Want a quick take on mobile barcode adoption, the state of mobile marketing and some predictions for 2011? Matt Valleskey talks to Mobile’s Next Big Thing and gives us his take, along with why Neustar is ready to help barcodes become ubiquitous in the same way the company made Local Number Portability possible in North America.
It may seem early to start talking about the holiday season, but if you are a marketer, you’ve already started planning your holiday campaigns. In fact, there is a lot of buzz right now around how retailers can capitalize on mobile as a channel and many believe that it will play a pivotal role in marketing, shopping and buying decisions this holiday season. According to a recent Forrester Research report, 74 percent of online retailers are planning a mobile advertising push.
Giselle Tsirulnik of Mobile Commerce Daily wrote a great article last month on “Why Retailers Need to Be Mobile for the 2010 Holidays” One of the main drivers for the move to mobile, according to the article, is that for the first time there are more smartphones than desktop computers being sold.
My colleague, Pete Langlois of Neustar will be speaking this week at the DMA’s Mobile Marketing Summit – Holiday Focus 2010 in New York. As part of a panel of experts, he’ll be sharing his perspective on “Best-Practice Tips: What Works and What Doesn’t Work for Holiday Mobile Marketing and Commerce.” Here’s a brief synopsis of the panel:
“For many marketers and retailers, holiday 2010 will be their first or second season incorporating mobile into multichannel plans. It pays to heed lessons learned from the Internet’s early days of what to do and what not to do. For example, SMS is governed by special rules in terms of opt-ins and list usage. Also, a banner ad that clicks through to a regular Web landing page and not one that is mobile-optimized may result in a lost sale or wasted branding impression. In this session, attendees will learn from the experts the key dos and don’ts to avoid any consumer or regulatory run-ins over the holidays.”
In addition to this panel, executives from major brands like Pepsi, Kenneth Cole, ESPN and Steve Madden will be discussing their plans for mobile holiday campaigns.
A few months ago, I wrote a blog about the Power of Mobile as a Channel and over the past year, I’ve seen more and more mobile campaigns hit the market. And, for the first time, companies are putting mobile as a line item in their marketing budgets. Whether it’s SMS, barcodes, or mobile websites, companies are moving full force into the mobile channel. With over 280 million mobile phone subscribers in the U.S. and growing, this is a channel retailers cannot afford to ignore.
Consumers are starting to integrate their traditional shopping experiences with mobile. They are doing comparison shopping with mobile applications like Shop Savvy and Red Laser, as well as going onto the mobile web to look for product information. In many cases they are doing this in-store with the product in hand. 2D barcodes offer an easy way for consumers to get the information they want quickly about the products they want to buy. Imagine going into a store and scanning a 2D barcode for more information about that product, and then being able to receive a coupon for that item, or better yet being able to purchase right through your mobile device. 2D barcodes offer the on-ramp for all types of consumer interaction, but market fragmentation is hampering mass adoption. Most consumers do not know what readers will work with what codes, and in many cases if they have a bad user experience, they will not try it again.
As the holiday season approaches, I anticipate an onslaught of mobile campaigns as marketers leverage this channel to engage consumers and drive holiday sales, and many brands will be experimenting with using 2D barcodes as an entry point.
Are you planning to incorporate a mobile element to your holiday campaign? If so, we’d love to hear more about it. Please share your thoughts.
The American Red Cross fundraising campaign for Haiti raised more than $32 million via mobile using a common short code. Texting the word “Haiti” to 90999 was an easy and efficient way for people to lend their support to those affected by the earthquake.
This kind of mobile marketing presents a huge opportunity for non-profits to expand their fundraising and outreach efforts. In fact, organizations such as MGive and Mobile Giving Foundation have been approved by carriers to do short codes for $5 or $10 donations. This method provides a great way to collect donations quickly and easily.
However, while common short codes are effective, charities can only use this method for a one-time donation and since the charge shows up on your phone bill, they have no way of knowing who made the donation. The relationship ends there.
These common short codes are also shared by multiple charities for donations purposes only and charities cannot use these shared codes for other uses, such as updates on progress, alerts, and continued outreach.
On the other hand, using mobile barcodes in campaigns can land users on a page and allow them to donate any amount they want via credit card. Barcodes also enable non-profits to provide instant access to specific content, such as videos, volunteer information, campaign updates, etc., thereby extending the relationship beyond a one-time donation.
