SECTOR PROFILE: Mobile barcodes & quick response
http://www.mobile-ent.biz/features/144/...ile-barcodes-quick-response
Mobile barcode technology has been around for some time, but is it now at a tipping point in the West? Tim Green investigates...In mobile, there’s a lot to be said for benign dictatorship. Take the Japanese market. The actions of all-powerful NTT DoCoMo, with its ‘do as I say’ approach to handset specifications, might never work in liberal-minded Europe, but it certainly makes the barcodes run on time, as it were.
At the beginning of 2004, seven per cent of Japanese mobile subscribers used 2D barcodes. By Q3 2006 this figure increased to 60 per cent, and today it’s over 70 per cent. The practice of scanning mobile barcodes in public places is now so commonplace that codes have even been placed on tombstones to that grieving visitors can access pics and info on the deceased.
This enviable state of affairs has been made possible by operator compulsion. Simply, the carriers make sure that virtually all handsets embed the same reader application so that every printed code can be successfully scanned for painless routing to the destination.
The rest of the world can only look on in envy. There’s no doubt that, for content providers and marketers, the mobile barcode (also referred to as the Quick Response or QR code), presents a wonderful opportunity – a seamless link between the physical world and the digital domain. Scanning a code printed on a magazine, poster or, er, tombstone to link to content, discounts or info is so much quicker and more foolproof than texting a shortcode or typing in a URL. But when was the last time you Western readers did it?
Well, some have. Thanks to the energy of barcode specialists like Neomedia, plenty of brands have rolled out trials. Last year, for example, pizza maker Papa John’s sent a mailer to selected consumers that asked them to text a shortcode to download the Neomedia reader app. Once installed, they could scan a barcode printed in the mailer to access delicious promotions.
Meanwhile, in December 2007 UK newspaper The Sun launched a barcode promotion (left) with I-nigma, using several pages to explain how readers could download the application that would enable them to scan for videos of Premier League goals, film trailers, music and images of ‘Page 3’ girls.
It reported 11,000 participants within a month. Is that good? Yes, considering the hoops users had to jump through. No, when compared with the numbers of consumers that text shortcodes to take part in promotions every day.
The heart of the problem comes down to fragmentation, that scourge of the mobile market in so many verticals. There’s a tussle going on between companies like Neomedia that favour an open approach with universal codes that can be read by one agreed reader application, and companies like Scanbuy who believe the only way to get the market moving is to propagate a proprietary system. The latter has partnered with Billboard and Wired, and has deals with Sprint and Telefonica.
It’s easy to see why two large operators might wish to team up with Scanbuy. The alternative is waiting for the industry to agree common standards. This process is underway, headed by the GSM Association and the Open Mobile Alliance. They launched the MC2 cross-industry group to push for shared standards. But that was in December 2007, so progress has been slow.
Iain McCready, CEO of NeoMedia, is hopeful: “The trade bodies are working hard on technical specifications, and what they’re doing is really helpful. I’m confident we will see a universal standard in place soon, and then suppliers like us can compete on the quality of our readers, financial model and reporting rather than on who’s got the best technology.”
Others are less optimistic. App developer Masabi has accelerated fast into barcodes for ticketing, but in reverse: it sends pictures of codes to phones, which can then be read by a regular retail scanning device.
Masabi’s Ben Whitaker is unconvinced by the idea of phone-as-scanner. He says: “If you look at the barriers in the way of barcodes, you have to conclude that shortcodes or even typing in a URL are simply much better. And it will stay this way for three years at least. For me, any barcode promotions being done now are merely by brands that are interested in experimentation.”
Scott Seaborn, head of mobile at OgilvyOne, is well placed to judge on the attitude of brands towards QR codes. “Every one of them is aware of the technology. They know what’s happening in Japan, and are keen to see how and when they can expect to use QR codes here,” he says.
Seaborn believes the curiosity of mobile savvy users and the determination of operators and handset manufacturers to force the technology through will bring QR into the mainstream sooner than we think.
Seaborn has plenty of previous in the area (sort of), having managed a campaign with Universal and Magnet Harlequin that enabled mobile users to take a picture of a Mr Bean poster and then MMS it to a shortcode to access content.
Although this channel is not instant and free (there’s a messaging cost), it is universal. Seaborn believes that this kind of ‘visual search’ could set in motion one of the biggest transformations mobile has ever seen.
He explains: “I think we’ll see the development of a visual search mechanism that’s like Google on crack. It will turn any object in the real world into a banner, and any phone into a mouse.” -----------
Wer den Euro nicht ehrt ist die Millionen nicht wert.
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