See first hand how our database driven mobile sites can help you connect with your customers and measure results like never before. Uncover how the simplicity and power of Blink Capture’s dynamic mobile sites will change the way you interact with potential clientele on a daily basis. If you're not convinced by the end of the trial period, simply discontinue your account without being charged.
People generally don't "like" what they dont' understand. If used properly, there is no denying the power behind QR Codes and Mobile Marketing. Combined, and with the right technology, you can really push the marketing envelope and make your business' exposure soar.
One of the key ingredients in really capitalizing on your QR Codes is having the power to control the content at your QR's target destination. Now, imagine you have more than one QR Code and are able to change the content of all target destinations in real time, whenever it's necessary, and as often as you like. If you can't see how this opens a myriad of marketing and business possibilties you need to stay tuned for more upcoming posts on how to use QR Codes effectively to power up your business. Quick hint....one of the first steps is getting yourself a Blink Capture Mobile Site.
With Blink Capture, getting a mobile site up and running just takes a few minutes, customizing it a few more. And unlike other mobile site services, Blink Capture throws in so much added value with powerful, responsive mobile marketing tools that can easily become your daily go-to for building leads, collecting and qualifying data, and automatically beginning the dialogue with new customers the moment they hit submit from any of the dynamic forms on your mobile site. Yes, this is a shameless plug. Shameless because you can only ever feel good about passing on something that is genuinely ahead of the curve; something that will genuinely add exceptional value to your marketing strategy and your business overall.
If you're still not sure what the big deal is about Blink Capture's Dynamic Mobile Marketing Platform, or why this collection of mobile marketing tools is something to do cartwheels about, here's an extensive, super simplified list of frequently asked questions, key features and in practical terms, why these features are potentially so powerful... [ Read the full article ]
Never has our World been more connected than we are today. With the advent of the Mobile Revolution, the global market has seen the rise of a truly savvy "new age" consumer - a consumer who is "plugged-in", connected, wherever-whenever, 24/7-365. Today, being "in-the-know" is as easy as pushing, touching, submitting or hitting send for any average person who owns a smartphone. Digital Mobile Culture is real, growing, and is definitely here to stay... Yet, a staggering 79% of businesses still don't have a mobile presence or strategy. Why?
The simple answer is that there still really isn't an "easy button" when it comes to mobile marketing. Sure, agencies everywhere now list that they can build you a mobile optimized site as part of the design, marketing and brand services they offer, but the truth is, these static mobile sites just don't offer the same level of engagement we have all become accustomed to surfing the web via browser-based deskptop or laptop personal computing devices. And, more importantly, these mobile sites do not offer the same level of technical funtionality critical for online business success. The inability to interact, track, collect market intelligence and capture data easily has been a big shortcoming to date for digital mobile marketing... [read the full article here].
To kick off things off, the BI Intelligence team—Pascal — Emmanuel Gobry, Alex Cocotas, and Henry Blodget — put together a very informative slide deck on the current trends in mobile. Bi Intelligence looked closely at the growth of smartphones and tablets, the platform wars, and how consumer behaviour i.e. how people are actually using their devices.
Every where you look there’s evidence of the smartphone revolution. Let’s face it, the numbers are growing rapidly and you don’t have to look far to see someone using an iPhone, Andrioid device, yes even a BlackBerry still. The rules of “engagement” – how people receive information and consume content continue to change with the advancement of technology. That said, so should your marketing plan.
Actionable Marketing Expert, Heidi Cohen, puts together a great list of 25 mobile research charts on her blog that serves as a invaluable resource for keping your marketing plan in the loop and up to date with what’s going on. Studying a list like this can quickly allow you to take advantage of the changes in the mobile tech landscape and give you the knowledge to tailor and adjust your marketing plan and keep moving forward with an effective mobile marketing strategy. How consumers use their phones, the implications behind content marketing, promotions, communications and purchase channels, are all critical points to note for marketers to continue to be successful at reaching and engaging their audience. The fact that US Smartphone ownsership increased by 11% since last May is a glaring statistic that your business needs to be in the mobile game if it already isn’t.