This past June, NeoMedia and Neustar partnered to support the “One Million Voices Against Prostrate Cancer“ campaign to extend the reach of Ed Randall’s Bat for the Cure, a non-profit dedicated to raising awareness about prostrate cancer. We worked together to developed an application that allowed users to scan a barcode to view video content, make a donation, and follow the cause via a live Twitter feed from @batforthecure. It also allowed people to add their name to a petition demanding sweeping policy changes and governmental action in the U.S. for prostate cancer. You can read more about this campaign here: Mobile Charity Moves Masses
Another recent example is that of a non-partisan group which launched a mobile barcode campaign called “Be The One” to address the BP Oil Spill (see “QR Codes To The Rescue In The Gulf To Address The BP Oil Spill.”) By scanning the campaign’s barcode, consumers are directed to a video as well as a place where they can sign a petition.
Barcodes and common short codes offer non-profits an easy and effective way to reach their target audiences via mobile devices. Here are some additional resources related to mobile giving campaigns:
On a related note, the Direct Marketing Association is hosting its Nonprofit Mobile Day today in New York City and I’ll be participating on a panel on “Why SMS is the Killer App for Charities.” If you’re in the area, come check it out.
Privacy laws are ever evolving. In fact, there are several conversations taking place in Congress right now surrounding how to increase online privacy for individuals in the U.S. One of the biggest drivers of this heightened awareness on privacy issues is Facebook and the attention it has received from consumers who are unhappy with its ever-changing approach to protecting their privacy and exploiting their information. The company is certainly pushing the envelope on how privacy is handled.
There are a number of people who are not satisfied with existing United States privacy laws and believe that they do not go far enough. They argue that our laws are far less advanced than those in other parts of the world, including Europe and Asia, and believe that many companies have simply found ways around what few requirements exist today.
The industry is moving towards making sure that personal identifiable information (PII) such as your age, phone number and address, is protected and that any use of it is known to the end user and is only done with their consent. However, there are questions about what constitutes PII in general.
Five or ten years ago, this seemed like an obvious concept: phone numbers, e-mail addresses, ages, home addresses, social security numbers, credit card numbers, etc. In short, it was fairly simple to understand the notion of information that would allow a third party to identify an end-user.
Today, however, with new technologies, including IP addresses, geolocation and a large emphasis on social media likes and dislikes, there is a lot more information out there that, in theory, can be used to identify an individual user. Even if no one piece of information can be used to identify a person, could an aggregation of all of that data constitute PII?
Moreover, there are those questioning whether the current restrictions and protections for children are enough. The Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act, passed a number of years prior to social media tools like MySpace, Twitter and Facebook, provided some protection for children under the age of 13. However, given the new social media era and the prevalence of its use amongst tweens and teens, there are those arguing that not only do we need more stringent protections for children, but that they should be afforded to those over the age of 13 as well.
While there are several groups advocating for tighter privacy controls, it is also up to the consumer to be careful when conducting transactions online or via a mobile device. They should only do business with companies they trust and ones that have the policies and procedures in place to protect their data. When a company provides a link to its privacy policy or terms and conditions, end users should read the fine print to get an understanding of how their information will be used. When tools are made available for the end user to control their privacy settings, he or she should take those controls seriously and opt for those protections that meet his or her needs.
The Mobile Marketing Association’s (MMA) Code of Conduct outlines privacy policies to help guide members of the mobile ecosystem in protecting the privacy of their end users. The MMA believes that “strong mobile industry privacy principles will protect the mobile channel from abuses by unethical marketers, and limit consumer backlash and additional regulatory scrutiny.”
In the case of mobile barcodes, there are several participants in the ecosystem all with their own level of private information to protect (see our blog The Mobile Barcode Ecosystem – Sorting Out Who’s Who for more details). Companies like Neustar are advocating for a more collaborative approach that would enable all members of the mobile barcode ecosystem to interoperate and engage a trusted third party like Neustar as an insurance policy against consumer fraud and deception.
Neustar is a company that handles phone number assignments in North America and manages number portability which allows you to keep your number whenever you change providers. It also manages the process of getting people from place to place on the Internet via the Domain Name System (DNS). We are also working hard with the Digital Entertainment Content Ecosystem (DECE) to launch a personal rights locker for consumers to buy digital content from retailers like Best Buy, Comcast and Netflix and watch that content from any device, including mobile devices (see www.uvvu.com).
We’re helping to pave the way for mass adoption of mobile barcodes by applying this same approach to the mobile market as well (see our blog Neustar’s Roots as Clearinghouse Perfect for 2D Barcodes for more details). The clearinghouse model is not just about making things interoperable between carriers and campaign managers from a technical level. From the business side, it can give users confidence that their transactions are trusted, secure, and private.
