It’s been nearly two years since I first published my article on decoding the mobile QR Code. It’s still a great primer and has stood the test of time so far.

What has changed?

Not a lot – except maybe  consumer awareness.  Marketers also have a lot more awareness – but still only a little bit of knowledge…. which can be dangerous to your ROI!

Here are a 6 things marketers and brands need to keep in mind as they look to integrate 2d bar codes in their OOH, Retail, POS, Print or Television campaigns:

1. Learn the difference between a QR code and everything else. “QR” or “Quick Response” codes are the most commonly used format. Most people use “QR” as the generic term for 2d bar codes. Nearly all 2d bar code readers will read a QR code – so this is a safe format to go with. If you go with an EZ-Code (used by the National Post and other publications), you’ll need a specific reader to decode it. Given that the consumer has to download a reader to begin with, why go with a proprietary code? There are dozens of other formats that will do the exact same thing – but may require specific readers. When looking at a code – make sure you know whether or not it’s a QR code or something else before you print that poster…
2. It’s not the reader, it’s the code. Some marketers think it’s all about the reader. There are many free readers that read most formats… but if your code is not being interpreted properly, chances are you’ve chosen a 2d code format that is not universally readable. Don’t create your own reader, borrow somebody else’s.  Quickmark and ScanLife are two great free Apps available – but do a search on your mobile phone’s App store to search for one.
3. You need to incorporate the code where somebody will want to interact with it. If you are integrating a 2d code in a transit shelter, make sure the code is at eye level. If it’s at the consumer’s knees or way above eye-level, they will be less likely to see it and scan it.
4. Creating a code is virtually free – don’t pay thousands for a code (and shame on marketers who charge thousands to produce them). What costs money and time is what the code does – like linking to a campaign or brand mobile website. It’s the destination that costs money. Having said that, you don’t have to spend a lot to get a lot.
5. Codes can’t just go to your current online website. Your current website likely looks like crap on a mobile browser. If it’s got flash, it won’t work at all. You need a mobile specific experience. If your code is going to your facebook, linkedin,or other social media site you are probably ok as they are already mobile enabled
6. You don’t need a smartphone to read a 2d code. Actually, all you need is a mobile device that has a camera. “flip” phones and other non-traditional smartphones have free readers too… it’s just often more difficult to download and use the reader initially.

With nearly all our clients either expressing interest or actively engaging in 2d code integrations within campaigns, my prediction is that the 2d bar code will replace the need for SMS marketing within 18 months.

If you’re excited by that prospect, just wait until flash lite makes it’s way to your mobile device so that we can start using Augmented Reality (AR) codes with our mobile browser…

Recently I was having a healthy debate with my friend Steve Sorge over at Mobile Fringe around “Wap vs App” – or should marketers focus their efforts on building out a mobile website vs. building out a mobile application.

Since my presentation at marketing magazine’s mobile 2.0 conference, my point of view had been shifting towards Wap – or the mobile web. My reasoning being that with the mobile safari browser webkit being commonly adapted by nearly all smartphones we can now build once and deploy many times with few changes to fit each platform while outputting a very rich experience.

This is not only cost effective but ensures reach – which is key if your audience isn’t on an iphone yet.

Steve pointed out that most people with iphones would rather search or browse on the App store than on Google – a huge shift in behaviour. With over 85,000 applications and 2 billion downloads, the App store is evolving to become your life tool for anything you need. After all, isn’t there an App for everything?

I was being trumped with my own traditional point of view – user experience trumps technology every time.

Yesterday it was announced in the media that the iphone is coming to Bell and Telus next month. Having recently completed upgrades to their networks to enable GSM (which is what the iphone works on), they can now offer the iphone and compete head on with Rogers. With iphone users already driving +60% of all mobile web traffic in Canada, what will happen when you suddenly make the most popular device available to everybody else?

2010 will be the year that the iphone changes the mobile landscape in Canada.

Although Canadians have other great options in the Palm Pre and the pending new Storm from Blackberry, making the iphone available to nearly all Canadians is a game changer – for both consumers and marketers.

So… Wap or App?

I’m back to the middle. You should probably do both, but start with a mobile website – unless your target audience is already on the iphone. By this time next year, that could be everybody.

Here’s  a copy of the presentation I gave at Marketing Magazine’s Mobile 2.0 conference in Toronto. Speaker notes are included – although what actually came out of my mouth was likely a bit different

The fonts are also a bit off here as I used fonts local to my machine for the presentation. Enjoy & comments welcome!

