QR codes as a marketing tool

For those of you wondering what those strange looking square boxes containing black and white pixels that seems to be popping up in magazines and advertisements, let me solve the mystery. They are known as QR codes or Quick Response Codes to give them their full title.

QRcodes are similar to the standard barcodes that have been around for many years and appear on packaging all over the world; however, QR codes can hold a lot more information than the standard twenty line horizontal barcode. These QR codes have been used in Japan and Europe in the past few years and are now starting to become more and more popular in the United States as well, especially within the marketing and advertising sectors.

Just think of a QR code as a hyperlink in paper form that allows your mobile or tablet to connect to the internet without the need to type out the web address. QR codes allow businesses to advertise their wares as well as their websites, and these codes can be located anywhere, such as billboards, posters, clothing, bus shelters, packaging, flyers and much, much more. This integrates the print world with the virtual world and is an affordable means to advertise products and services as everyone can use these from the small business owner to multi-national companies.

You access the information by simply using the camera on your phone or tablet to scan the QR code, providing you have an application that allows the device to decode the information contained within the QR code. These QR code reader applications are usually free to download and can be found for most iPhone and Android enabled devices.

There is a whole host of practical uses for QR codes as a marketing and promotional tool. QR codes can be used on a whole host of different printed materials such as, event and conference banners and displays, flyers, business cards and posters.

The QR code can link you to a number of different things, not just websites but also email, SMS messages, a social media profile or it can even get your phone to dial a specific telephone number.