss ratios. AR and VR in insurance have become a base for marketing campaigns and sales pitches. Now, over 85% of top managers in the insurance industry admit that VR and AR systems are crucial for reducing physical distance with customers and employees.

Virtual Reality in the insurance industry – how is it used?

VR is a digital technology that provides the user with a fully immersive visual experience. The experience is delivered through a headset or smart glasses. Virtual Reality in the insurance industry has, for instance, the potential to simulate workplace environments. Also, thanks to VR, insurance carriers can connect with customers, train teams, and gather information easier than ever, no matter conditions and location. One might say that VR is transforming insurance. How?

• Risk assessment and underwriting are enhanced – insurers learn more thanks to a fully immersive environment, safety and efficiency are improved. Insurers can replicate any environment or simulate any potential situation. This leads to more informed insurance decisions.
• Customers are more engaged – today’s customers are hungry for customization and efficiency. And VR in insurance has the potential to deliver this, improving the way insurers engage with customers.
• Claims experiences are improved – compensation claims are more and more often handled by bots which speed up the assignment of new claims.

Augmented Reality in the insurance industry – how is it used?

Augmented Reality is a digital display over a real-world view. The technology offers a very convincing experience because the visual field includes the user’s real surroundings. The user uses a headset, glasses, or a mobile device. Augmented Reality is an alternative to VR, mostly when a person’s own physical environment is an important factor. How can AR be used in insurance? Some insurers use machine vision in areas like claims damage assessment and risk mitigation for personal property. Augmented Reality in the insurance industry allows the assessment process to happen in real-time while incorporating information like condition, building materials, or damage potential. It is used for customer education, risk mitigation and loss control, guided underwriting, or claims adjusting and assessment. The technology may be helpful in predicting risks either before they happen or as they happen for both. It can also help customers identify and avoid risk in real-time by educating them and incentivize less risky behavior.

Benefits of AR and VR in insurance

Needless to say, innovative technologies boost all industries including the insurance sector. VR and AR in insurance lead to a positive customer experience and reduce the need for customer service representatives. Second, VR and AR can simulate a work environment and the risks and hazards that employees may encounter which is great in workers’ training and rehabilitation. Third, Virtual and Augmented Reality affects claims and underwriter education. Read more about the benefits of Virtual and Augmented Reality in the insurance industry below.

VR and AR in insurance – virtual offices

Virtual offices and branches started to come up a few years ago, together with virtual bank branches. Stats show that Virtual and Augmented Reality might be an amazing value for virtual insurance offices. Virtual branches make it possible for customers to interact with the consultant through video or even a hologram. Virtual offices are proved to have a higher conversion rate when compared to e.g. call centers and customer satisfaction is also higher. A great benefit is the opportunity to collaborate with experts from various fields of the insurance industry. They can discuss particular cases and solve urgent issues in virtual meeting rooms which reduces costs by up to 50% (no traveling, accommodation costs, etc.). From a client’s perspective, a virtual branch’s offer is usually richer than in stationery insurance branches and it is much easier to access the services. No need to highlight that using Virtual Reality in the insurance industry is also an answer to young generations’ needs.

Enhanced customer service

The insurance sector very often deals with property or automotive serious damage. Such situations require an insurance agent who will inspect and assess the damage. The client who suffered in the situation has to wait for the agent to come or even pay some additional costs. VR and AR in insurance make it possible to provide real-time assistance which speeds up the entire process. This really improves the customer service. When it comes to customers, it is worth mentioning about education that is boosted by advanced VR and AR technologies.

Damage visualization made easy

Better damage estimation based on VR and AR models and simulations is one of the most important benefits of AR and VR in insurance. Investigators can evaluate post-disaster damage from a safe distance by using 3D footage for ‘up-close’, virtual exploration of the area. AR and VR help insurers determine the damaged area of various objects and provide 360-degree assessment by using 3D models built from photos of the damage. Technical specialists are able to understand the damage volume by overlying object images representing the object condition before and after the accident.

