On Monday, we published How to Introduce VR to Your Sales Team. On Wednesday, we published What VR Content Will Help Your Sales Team? For our final installment of “VR in Sales” week, we’ll discuss which hardware (ie VR headsets) you should purchase and use for sales presentations.
Choosing the right VR headset for your project can make a HUGE difference. If you’re trying to sell a $20 Million Jet, and you want to show the potential buyer what the interiors can look like, it’s not ideal to hand him or her a Google Cardboard. Conversely, if you’re meeting with 15 potential buyers, using an HTC Vive or Oculus Rift is going to cause a long wait as you load each user into the immersive headset.
Pairing the right headset with your project might seem like common sense. But you have to factor in things like price, portability, and stability of platform. Below, we’ll give some advice on which VR headsets pair best with which type of sales VR app. And just as an FYI… all platforms below you can publish to with a monthly or annual InstaVR Pro subscription.
Gear VR/Google Daydream/Oculus Go
If you follow this blog, you know our love of the Gear VR headset. At about $800 for the headset + phone, it’s not exactly cheap. But it’s portable, powerful, and can handle long-form VR videos. If you travel on the road to meet with clients, the Gear VR will certainly impress them without being as cumbersome to lug with you as an HTC Vive or Oculus Rift.
We’ve published to Google Daydream since all the way back in May. It’s a fun, lightweight, stylish headset. Like the Gear VR, it’s good for its mobility and hand controller compatibility. According to SuperData, Google Daydream has sold approximately 1.2 million of the headsets. The issue is it was only compatible with the Pixel phone, which has had somewhat muted sales. They’ve opened up the platform, so look for them to make major sales strides in the coming year.
Oculus Go got a lot of buzz when Mark Zuckerberg announced the new standalone headset would retail for a very reasonable $199. InstaVR has already announced publishing compatibility with Oculus Go, which should launch in April or May of this coming year. We’re big fans! Once publicly available, there’s a pretty good chance this will be a go-to VR headset for sales professionals.
GearVR/Google Daydream/Oculus Go is good for sales people that travel a lot, that need a more professional headset than Google Cardboard, and that want to showcase long-form 360 video.
HTC Vive/Oculus Rift
HTC Vive and Oculus Rift are both impressive, high-end VR platforms. Their downsides are the necessity to connect to a high-powered computer, the required sensors, and the cost. If you’re doing a sales presentation at a trade show or exhibition, for example, you need a certain amount of space to set it up.
But what you lose in mobility, you gain in power. If you’re using 8K images for instance, that’s not going to work on a mobile phone or Google Cardboard. But on an HTC Vive or Oculus Rift, it will look amazing! Do note that unlike other headsets, you’re likely only going to be able to showcase your app to one person at a time.
HTC Vive/Oculus Rift is a great fit if you’re showcasing sales VR content in your offices and if you’re selling a very high-end product or service that requires high resolution images/videos.
iOS/Android/Google Cardboard
Google Cardboard has been the highest selling VR headset over the last two years. It’s not surprising, given the cost and ease of transport. You can even make your own if you have 3D Printer. Plus, from a sales perspective, businesses love to use them because they can give them away to clients, complete with their brand logo on them.
Google Cardboards are also great if you’re going to be meeting with a lot of potential clients. So at trade shows, you can give them out quickly without having to do much set up. Or if you’re meeting with clients, they can all view the VR simultaneously rather than sequentially.
The downside to Google Cardboard is it requires a mobile phone to use. So long-form VR videos are out. And the Cardboard often feels a little cheap compared with say the Gear VR, making the overall experience feel less immersive.
Google Cardboards are a good fit if you’re going to be meeting with many potential clients at the same time, if you want to give your clients VR they can take home with them, and if you’re on a tight budget.
WebVR
WebVR should never be a primary means of showing off your 360 media. However, it does serve a number of purposes. First, you can incorporate it into your web site to give users a taste for your VR sales content, and hopefully encourage them to download an app. Second, it’s great to load on a laptop to show at say trade shows, if users are hesitant to put on a VR headset. You can also easily project your 360 media to a big screen television, which again, is great for presentations.
WebVR is great for sales presentations where handing out VR headsets is impossible to potential clients, or for getting potential clients’ attention to hopefully entice them to try on your full VR experience.
Conclusion
Selling requires a lot of knowledge of your potential customer. Just as you want to pitch them the right solution that your company offers, you also want to pair up your VR sales content with the right VR headset. Hopefully this guide has given you some things to consider. If you have any specific questions on VR headsets, don’t hesitate to reach out to us via Live Chat in your Console — available 24 hours a day on weekdays.
And thank you to Premise LED for sharing their VR sales story with us and inspiring this week’s series of posts.
