It's indisputable. One of the most increasingly used arrows in the Mad Marketing Tactics quiver is the QR Code -- a curious mixture of powerful instant marketing and contemporary art. They effectively use minimal advertising 'real estate" or available space to convey the greatest amount of crucial information. Efficient? No?
QR codes (those funny-looking little "stamps" that you've been seeing everyplace -- you know, the ones that remind you of bar codes at the supermarket, except that they are more square, and contain seemingly random patterns within them instead of a series of vertical stripes of varied thickness) have become all the rage. QR stands for Quick Response.
A QR stamp is a powerful mobile device-readable marketing tool which can be placed on a poster, in a store window, on the outside of a mailing piece or magazine, a business card a T-shirt, a coffee mug, a temporary tattoo, a laminated ID badge -- virtually anywhere. And they have taken on the role of being some sort of pop art. Some companies are now actually modifying these two-dimensional icons to make them extra colorful, or to make them look like neon or graffiti. If there's a surface, it can be home to a QR Code....even if that surface is a side of a moving truck, or a T-shirt, or a briefcase!
I can use a simple, free downloadable application on my iPhone [I'm virtually chained to it anyway] to capture these symbols and translate them. They usually lead me to a mobile-friendly website, but on occasion they have just contained a message in simple words, a name and a phone number, a slogan or meme, an image or collage of images or even a direct link to a music video or media production.
In real terms, these QR codes take a great deal of information and shrink it into a little stamp, although I've seen these things tattooed on a woman's forearm, a college kid's sweatshirt, and magnified to a giant placard outside on the sidewalk in front of an Asian-Fusion restaurant. No kidding. They have become single 'snapshots' that contain access to volumes of information, or to websites, mobile sites, videos and other images.
Mad Marketing Tactics enthusiasts are utilizing QR codes (as well as some bar codes), and some very slick images with embedded QR codes to mystify and engage passers by.
Images, even very obscure ones, are more likely to catch the eye than printed words or elaborate lists. And once captured in a mobile device, they can be used repeatedly, like little bookmarks in order to open the door to the same destination.
And don't be fooled by the notion of "Quick". Quite often, a curious prospective customer (not realizing that he or she might in fact be a prospective customer at all), merely photographs the image, the mysterious symbol, and translates it later.
If you can construct a thematic marketing, promotional or branding strategy that is anchored on the creative use of QR codes, please tell me about it, so that I may request your autograph over a cup (biodegradable, environmentally-friendly, post-consumer content) of coffee. I'll buy.
Thank you for reading me, tweeting me, and shooting me out of the cannon into your giant Colosseum of social media buddies!
Douglas E. Castle for The Mad Marketing Tactics Blog and CFI - CrowdFunding Incubator LLC
p.s. If you'd like to generate and design some of your own QR codes, please click on the button below:
#MadMarketing
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