Improvement of risk assessment

Thanks to Augmented and Virtual Reality, insurers or underwriters can explore an entire building via visualization or simulation derived from on-site images and building schematics to look for conditions that might pose a safety hazard. Also, the customers are presented with situations which make them understand various risks in more detail.

Documentation processes made smooth

Augmented Reality provides remote assistance and enables the reduction of visits by insurance agents to places where issues might have occurred. This makes extra paperwork unnecessary and saves work time. Also, AR remote assistance challenges the physical distance and makes it possible to document various processes – they can be used again later for numerous reasons. This way, evaluation processes are much easier.

VR in insurance – training

First and foremost, Augmented and Virtual Reality helps provide precision and safety and these play a significant role in liquidating accident consequences. You can easily overlay damaged areas and prepare necessary instructions to remotely help specialists perform any operations. Technical experts are able to remotely guide juniors e.g. marking necessary areas on a mobile device built-in screen and add some useful tips. Augmented Reality in the insurance industry is a great way to reduce expenses and increase work effectiveness, also when it comes to training.

Read also: Virtual Reality Soft Skills Training

Benefits of using Virtual Reality as a communication tool in business

Hold efficient board meetings

With VR, you can easily organize and hold board meetings, without actually having to ever gather your board members in a physical room. This can be especially useful if your board members are located far apart from each other and organizing a physical meeting might be difficult and expensive. In such a case, VR is much more effective at serving as a communication channel than simple communications apps – which tend not to work very well in the first place. With VR, you can actually see your coworkers in a 3D space, interact with them, and create shared projects – without the need of organizing any means of travel. Conferences, meetings, and collaboration spaces can be created effortlessly with the help of Virtual Reality.

Train your staff over long distances

Virtual Reality also proves useful when it comes to training your staff and organizing courses. Similar to how VR conferences work, you can quickly gather large amounts of staff in a meeting space without having to physically bring them all together. However, with Virtual Reality, you can quickly create simulated lifelike scenarios in an active environment, allowing your trainees to experience through practice even more than they would be able to in a physical setting. Creating a practical course with simulated scenarios in real life can be costly – very costly. Using VR, you can organize professional corporate training at a much cheaper price. Moreover, VR sessions eliminate the risk factor which becomes a problem in some training situations. Research has also shown that using VR in corporate training increases trainee engagement and retention rates, making the training much more efficient.

Virtual Reality can be easily adapted for any industry

VR software can be used in a wide variety of scenarios. A business representative can provide virtual presentations, meeting with clients face-to-face, or train for doing so in a simulated environment, where they can be measured on aspects such as eye contact and behavior. Even the retail industry uses Virtual Reality for staff training, preparing them for scenarios such as the holiday rush. VR gives a sense of presence and scale not possible to achieve with other devices. It can be utilised when constructing buildings or accessing windmills farms optimal placement for increased productivity. Logistical scenarios can be planned beforehand or even errectic an entire production facility, without it even existing yet. However, VR can be used for much more than that. Medical professionals use Virtual Reality to simulate high-risk situations, such as surgeries, allowing them to practice in a lifelike environment without putting themselves – or anybody else – at risk. You can read more about virtual reality in medical training here. Military personnel have also been using VR for years now as part of their training, including flight simulations and battlefield simulations.

Increase your staff’s productivity with VR

What are some other benefits of VR in business? Apart from training, VR can be also used for the actual work done at your company. For example, Virtual Reality can be effectively used for interior and architectural design, providing the designer with all of the tools and space necessary to let their creative juices flow. Unlike regular 3D design software, Virtual Reality actually puts the designer in a 3D environment with which they can interact fully – and it has been shown to produce much better results! While equipping every member of your company with a VR headset of their own can be expensive, some of the newest headsets can be quickly assembled and disassembled at any place, allowing you to simply lend the headsets to your employees whenever necessary. This makes VR not only an extremely effective tool, but it is also one that is not expensive to utilize.

Read also: Don’t Let Long Distances Hinder Your Business – Use VR.

