Can you patent the feeling associated with online shopping? Apple is trying.
A new patent application from Apple explores methods of "enhancing the online shopping atmosphere". Specifically, Apple notes that while online shopping can be far more convenient than traditional retail stores, the experience can feel "sterile and isolating". To address that point, they propose showing users where other customers are in the store, even allowing customers to interact with others while shopping.
This would allow you to see what products people are looking at, and by clicking on one of the other visitor icons, customers could even ask questions to users about why they'd left one product or gone to another product. This visual representation can be used to help with live real-time changes in interest. Users could, of course, opt-out in certain privacy settings, but these techniques could be applied to both Apple's Online Store as well as their iTunes Store. An interesting concept.
In the physical shopping world, retailers such as JB HiFi work hard to create an atmosphere that is full of energy in order to increase sales. David notes that “I have often thought that showing numbers of people on a website, and indicating what they are actually doing adds to the richness of the experience. This certainly works for modern online forums that show numbers of members currently online.”
Back in 2000, we visually represented the number of users online on the Metalshop site. This definitely added to the ‘vibe’ on the site and encouraged people to become part of the online community. It was quite surprising that there were often 250+ people online on Metalshop at any one time. It is a different psychology, knowing that you are one of 250 as opposed to being the only person in the store.