Elizabeth Arden?s Taylor by Taylor Swift fragrance is incorporating augmented reality into its campaign for the sixth time, pointing to the technology?s growing popularity and proven value for some marketers.

This is the third Taylor Swift fragrance to launch, and for all of the brand?s six campaigns, it has partnered with Aurasma to include an augmented reality feature. The augmented reality can be accessed via direct mail, print advertisements, in-store point-of-sale and product packaging.

?For me this was an interesting message because I think people think of augmented reality of being potentially kitschy or a one-off,? said Annie Weinberger, general manager at Aurasma, Palo Alto, CA.

?I think the fact that this is [Taylor Swift?s] sixth Aurasma campaign is showing that augmented reality is becoming much more mainstream and when they sit down and think of the campaign for her fragrance she?s always going to include augmented reality,? she said.

?And we?re seeing that more and more from our customers, that they?re not just doing a one off they?re coming back again and again. And they?re doing that because they?re getting real results.?

Mobile fragrance
This is Taylor Swift?s third fragrance with Elizabeth Arden, and the brand has leveraged augmented reality for all of the fragrances? campaigns, including international campaigns. The brand believes that the technology will help it better connect with mobile-native millennials.

According to Elizabeth Arden, the campaigns for the first two fragrances brought positive results, leading them to stick with the technology, upgrading to Aurasma?s newest version which updated social integration and targeting.

Consumers can access exclusive content by scanning direct mail, print advertisements, in-store point-of-sale and product packaging with the Aurasma app. Taylor Swift has the ability to easily update the back-end to deliver different experiences from the same print product.

The content explains to consumers how Taylor Swift came up with this new fragrance and lets them better understand the background behind it.

According to Ms. Weinberger, previous campaigns delivered social scavenger hunts that integrated with Facebook and Twitter, so she would not be surprised if similar experiences were used with the new fragrance.

Augmented reality
Augmented reality has been gaining steam with more and more print and out-of-home advertisers connecting to additional content.

One brand that has been leveraging Aurasma?s technology is AMC Theaters, and according to Ms. Weinberger, it has seen a 75 percent click-through rate with the augmented reality. More than 40,000 clients use Aurasma?s augmented reality technology, and its app has about seven million downloads.

Additionally brands such as AMC and Office Depot insert the Aurasma SDK within their own branded apps so that consumers do not have to download an additional app to access the augmented reality feature.

Office Depot leverage the augmented reality technology for an anti-bullying campaign with One Direction (see story).

According to Ms. Weinberger, the campaign saw a 300 percent increase in usage after adding augmented reality functionality.

?We?re seeing this huge explosion of augmented reality,? Ms. Weinberger said. ?I think the main reason is consumers are wanting to get information and wanting to interact through digital.

?Print?s not going away, but there?s a real need out there to bridge the physical or the printed world with the digital world, so there?s not this disjointed voice of a company or campaign or event, there?s one cohesive message and voice and it?s very seamless to the consumers so they don?t have to go to multiple places, they can launch a digital medium from a physical object,? she said.

Final Take
Rebecca Borison is editorial assistant on Mobile Marketer, New York