VR and AR in financial data

Data has always been a critical resource for institutions and organizations. Businesses need data to both function normally and stave off competition. Data creates the core of strategies formulated by businesses, including financial institutions, to predict what customers need and what the competitors are up to. In the last few years, rapid technological developments have enhanced the way financial organizations can deliver their services and the financial industry no longer has to depend entirely on human input to collect, manipulate, and use data.

Data is something that has seen a rapid growth in relevance in recent years. All industries, including the financial sector, are processing more and more of it each day, but simply gathering and analyzing large volumes of data is no longer enough. Using the insights is crucial too, which is where data visualization comes in. Big Data, machine learning, AI – they have become an integral part of our daily lives. Being able to visualize data is a crucial tool financial institutions use to help them make important decisions. Not only is it helping high-level staff to formulate long-term strategies, but it is also enabling quick responses in everyday operations.

Virtual and augmented reality add to this experience and make it much easier to visualize and organize amounts of information. AR and VR in financial data allow the creation of immersive 3D environments to, for example, analyze financial information and stock portfolios with higher-than-ever accuracy. Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality in financial data is a 3D reality for insights and data immersion. The technology brings multi-dimensional data analysis, new patterns, and better decision-making. Virtual Reality data visualization enables businesses to get a clear, comprehensive picture to perform analyses of high-dimensional statistics.

VR in financial data – Virtual Reality data visualization

Thanks to virtual reality, the data visualization process can be more interactive and immersive. VR in financial data enables users to view data from a completely different perspective. The process is turned into an experience and the user can immerse themselves in a virtual world full of data to gain insights at both the macro and micro level. Virtual Reality data visualization definitely brings innovative benefits to the world of financial technology. 3D data visualization allows users to imagine multiple data sets in immersive experiences that make insights much more intuitive. Financial information, graphs, and charts can be presented in a 3D visual space, and it becomes much easier and more intuitive to draw relevant connections and engage with models to anticipate possible outcomes. All you need is a headset to find yourself literally immersed in the financial world. Here are some real-life examples of VR in financial data:

• To make sense of the data collected from the supply chain, thus accelerating an understanding of what processes relate to each other.
• 3D data manipulation through an AI-driven visualization VR tool that allows companies to get actionable insights quickly.
• Platforms developed for cybersecurity operations. These enable users to take command and control of complex networks, which in turn facilitates better and faster decision making.
• VR apps that take hundreds of variables to reduce dimensions to a handful of data points. For example, they can collect data of global company valuations as a subset of the entire market or evaluate multiple companies and project the valuation across the globe.
• Data visualization libraries that can be used in the VR space.

To sum up, Virtual Reality data visualization answers the question of how to view and process large amounts of data at one time. Anything that can be imagined can be created – virtual reality makes it possible for an analyst to have an entire room full of screens and 3D graphs. Instead of the traditional mode of presentation, they can become immersed in the data, walk into it, and see walls of the information displayed simultaneously. Thus, it is much easier for decision-makers to act on multi-variable relationships. Thanks to VR data visualization, financial information can be communicated as effectively and memorably as possible.

AR in financial data – Augmented reality data visualization

Augmented reality allows data to be brought out of the screen and visuals to be overlaid in the 3D space we live in. Thanks to AR, we get a clearer context to the information we are analyzing. Data navigation and gaining insights are much easier and more intuitive, even in situations that involve multiple dimensions or attributes. AR in financial data visualization allows a computer-generated 3D model to be superimposed onto a real-world environment in real-time. This can then be manipulated or probed interactively, just like it is part of the real world. AR data visualization is a more user-friendly way to perceive and analyze financial information. It enables the user to easily uncover important trends, anomalies, gaps, and patterns that would be impossible to spot using traditional charts, graphs, presentations, and spreadsheets.

Here are some real-life examples of Augmented reality in financial data.

• Wearing AR devices, analysts and decision-makers can walk around in physical space to see the correlation between variables presented in an interactive format. Gestures can be used to interact with the visuals.
• AR platforms that have real-time analytics to allow remote teams to work together on certain financial data. Hundreds of financial data points are displayed in the most interactive way. AR data visualization enables analysts to predict maintenance, detect and respond to threats, and solve decision-making problems.

