Creating virtual customer experiences for wildlife conservation

Abstract

Protecting endangered animal species and plants is important for maintaining the ecological balance on the earth. Conserving wildlife and natural habitat encourage ecological stability and balance in the world. Balanced ecosystem supports clean air to breathe, diverse marine life, healthy water and arable land for agricultural production. Failure of the ecosystem causes massive effects on people’s health as well. Wildlife conservation started from over hundreds of years ago and has been made more visible by many organizations. However, world’s wildlife has still decreased by half in less than a generation. Because of that it is crucial to innovate and develop new ways to protect wildlife and utilize the technology with it.

This product-oriented thesis presents the idea of how virtual technology can be connected to wildlife conservation. The aim is to enhance the customer experience which takes wildlife conservation involvement to another level. Research was conducted by utilizing theoretical framework and the findings from benchmarking different organizations’ customer experience. The benchmarking process was done in order to get an overview of existing organizations, their operational environment and customer experience.

The main objective of this thesis is to highlight the use of technology in wildlife conservation in a way to enhance customer engagement and experience. The product of this thesis includes the concept of a VR game, marketing plan and brand activation launching event. This thesis is conducted without commissioner due the resource constraints caused by Covid-19.