As part of our Mobile Barcode Pilot Program, Neustar is bringing together the right set of players to ensure that their information is protected and that privacy rights are preserved. Neustar can ensure that campaigns are certified and that the industry guidelines and procedures are being followed.
Protecting consumer privacy will continue to be a key driver for the adoption of new mobile technology. With a secure, protected infrastructure in place, all members of the mobile barcode ecosystem can deliver a more meaningful consumer experience while ensuring that the personal information about individuals remains private.
The mobile barcode ecosystem is full of unique point solutions and competing applications that scan barcodes and manage barcode campaigns. While each is interesting and may be useful in their own right, they are also frequently incompatible with each other. Choosing the right platform to support your mobile marketing campaign can be a confusing process and a risky proposition. This is an industry wide challenge that all technologists face and it’s a problem that inhibits widespread market growth and consumer adoption.
There are number of factors that drive this fragmentation, but here are three important ones to consider:
1) Multiple barcode symbologies
There are many different types of symbologies or languages in the mobile barcode world. We’re all familiar with 1-D barcodes. We see them everywhere, on consumer packaging and especially when making a purchase in most any retail store. 2-D mobile barcodes are the same basic idea, except there is less of a universal standard for all of them and they vary widely in their purpose. These mobile barcodes are mostly square in shape but the “symbols” inside them vary. For example, there are open access symbologies such as QR and data matrix barcodes which are the most common. Then there are a number of unique and proprietary symbologies as well. All of these options require scanning devices to know how to read each one. That’s the chief problem — not every provider of barcode scanners wants to support the proprietary barcode symbology of another company. So, brands and other promoting barcode campaigns are left asking the question: which symbology gives me the best market reach?
2) Mobile barcode readers
There are a lot of barcode readers that a consumer can download to his or her mobile device. These readers can be downloaded from mobile application storefronts, pre-loaded on mobile devices, or discovered. Some of these reader applications are focused on specific purposes, such as price comparison shopping. Others can be used for more general purposes like scanning barcodes in a printed advertisement. With all of the possible barcode symbologies (some of which are proprietary) and all of the available mobile devices, developers must choose which types of barcodes and which devices to support. It’s a labor-intensive process to do this well on a global scale.
3) Proprietary campaign management platforms
Several companies have developed robust campaign management platforms that allow you to create a barcode and promote their barcode readers to read that code. These platforms may work well but still don’t solve the problem of reaching a truly global audience. What are the advantages of advertising a barcode that only works with one kind of phone or can’t be used with popular barcode readers? There may be some, but it clearly limits the value for most kinds of mobile marketing.
AT&T recently launched its own 2D barcode generator based on a proprietary system so any codes that are generated from it can only be read with an AT&T code scanner. The folks at 2D Code wrote an interesting review of this on their blog: Use the AT&T Code Generator and Show Your Ignorance. The blog title is a little harsh. After all, initiative is the first step to driving general awareness and adoption, but there’s still a bigger question left unanswered by these closed solutions: How can all of the proprietary platforms work together to create a robust and valuable market for everyone?
Despite these obstacles, this market fragmentation can be overcome (see Compatibility Key to Mobile Barcode Success.) At Neustar, we recognize the reach and scale that are required for barcodes to become an effective advertising medium. We also recognize that there are many different participants that need to interconnect for this reach and scale to become a reality. Mobile network operators play an important role in proliferating the use of barcodes among their subscribers. Equally important is the role that brands and media publishers play in educating consumers about this powerful new call to action.
Having multiple, competitive solutions in the market is a good thing, as it provides users of the technology with more choices. As a trusted and neutral third party, Neustar can help make all these competitive solutions work together through an interoperable solution. Neustar offers a centralized barcode clearinghouse service to provide standardization, security and critical mass, making it the critical component for a successful barcode marketplace to flourish.
In the last six months there has been explosive growth in mobile barcode campaign launches. Many have been creative and yielded great results. Others have not been so successful and have just missed the mark by making some simple mistakes. Let’s take a look at some of the more recent campaigns and how their problems could have been prevented.
The 2D Barcode Strategy blog covered a few of these including Macy’s and the New York City Department of Sanitation. In the case of Macy’s, they recently placed an ad in Lucky Magazine that featured a mobile barcode. Unfortunately, when people scanned the code, nothing happened. The reason: Macy’s had planned to link the barcode to a promotional video, but the ad ran before the video was ready. Oops!
