Queue Up! QR Codes Are Coming On Strong.
Categories: Custom Data Solutions
To drive traffic to our DMA10 booth in San Francisco, EU Services developed a fun pre-show campaign that incorporated QR codes. We contacted folks via direct mail and email, offering a 15-month personalized calendar that featured variable imaging. Respondents had a week to place their order and we offered response via both QR codes and personalized urls. The p-URLs performed well, generating a 4% response rate, an 83% conversion rate, and 65 orders. The big news for us this time, though, was that six people used the QR codes to place their order. In launching QR codes, EU Services is following in the footsteps of many respectable companies. Sears’ Holiday Wish Book catalog includes QR codes in the print edition, as well as versions for Sears’ Facebook page and the iPad. Blog Notions’ Danny Flamberg reports that “Esquire used [QR codes] to boost subscription offers, Best Buy put them on in-store signage, as did Dicks Sporting Goods, and Delta uses them to expedite ticketing. Movie marketers use them to distribute trailers and prompt pre-release demand. Starbucks tried them as a payment device. Ford, McDonalds, and Calvin Klein have also experimented with them.” Dan Smigrod, CEO and chief creative officer for Great! cites 101 Uses for QR Codes, including business cards, locator information codes for fresh produce, name tags, fashion and t-shirt identification, “house- for-sale” signs, luggage tags, movie ads, maps and directions, recipes, micro-payments, teaser mailings, window displays, wine bottles, and a host of direct mail commands such as: call us; watch a video; launch our website; enter sweepstakes, etc. Fast Company points to other practices emerging in the QR code realm, including Google’s encouragement of its "Favorite Places" campaign, which puts QR codes in the windows of local businesses that point to their online listing page. Heidi Tolliver-Nigro recently updated her Marketers Primer “QR Codes: What You Need to Know,” noting that “some really terrific new best practices are emerging.” Writing on The Digital Nirvana blog, Tolliver-Nigro notes advertisers are beginning to add “Tweet this” and “Like this” QR codes for Twitter and Facebook applications. Flamberg says, “Advocates think [QR codes] will be as big as UPC bar codes and will offer an important enhancement to retail and be a companion to consumers at virtually every point of sale.” EU Services’ experience? We’re interested. Though small in number, our QR code response both provided insight and proved an easy conversation-starter at DMA10, offering a great talking point for folks who stopped by the booth to pick up their calendar. We'll definitely be using them again. For more information about using QR codes with direct mail, contact Bert Salter at bsalter@euservices.com.