But, keeping up to speed with mobile tech is only a piece of the larger puzzle. A big part of a successful mobile marketing strategy will include the creation of a flexible mobile optimized web platform. After all, you can’t expect to present and serve up content and media, let alone engage your mobile audience without the right platform and tools to do so. That said, if you’re still unsure about how to go about creating a good mobile optimized site, or, if you’re unhappy with your current mobile optimnized site, try out BlinkCapture for free and get a better understanding of how a powerful and effective mobile marketing platform works and how it can work wonders for you and your business.
In previous posts, we’ve talked about the “Shift” in the world digital marketing, where marketers move past browser-based online strategies in order to properly learn how to leverage and capitalize business success in the new mobile frontier. To a certain extent, part of this transition involves unlearning practices that were effective for browser-based marketing and reeducating oneself with what will work in rapidly growing mobile market. QR Codes have been one of the potentially powerful tools that many still don’t quite get yet, although at this point, QR Code usage has now past the early adoption phase in the US and finally starting to gain wider understanding and acceptance.
Actionable Marketing Expert, Heidi Cohen, recently published a very helpful list of 26 QR Code data points, complete with charts and anaylsis. We all know that smartphone’s drive QR code usage, but this breakdown gives us a whole lot more to chew on with regard to an outlook on mobile globally, QR Codes and mobile marketing for 2012 and on. This data and analysis also reinforces the importance of adopting a complete mobile marketing platform that will yield the most ROI – one that will allow any marketer or business to make the transition smoothly, quickly and effectively. A powerful and complete mobile marketing platform like Blink Capture easily fits the bill. Not even a handful of other products out there really offer as much as the Blink Capture Mobile Solution.
Ms. Cohen finishes off the article with two key points that marketers should take not of:
“Remember when incorporating QR codes into your next marketing and/or communications project, it’s important to supply viewers with a call-to-action and information regarding how to download a QR code reader and use the QR code since it’s still early days.”
And any marketing professional who’s just learning about mobile marketing and QR Codes should ask themselves these basic questions:
“Have you scanned a QR code? If so, what were your opinions about the experience? Have you considered integrating QR codes into your marketing plans? If so what do you plan to do and why?”
Sure, everything “Mobile” is growing at a rapid rate, but we’re still waiting for a Shift. And, for that “shift” to start happening, marketing professionals first need to realize a mobile strategy is not the same as an online browser-based strategy.
One key element in Mobile Strategy that is taking marketers a little longer to understand is the connection that Mobile has with the Print world. Yes, Mobile very much exists in the digital realm (obviously), but a big part of a mobile user’s experience and behavoir has to do with a tangible experience as well. It would only make sense that a large percentage of mobile use and application occurs with some geographical context involved. Think about it – it’s not hard to put two and two together, you just have to step outside of the browser. In many respects, the small mobile device in the palm of your hands is like a gateway between the big bad real world and our virtual reality, the Internet.
So with this in mind, marketers have to design their mobile experiences appropriately. A condensed, duplicate version of your existing browser site is probably not the most effective move. Yes, a good mobile-web experience should get you to the point as quickly as possible. But a smart and effective Mobile strategy that will deliver tangible ROI should position a business to invest in a mobile experience that does more than just deliver a few key tidbits of information. A good mobile strategy should include some of these key elements:
multi-channel or multi-site approach that caters to a specific target whether that’s a certain demographic related to your product or service, a geographic area, or just product or service specific
a target specific draw; something of value that you can extend to the target audience of that mobile destination that will engage them
QR Codes to help bridge print to digital seamlessly in-depth research on placement of visual print signage
the ability to capture data and have it easily accessible for you and your team personalized response mechanisms (e.g. custom email auto-responders) that are in sync with key triggers like data form submissions to leverage and maximize on a qualified lead
activity notifications and accurate site metrics
There’s one last key element that I didn’t include in the list above that will differ from company to company, but will remain the same for your end audience: design the mobile experience you offer to your target audience as personal as possible. Because the window between the two worlds is so small, you have their entire focus, so carefully consider and design the way you communicate with your end audience. Most windows of opportunity these days are short, fleeting moments, so the time you do manage to get with a mobile visitor should speak to them in an up-close and personal way. After all, you are literally in the palm of their hands.
