Weve seen plenty of print publications doing tie-ins with AR (Augmented Reality) over the last couple of years, but daily newspapers offering AR content on any kind of regular basis are much less common.

However, this month has seen not just one but two instances of just that. Earlier this week, The Independent launched its first issue as part of a regular tie-in with Blippar, called Independent+. 

Metro has also been trialling AR content with Blippar, but in a much more quiet way. From 9-19 April, it ran a handful of Blippable articles each day in its Guilty Pleasures gossip section, including the usual mix of images, videos and competitions, as well as Blipp to Buy mCommerce functionality.

“We wanted to make sure the print product wasnt left behind,” says Sophie Robinson, creative director at Metro. “Theres no reason for it to be two-dimensional. With AR, we can feature all of the same extra content and feedback as on the website. If youre on the move and youre reading about a video on YouTube, to be able to see it on your mobile phone straight away just makes sense.”

Doing it right

“If were integrating Blippar into any advertising content, its a one-off,” says Metro marketing communications director Bryan Scott. “The challenge on a daily title is, how do you make sure youve got content day-in day-out? It requires extra content, and thats an extra pressure on us, but were determined that if we do it, were going to do it properly, and infuse it through the paper.”

Whether that means Metro would consider integrating AR as deeply as The Independent has remains to be seen – for now, its all strictly in the test stages.

“As we investigate new revenue streams, weve been meeting up with small companies who offer AR technologies,” says Robinson. “Were just trying to test the appetite of our readers for this content, and were also going to be testing a few other things. We have no idea yet if were going to carry this on.”

Known

Metro has worked with Blippar before. In November 2011, it ran an early test campaign which gave readers the chance to win an iPad, by playing a virtual fruit machine, which attracted more than 10,000 unique users, and in March 2012 ran a promotion with an AR element added on, which was interacted with by 3,500 individuals.

In fact, thats a large part of the reason Metro chose Blippar – its familiarity, not just to the paper but also to its readers.

“Out of all the companies we met with, we decided a trial with Blippar would be best because weve done stuff with them before,” says Robinson. “Plus, we know a lot of our readers already have Blippar on their phone, and they get it. In fact, every time another magazine or paper uses Blippar, it actually helps us, by educating them about the technology and encouraging them to download the app.”