I’ve updated my standard mobile marketing 101 presentation deck to include updated stats and points of view of how the landscape is evolving and where the opportunities are for marketers to extend their multi-media campaigns into this channel.

Topics covered include: Canadian landscape stats, the 8 mobile consumer segments, SMS Marketing, Mobile Web, Mobile Applications, designing for mobile, mobile media, 2d / QR codes, Bluetooth, and a few points on what to expect next.

This is meant to be in introduction and overview – but let me know if you think I’ve missed anything you believe is really important. Feedback on content welcome too!

Here we go again…  here are my 10 informed best guesses on what will happen in the Canadian market place this year. Click here to see how I did against last year’s predictions. 

1. It will be the year of the App store. Every manufacturer in the smartphone space will have a mobile application store, but Apple will continue to dominate the market because they are the only ones who focus on usability first
2. There will be several new models of the iphone announced and launched this year – including a “nano” version.  I predict that copy & paste will still not be among one of its many features
3. Palm Pre will do better than any Android device. Friends, peers and industry pals all mocked me for predicting that they would make a come back when I published some predictions in August, but I’m sticking with this one
4. Mobile security and privacy will become a big focus for marketers and the industry as more people use feature rich smart phones (25% of Canadians are already on them)
5. Mobile payment systems will finally reach retail as both MasterCard and Visa should be ready to go  
6. MMS will fail to reach its promise as the market shifts to the mobile web for richer experiences
7. Both Bell and Telus announce GSM compatibility / network infrastructure upgrades in order to get a piece of the lucrative GSM roaming market and to counter efforts by new regional and national carriers who will be entering the marketing in Q4
8. Microsoft will release a new OS for mobile that includes a 2d code reader that supports their own proprietary M-Tag.  This will finally bring 2d codes into the mainstream in North America
9. All major Canadian news / content websites will have a specific mobile enabled website
10. 40 Billion SMS messages will be sent in Canada – up from about the 20 Billion fore-casted in 2008.

What do you think? Feel free to comment /add your own predictions.

Around this time last year I made some outrageous predictions about what was to come in 2008.  Let’s take a quick look back and see how well I did: 

1. SMS third party advertising will take off.  Didn’t really see this take off in Canada and with the mobile web / and mobile widgets taking off, I can’t see this as a big focus in 2009. Having said that, there are more services popping up that allow media planners to venture into SMS as well as the Mobile web.
2. Mobile Web Advertising will become part of your media buy. This definitely happened in 2008 in Canada with Quattro and Yahoo offering a good mix of inventory to buy. This will only continue to grow in 2009. 
3. MMS Common short codes will arrive. This did happen in 2008 – although not all mobile aggregators are able to facilitate this for you. MyThumb mobile was the first to offer MMS short codes and now you can also go through Magnet Mobile too. 
4. Mobile payments will start to emerge as a new payment medium. There was a great conferences this year on the subject in Canada facilitated by the Canadian Institute.  RBC and Visa launched their pilot program for contactless payments in Canada. Visa also recently launched 4 new international pilot programs. Mastercard also announced this past May that they’re launching a pilot to extend their pay pass program to mobile. 
5. The iphone will finally arrive in Canada. It sure did – and I was right that they waited until the 3G version came out. I also predicted that other retailers may offer the device – which didn’t happen… although both Walmart and select Sam’s Club stores will be selling them in the near future.  Best Buy and Future shop also announced that they would be carrying it. 
6. Fixed or low-cost data plans will be universal. Although not as low as we’d like, we finally have affordable plans in Canada. Yah! I was paying $80 for 500 megs last year and now I’m paying $45 for 500 megs and includes a voice plan. 
7. Mobile web will catch fire. I was partially right here. Thanks to smartphones like the iphone, more consumers discovered the mobile web, but more specifically mobile widgets that grab data from the mobile web have really taken off thanks to the iphone app store. 
8. New mobile carriers will be announced. This happened and was blogged about here.
9. Google will launch their own phone (gphone) with their own operating system and buy U.S. spectrum. The first two happened, but they decided not to aggressively pursue spectrum… this time. There are other auctions coming up in 2009…
10. Social Networking will make the leap from desktop to Mobile as a primary interface / access point. We definitely saw a huge leap in 2008 to mobile – with facebook, linkedin, hi-5 and twitter all offering great mobile options through widgets and mobile web. Twitter saw over 600% growth and a big part of this can be attributed to mobile.  Mobile only social networking sites such as itsmy.com also saw big growth in 2008. They even partnered up with my favorite mobile and social search tool taptu to enhance their member services. 

