How to run your first 3D product page pilot in 30 days

Put ten of your products on their pages in 3D and AR, measure for a month, and decide on the rest of the range with your own figures.

Imagine a customer looking at a corner sofa on your site. She has three photos, a measurement table and a living room she is trying to picture it in. She measures the wall a second time, opens another shop in a new tab to compare, and closes both without ordering.

A 3D product page pilot shows you what a 3D viewer and AR would change for customers like her before you commit to the whole range. It takes ten products and a month, and it ends with numbers from your own shop.

What Is a 3D Product Page Pilot?

A 3D product page pilot is a small, measured first project: a 3D viewer with AR on ten of your product pages, ten pages you leave as they are for comparison, and a fixed set of figures to read after a month.

On a pilot page, your customers can:

• Turn the product and look at it from any angle, including the back and the underside
• Zoom in on the fabric, the wood grain or the stitching
• Read the measurements on the model itself
• Switch between colours and materials on products that come in several
• Place the product in their own room at its true size with AR, from the browser on their phone

Why Use a 3D Product Page Pilot for E-commerce?

Pricing the whole catalogue at once is a large decision, and in many shops it waits for next year's budget. A pilot is small enough to approve this quarter.

Increase Conversion on the Pages Where Photos Fall Short

Pilot products are chosen where the photos leave questions open: large items, items with many variants, items shot from three angles on white. When customers can see the whole product and check its size in their own room, fewer of them leave to think it over. Across Shopify's merchants in 2020, products shown in 3D or AR converted 94 percent more often than products without. That is a comparison across many shops rather than a controlled test, which is why the pilot measures your own pages against a control group.

Reduce Returns Caused by Size and Expectation

Returns on large products are the expensive kind. With the measurements shown on the model, and the product standing in the room at its true size, customers order the size that fits and know what the material looks like up close.

Answer the Customer's Questions on the Page

Customers see for themselves how deep the seat is and what the back looks like, so they have less reason to open a support chat or to postpone the order, and your team answers fewer of the same questions.

Reduce Photography Costs for Variants

A sofa in eight fabrics with three leg finishes needs twenty-four photo sets. One 3D model with switchable materials shows all of them, and a new fabric is added to the model instead of being photographed.

Use Case: Choosing the Ten Pilot Products

Best sellers are tempting, but they are the pages with the least room to improve. Pick products where:

• Size decides the purchase: sofas, stoves, desks, wardrobes, large lighting
• The product has variants: fabrics, finishes, modules or sizes
• The current photos hide the back, the underside or the joinery
• The page gets enough visits in a month to show a difference
• The return rate is above your average and the reasons given are size or appearance

Ten products are enough to see a pattern and few enough to finish in a month. Keep ten comparable products unchanged as a control group, so that a sale or a season is not credited to 3D.

What We Need From You

• The link to each product page
• Dimensions from the specification sheet
• Photos from every side, including the back and the underside, and close-ups of joints, seams and hinges
• Material references: fabric swatches, wood and metal finishes, paint codes
• CAD files or existing 3D files if you have them; they shorten the modelling but are not required
• The variants that should be switchable on the model

What Reaches Your Product Page

Each product comes back as a 3D model hosted by us and one snippet for the page. The viewer goes next to the main image, and on a phone it shows before the customer scrolls past the price. The AR button opens the model in the phone's own AR view, AR Quick Look on iPhone and Scene Viewer on Android, with no app to install. Shopify shops can also upload the model to the product's media, as Shopify's own guide to 3D e-commerce describes.

Brands Already Using CharpstAR

Sweef had internal 3D resources for its modular sofa, and we turned them into a customer-facing configurator with web AR. Contura's Build Your Stove configurator came out of CAD files the brand already had, and it supports both the online shop and the retailers' showrooms. MELIMELI brought its in-store sofa experience onto its product pages with 3D and AR.

How to Add a 3D Product Page Pilot to Your Website

You keep your shop platform, your product pages and your checkout.

Step 1: Send the Product List (Week 1)

Send us the ten product links and the files listed above. We confirm within one working day what we need and what the pilot costs. In the same week, decide how you will measure the pilot pages and the control pages, before the models go live. A pilot measured from launch day can show a difference; one measured from memory cannot.

Step 2: We Build the Models (Weeks 2 and 3)

We build the ten models in parallel from your photos, dimensions and material references and send each one to you as it is finished. You check it against the product and approve it or ask for a change.

Step 3: Place the Viewer (Week 3)

The viewer is one snippet on each product page, whatever your shop platform, and we help you place it.

Step 4: Measure and Decide (Week 4 Onwards)

Read the figures in the table below for the pilot pages and the control pages. Viewer use and AR use are readable within the month. Conversion needs enough orders to be meaningful, and returns need the full return window, so keep the comparison running after the 30 days.

How to Measure the Pilot

Published figures give you a direction to compare against. Shopify's Rebecca Minkoff case reports that shoppers who had looked at the product in 3D put it in the cart 44 percent more often and ordered 27 percent more often, with purchases up 65 percent on the pages with AR. Your pilot produces your own version of those numbers.

How Much Does a 3D Product Page Pilot Cost?

There is no fixed pilot price. The first of the ten products is free: it is our standard sample, built in 3D and AR, and it stays yours whether or not you continue. We quote the other nine in our reply to your product list, and the quote says how the ten models carry over into a plan. The plans on the prices page are not pilot-sized: Basic is priced per product and month, from 10 dollars, and begins at 100 variants over a year; Value, from 20 dollars a model and month, begins at 100 models over two years; Enterprise is quoted with a flexible product volume. Models, hosting, updates and implementation are included in each, with no setup fee.

Is a 3D Product Page Pilot Right for Your Business?

A pilot is a strong fit if:

• You sell products where size or fit in the room decides the purchase
• Your products come in fabrics, finishes or sizes that are costly to photograph
• Returns for size or appearance are above your average on some products
• You want your own figures before you decide on the whole range

Start the Pilot With One Product

If ten products feel like too many to begin with, start with one. Send us your first product and it is on your product page within ten working days. What we build after the pilot is described on solutions.

Sources

• Shopify, merchant data on 3D and AR content, September 2020.
• Shopify, AR shopping and 3D e-commerce.
• Google, Scene Viewer documentation.
• Apple, AR Quick Look.