We mentioned the New York City Department of Sanitation barcode example in our last post on Real World Examples. While this was a great effort to promote recycling in the city, the barcode appeared with no context or explanation of what you were supposed to do. People who are not yet familiar with mobile barcodes probably had no idea what the little black and white box in the lower corner of the ad was, much less what to do with it. One day we’ll get there – but we’re not there yet!
Then there’s the case of a winery in our neck of the woods (Virginia) that made some very common mistakes with their barcode:
- The bottle is curved, which makes it difficult for the reader to effectively scan the code
- The dots are too small to be read accurately by the reader
- There should always be 5/8 inch or 1.2 cm of white space surrounding the barcode
We tested this using multiple readers and were unable to scan the code.
And lastly, AT&T just launched its own 2D barcode generator. The problem is that it is based on a proprietary system so any codes that are generated from it can only be read with an AT&T code scanner. The folks at 2D Code wrote an interesting review of this on their blog: Use the AT&T Code Generator and Show Your Ignorance. These types of interoperability issues have plagued the industry for some time and is something that we at Neustar are working to help resolve. (See Compatibility Key To Success of Mobile Barcodes for more details.)
We’ve talked a lot here about the opportunities and challenges for mobile barcodes in the U.S. While full consumer adoption has not occurred yet, barcodes are starting to make their way into the mainstream on billboards, in magazines, at the movies and even on business cards. Here are some of great examples of mobile barcodes in action:
- One of the most recent brands to call attention to mobile barcodes was Calvin Klein Jeans. After much controversy for its racy photos on billboards across New York City, the company replaced them with large barcodes that could be scanned to reveal 40-second commercial featuring models Lara Stone, “A.J.,” Sid Ellisdon, Grayson Vaughan and Eric Anderson. There was a great story in Mashable on this campaign: “Calvin Klein Jeans Replaces Racy Billboards with QR Codes”
- New York City’s Department of Sanitation has also made headlines for its use of QR codes for promoting recycling. They have joined forces with NYC Media to place mobile barcodes on the sides of approximately 2,200 garbage trucks. When residents scan the barcodes, they are directed to videos about recycling options. AdAge and GoMo News wrote great articles on this campaign.
- At the SXSW Interactive show this past spring, QR codes appeared all over the show’s promotional materials including flyers and postcards as well as on people’ business cards and t-shirts. There was even a QR code on each attendee’s badge for quick access to their contact information. See the Fast Company article What Business Card? Just Scan My QR Code for more details on this clever use of QR codes.
- QRe8 has a comprehensive list of the Top 21 Massive Brands Using QR Codes. Among them is Chevrolet which placed QR codes strategically on certain parts of its newest cars. For example, a QR code placed on the hood would lead to information about the car’s engine. Or, what about the promoters of the movie Iron Man 2 who used QR codes on movie posters that directed people to a mobile site with photos, trailers and information about the film. Brilliant!
- The 2D Barcode Strategy Blog provides a number of examples of 2D barcodes used in the publishing industry by publications such as Lucky Magazine, Road & Track, and Time Warner Cable’s monthly entertainment magazine, delight, and to name a few.
While this represents only a small sample of the many barcodes being experimented with out in the “real world,” we expect more of these as interoperability issues are resolved and marketers understand the value of this technology as a viable way to engage their customers. We’re excited to see so many brands experimenting with this technology in very innovative ways. Try scanning a 2D barcode today, interact with one of these brands and tell us what you think.
This week Mobile’s Next Big Thing sat down with Mickey Khan, Editor in Chief of Mobile Marketer magazine. Mobile Marketer is the leading publication in the space, and we’re excited to get a few minutes with Mickey to talk about where mobile is going.
According to Mickey, mobile marketing is general is still a baby, but the baby is definitely walking. There is an explosion in mobile adoption and commerce right around the corner. Click below for the full interview.
Listen to Mobiles Next Big Thing
Customer loyalty and advocacy is the Holy Grail for marketers. With the explosion of mobile devices penetrating the market, it’s no surprise that mobile marketing is quickly becoming the next big wave to extend brand value. Mobile allows brands to engage in a level of interaction that is more relevant and meaningful to their customers. And, social media empowers these same customers with tools to turn those brand interactions into shared conversations with friends and family members. Brands must be prepared for the “conversations and engagements they start” because with today’s media, the customer has the final word.
So what does this mean for customer loyalty?
According to a recent Microsoft Mobile Behavior and Ad Acceptance Study, “media-savvy US consumers believe that advertising has reached saturation point and that brands are using increasingly desperate tactics to get their message through. Yet we found that many smartphone users are already inviting brands into their mobile world and reaping the benefits, often without even considering this as advertising.”
