Shark Freestyle Announces Partnership with Aurasma
Costa Mesa, December 13, 2011 – Shark Freestyle, the watch that started it all in the surf category is aligning with Aurasma, the world’s leading augmented reality platform, the 1,000 commercial partner – to do so. Shark Brand ads running in magazines through December and January become interactive with the free Aurasma app by pointing smart phone or tablet devices over the images. The Aurasma experience, known as an ‘Aura,’ allows the static print advertisement to transform into video showcasing the Shark brand and driving sales by allowing viewers to “buy now” from the ‘Aura.’
Chad Labass, Marketing Manager at Shark Watches said, “Our brand is very much about energy, activity and motion so Aurasma’s a perfect fit because it lets us take our conventional static print ads and inject them with dynamic digital content. By partnering with Aurasma, we are taking our marketing strategy to the next level and engaging with consumers in a completely new way. Consumers consistently demand more from their smart phone and tablet devices and soon they’ll be demanding more from the print ads in their favorite magazines too – we’re stoked to be ahead of the curve in bringing this to our customers.”
“In just over six months since our launch, we’ve been caught up in a huge wave of interest from global brands operating in pretty much every vertical market you can think of – entertainment, advertising, publishing, education, tourism, fashion, real estate, automotive and retail,” said Jennifer Rapp, General Manager at Aurasma. “Whatever the market they operate in, our partners all share one thing in common and that’s a desire to bring their offline and online activities together into one integrated customer experience. Our 1000th partner, Shark Watch is a case in point – they’re delivering high-impact digital assets through conventional print ads and in the process, creating a dynamic and memorable customer journey to an online point of purchase.”
About Shark Brand
Founded alongside Freestyle in the early 80’s, Shark Brand has since developed its own iconic youth influenced style. Ultimately fueled by energy of the board sports generation, Shark Brand is built upon innovation and durability with a keen eye on the styles and trends of today’s youth. Forever inspired by the athletic feats of the sport of kings, Shark Brand supports a growing team of athletes including surfing greats Cory Lopez, Bede Durbidge and Sage Erickson. For more information on Shark Brand visit www.sharkbrand.com
Media Contact:
SnL Communications
Marla White
mwhite@snlc.net
310-996-0239
ABOUT AURASMA
Aurasma is the world’s first visual browser – a new platform technology that merges the physical world with the virtual. Available as a free app for iPhone 4, 4S, iPad2 and high-powered Android devices or as a free SDK for developers, Aurasma uses advanced image and pattern recognition to recognize and understand real-world images and objects in much in way the human brain does. It then seamlessly blends the real-world with rich interactive content such as videos and animations called “Auras”. Auras can be created for printed images, product packaging, clothing, physical places and users can even use the app to create and share their own.
Since its launch in June 2011, Aurasma has had more than two million downloads. Over 1,000 partners in markets including retail, sport, automotive, consumer electronics, entertainment, advertising and publishing are using the free technology in their campaigns or embedding the technology in their own applications. Aurasma was developed by and is part of software company Autonomy – an HP Company.
Media Contacts:
Ogilvy PR
Meghan Fintland
Meghan.fintland@ogilvy.com
415-677-2704
Aurasma
Lauren Offers
lauren.offers@autonomy.com
415-852-8998
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