I published a second list in August as part of a mobile insert at Strategy Magazine.  We’ll take a look at those ones in my next post before making some super crazy predictions for 2009

Q: Are there certain age groups or regions that have been more responsive to mobile marketing and how would you predict this to change?

A: Just like the interweb, the younger generations were the quickest to adopt SMS and are still the most likely to respond to a call to action via sms

Having said that, keep the following three things in mind:

1. Parents and grand parents are fast growing segments for SMS because they’ve realized that in order to stay somewhat in touch with their kids and grand kids, they had to learn how to text. As a result, SMS adoption is penetrating all demographics and should no longer be considered a tween or teen obsession only
2. How many of your friends have blackberries? Ever notice that they are emailing their co-workers & friends as often as the kids sending SMS back and forth? With RIM having around 40% market share in Canada, there are lots of people who are exhibiting the same behaviours and dependancies on mobile as those who are more SMS reliant.
3. We’ve found that the “professional age” demographic is far more likely to go on to the mobile web than other demographics. The reason is that many of these folks are using PDAs (like blackberry) that come with nicer & larger screens and data plans that are paid for by their company.

Response rates for mobile marketing can be good or great across all demographics. It’s not unusual to get 6% on well targeted mobile campaigns for example.

The key is knowing your audience and understanding how to deliver your message in the most audience relevant context (sms, mobile web, bluetooth etc…) with a relevant message.

With 3.3 billion mobile devices in use worldwide today, mobile is already a mass medium and marketers who figure out how to integrate mobile into their marketing mix now will be at a huge advantage tomorrow when mobile goes from experimental to essential.

Q: When will the carriers start to let go of the grasp they have over what applications and content can be put out there on their network/deck?

A: The topic of carriers becoming less controlling & more open has been a very hot topic in the U.S. especially and even led to Google’s initial bid on the U.S. spectrum auction.

Although nearly all carriers say they are open to being open, they also say that without controls and checks built into the system, they fear losing all control of their devices – and therefore their ability to deliver a consistent and positive experience to their customers.

Whether or not you believe that, the reality is that few carriers want to open up their platforms to third party developers until they no longer have any choice – whether that be through legislation or to keep pace with a competitive force.

Having said that, “off-deck” mobile websites are growing every day and offering content and services not currently available through on-deck.  Mobile browsers are getting better and are now rendering richer and richer experiences – so the need to have a fully open carrier may become less important as most of what consumers want can be serviced through the mobile web.

Q: As you said, you mobile device is very personal. As a marketer, what kind of mobile marketing tactics can you do that don’t annoy or invade consumer’s perceived personal space

A: Unlike some other marketing mediums, mobile is not an interruption medium – which means every tactic can be perceived as annoying or invading personal space… unless you get permission or an opt-in first.

In cases where you are leveraging bluetooth to engage a consumer directly, ensure the message is specifically relevant and in context to where they are receiving it, and ask for permission to continue the conversation before delivering the message.

For all other mobile channels (sms, mms, mobile web, widget etc…) it again starts with relevance and in the case of acquisition based initiatives, you need a strong call to action.

Mobile rarely works on its own – so don’t think of a mobile tactic as something to replace something else in your marketing mix that has worked before. Instead, think of mobile as an extension of your existing campaign.

For examples and case studies on effective mobile tactics, check out the Mobile Marketing Association (MMA) website here.

With retailer’s becoming more technologically advanced (RFID, Bluetooth, wifi) what is the future of “proximity marketing” through a mobile device? – Ian Barnett, spider marketing.

With technology playing a larger role in the retail experience, we can expect traditional old in-store media to become very interactive. It’s happening now with LCD screens – but the ability to get additional product information or get drawn to products through bluetooth, SMS, mobile web, or qr codes represents real and near future opportunities

In some countries like South Africa for example, consumers are entering malls and downloading virtual coupon books through Bluetooth before starting their shopping. They download a widget or application to their device once, then simply update the content through bluetooth every time they enter a bluetooth zone in the mall.

Think of mobile technology as conversation enablers vs. interruption devices. Nobody wants to be bombarded with messages on their phone – so the successful retail experiences will incorporate opt-in first for any technology play that goes beyond signage.

When will this happen in Canada?

It’s already started. Several malls in Ottawa and out West have already started piloting bluetooth projects and other mobile related projects are also in play across the industry. RBC is piloting a mobile payments platform called mobex which could also roll out to the masses in the next 18 months.  You won’t see widespread qr codes until a carrier incorporates them on their device.

We have enough examples from around the world on the future of proximity marketing in Canada, the bigger question is when will proximity marketing really take off. My bet is 2010.