To sum up, using AR in financial data may solve many issues from a narrow visual angle, navigation, and scaling, etc. From a financial data visualization point of view, multidimensional systems cause many scaling issues as branches of information are presented separately. Augmented reality provides a way to increase the usability of visualization systems.

Why you should use VR and AR in data visualization

Virtual and augmented reality now represent one of the biggest and the most relevant trends in financial data analysis and visualization. VR and AR allow users to see all their data at once, enabling a holistic view of the data. Such an accomplishment is impossible with traditional data visualization based on 2D presentations, graphs, and reports. AR and VR data visualization makes cognitive processing of data faster and more efficient. Users can view data from a different standpoint, turning data visualization from a simple activity into a wholesome experience. With such abilities, the financial industry can lessen the gap between theory and practice and speed up the development in performance.

Virtual and augmented reality data visualization is a method to work on data visualization scalability. The technology gives analysts and financial sector professionals a chance to view their datasets holistically in a limitless environment. Data can be accessed and analyzed by multiple people at the same time, which makes the scale even greater. Increased immersion means increased focus and multiple positions can be used to communicate data attributes. Ultimately, the 2D barrier is finally broken down and data can be presented in a multi-dimensional format.

Last but not least, Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality data visualization is… fun! Users can literally step into the data, which makes the process of data visualization interactive and interesting. The days of endlessly poring over spreadsheets and reports is now over! It’s time to bring immersive experiences to the financial industry and, if you do, you will undoubtedly see the countless benefits in no time at all.

Read also about VR in Retail Workplace.

Virtual Reality for business – how can you improve your company with VR

There is, however, a great tool that can help diminish the negative effects of long-distance working – virtual reality! With VR, your employees can see each other, talk to each other, and interact with each other, without actually having to be present in the same room – at least not physically! Let’s go over some of the most prominent features and uses for VR in business and work environment.

It’s an amazing communication channel!

While there are certainly means of communicating over long distances that have been used for years now, none of them are even close to the effectiveness of face-to-face communication. Phone calls, video calls, and even online conferences – all of these have been proven by research to be very ineffective, with poor engagement rate and information retainment rate. Using virtual reality to hold meetings and conferences, you can let your employees immerse themselves in a simulated environment, isolated from any external distractions. Moreover, your employees will be able to feel confident and stress-free, as no longer will they have to constantly be on camera at their own homes, which makes many feel insecure and distracts them from work.

Attract new customers with virtual reality

When it comes to impact of virtual reality on business, it is not just a new communication channel, but also a new medium to present and create content. As such, it creates many new marketing opportunities, allowing you to reach new, previously unexplored audiences. Many companies have already started successfully implementing VR in B2C communication through virtual reality, and the results are very promising. A great example of that would be IKEA and its use of augmented reality to let customers place a virtual copy of their furniture inside their own homes using nothing more than a smartphone. This not only presents a great opportunity for the customers to see how the product looks without having to visit the shop physically, but it also lets the clients see exactly how it will look in their own setting!

Train your employees effectively with VR

Because of its technological advancement and tons of tools available, VR can also be effectively used for employee training. Thanks to its flexibility, VR training solutions can be implemented by virtually any industry, teaching its employees an array of skills without spending on travel expenses to bring the team together. From VR in medical training and doctors performing surgery, to military personnel training, to architects and interior designers – VR training has limitless potential in creating personalized scenarios to train in. Even astronauts use VR to simulate training situations which would not only be expensive to recreate in real life but also possibly life-threatening.

Create new products fully in VR

We have talked about VR’s use in communication and training – but can VR actually be used to create a full product? The answer is absolutely yes! Creative workers such as designers and architects can utilize the fully 3D VR environment to create new projects, without the limitations that a 2D display brings. VR can be a factor that directly influences sales. For example, a sales representative might use VR to not only connect with potential clients, but also to demonstrate the product without bringing the clients physically to the company. A car dealer might use VR to show their potential customers a vehicle, and even let them drive it – the possibilities are truly endless!

Read also: The Benefits Of Using VR As A Communication Channel For Businesses.