Examples of companies extending their brands through mobile include MLB, Ford and McDonalds.
With more consumers opting-in to mobile promotions and information alerts, brands can engage with their customers based on intelligence around what the consumer has opted into: location sharing, identified interests, time of day and other targeting, thereby making the experience much more relevant. For example, mobile barcodes are an excellent medium. Because consumers choose to scan, they allow consumers to opt-in to a number of options to engage with the brand and offer an immediate call to action. If the mobile campaign is done correctly, consumers can easily be moved up the marketing ladder from call to action all the way to sale, and even to member loyalty.
Consumers decide if they want to scan a barcode and get more information about a product or service, receive an offer or make a purchase. Whether you have a loyalty program or not, mobile is a new way to engage customers in a two-way dialog based on what they care about at that moment in time. Brands should follow Mobile Marketing Association guidelines to know if and how often they can continue the engagement post initial scan.
If you are just getting started, here are some questions to consider before launching a mobile campaign:
- What problem are you trying to solve for your brand? For your customer?
- What do you truly want to gain? More sales? More members/opt-ins? Deeper consumer insight and analytics? Improved ROI /lift on traditional media buy?
- What’s in it for the customer?
- Are you ready for the conversation?
- How often can you provide value to the customer?
- Do you have the analytics to measure the campaign’s effectiveness?
- Can everyone access your campaign regardless of their mobile device?
- Does your campaign have the underlying security in place to avoid hackers/scams?
- Do you have the right experienced partners to help you navigate this new landscape?
Once you’ve launched a campaign, it’s important to remember that many customers are signing up for opportunities with an average of 7-9 other brands at the same time. So, even though consumers opt-in, you need to be mindful of how often you are reaching out to them via mobile devices.
With mobile, people are interacting with brands in new, innovative ways. The consumer’s connection with their mobile device is powerful and intimate. Tapping into that connection through an effective mobile campaign can not only drive business goals, but create a deeper, more meaningful relationship with the customer, thereby increasing loyalty and retention.
We usually consider an ecosystem to be a community of organisms within their environment. In the world of mobile barcodes, there are many “organisms” involved and their ability to coexist is critical to sustaining a healthy environment.
The mobile barcode ecosystem is full of competing apps that scan codes, code types, and resolution companies – each are interesting and powerful technologies which all too frequently (and unfortunately) are completely incompatible with each other. This market fragmentation makes barcodes confusing for businesses and consumers, and is a real challenge to barcodes’ widespread success.
Let’s take quick look at the different players and their respective roles:
- Mobile Network Operators – For phones to get to content, a network is essential. Mobile Operators can also play a strong role in distributing barcode apps to consumers so that brands can advertise to a sufficiently large audience.
- Registry – A place where companies can turn to ensure that the codes they publish will work with different reader apps and Campaign Managers. It is a database that tracks relationships between specific barcodes and campaign managers.
- Neustar Clearinghouse Service – Ensures proper routing, and protects consumer interests like privacy and minimizing mobile fraud.
- Barcode Readers – Apps on handsets that consumers use to scan barcodes.
- Campaign Managers – Companies that create barcodes and barcode campaigns and provide value-added services to brands and advertisers who publish codes.
- Media Companies – Critical participants for consumer education and adoption. They have a big opportunity to drive adoption, promote use, and benefit from placing barcodes on television, in newspapers, magazines, and outdoor locations.
- Advertising Agencies – Coordinate the use of barcodes with media buys and development of creative user experiences on behalf of brands.
- Brands – Provide valuable content and an engaging user experience by adding barcodes to existing media.
We’ve been working with these ecosystem players over the past few years to understand the needs each has for a scalable, interoperable and customer-centric service. In fact, earlier this year at the GSMA Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, we launched a “Mobile Barcode Interoperability Pilot Program” to demonstrate the power of mobile barcode advertising.
Through this Pilot we have demonstrated the power of interoperability among global campaign management partners. This effort established an open solution allowing all players to join the ecosystem and to access the same infrastructure.
As the mobile barcode ecosystem matures, we will continue to play a strategic role in facilitating compatibility across barcode software and systems. Like a well-oiled engine, each of these players needs to work in harmony in order for those who put codes in the market to have confidence that their codes will work, and for the resulting customer interaction to reach its fullest potential.
Diane Strahan
Matthew Valleskey
Peter Langlois
Lock Dethero
Jeff Neuman
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