A couple weeks back, a company called Quest Visual released Word Lens, an iPhone app touted by many as one of the most innovative, practical uses of augmented reality to-date. Its purpose: the translation of text from English to Spanish and vice versa in real time, imposing an aesthetically matched translation of text on your mobile device’s (currently only iPhone) camera view of textual objects.

While interesting in and of itself, the release of Word Lens is symbolic of a broader, more important historical trend that’s happened time and time again: the increasing relevance of certain novel technologies over time — e.g., the car, the television, and, in this case, the mobile phone/augmented reality. 

Why is this important to the business of brand experiences? At present, we’re living in a world of rapid technological innovation, in which communications technologies are at the forefront. The ways people see, hear, and feel the world are changing — even if, for the most part, we hold on to perennial values, principles, and processes for making decisions about stimuli (which, many argue, are also changing). As marketers, we must adapt, look forward, and prepare for how to best reach people’s hearts and minds.