Like any good business or marketing strategy, take your time to think about what you’re doing, what you’re hoping to achieve and how you’re going to go about it. Any good strategy has to be well thought out from start to finish. This includes practical analysis of how, when and why your end audience may or may not engage and interact with what you’re putting out there. Again, you can’t blame QR Codes for the poor execution of the mareting team behind them. The fact still remains that Quick Response codes have huge potential if presented and executed properly.
Part of learning is unlearning. A lot of the time, unlearning something can be much harder than actually learning something new. The ability to unlearn, refocus and adapt quickly in a surging global mobile marketplace will be a difference maker in these fast moving times. That said, the way you approach your mobile marketing strategy should not be the same way you approach your marketing mandates in the browser-based online world. If you’ve figured this much out already, I would say that you’re a small percentage that’s ahead of a very large pack.
So what do I mean? How do they differ?
The first mistake you could make with your mobile marketing strategy is believing that one mobile site will cover your bases. The second mistake you could make is to believe that two mobile sites will cover your bases. See where I’m going with this? The reality is, your mobile strategy should include as many mobiles destinations your business or campaign needs. Think about it from a business point of view – the mobile revolution is not just about the ability to connect and communicate wherever you are, but also about having the right target destination accessible at the right place at the right time. You have to think “mobile” or “mobility”…
Here’s a scenario:
I’m out and about happen to drive by a home with a For Sale sign that I’m interested in and want to find out more, but would not like to have to speak with the agent just yet, without first finding out more details about the house. The sign out front has the agent’s phone, email and browser based web address. Are those really the best 3 options to have on your sign? What if this agent had a mobile address that sent an interested visitor to a mobile optimized site that was set up just for that house alone? What if that same mobile optimized site had an Info Request Form that an interested party could fill out in two or three minutes and uopn submission, the data was saved for the agent to access later at any point in time? And, what if a few moments after that new visitor pressed submit, an automated email response appeared in the interested party’s inbox with a link to the complete listing and agents info for their record, to revisit again when they got home? And, if the agent were to receive an email notificaton themselves the moment submit was pressed? Would that not be a more ideal scenario? What if the agent had mobile optimized sites for all her or his listings across town?
Another unimaginative and closed-minded assumption that so many “marketers” are making these days is that QR Codes are “dead” or have no practical purpose. Again, think “Mobile”….how could a QR Code NOT have some practical, valuable use? The smart marketer should be able to see how easily a QR Code can make target-specific information accessible from a targeted location.
Here’s another scenario:
You just got your year end bonus and are brimming with excitement about the vacation you’re going to take this January after the New Year. You’re waiting to catch your bus and plastered in front of you is a gorgeous poster advertising holidays to Fiji. Here, a smart marketer here has learned to leverage the power of QR Codes. Since you already have your smartphone out while waiting for the bus, you see the QR Code on the ad and scan it. Immediately you are taken to a mobile optimized site that has all the details and specials for this specific holiday. The site even has a contest you can enter to win a trip to Fiji! This is your lucky day!!! Little do you know, but this smart marketer has ads across town too. One in the bustop outside the casino advertising trips to Veags, another at the streetcar stop outside Mountain Co-op promoting trips to beautiful British Columbia, with any more across town. At the end of this campaign, this smart marketer will login to his or her Blink Capture admin panel and download metrics specific to all the signs across town that he or she had posted. Not to mention all the valuable qualified lead data collected from people’s Info Request and Contest submissions. Now that’s smart mobile marketing. And, quite different from a browser-based strategy.
So….are you ready to rethink yet?
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Stay tuned for more posts on Mobile Marketing with Blink Capture. Drop us a comment, we would love to hear from you.
In business, everyone’s always trying to get the one-up on their competition. Most businesses would go out of their way, (even hit below the belt), to see larger, faster ROI and gobble up more market share. ‘Crushing the Competition” is in fact, an age-old and modern day CEO sport. What is striking however, is that there is still such a large number of companies big and small without a real mobile strategy. How is it that in this Age of Hi-Tech and instant communication that there are still so many businesses who have yet to make a solid push and investment into the mobile market? Yes, the Mobile Market, the one that doesn’t close – ever. The one that laughs at immobile computing-dinosaurs because accessibility has quickly become the new “cool”. And, rightfully so. Yes, the same baby of the Mobile Revolution, now practically a teeanger in tech years. Did 79% of businesses just not get the global news update? Do 79% of businesses really still not have a mobile marketing strategy and presence? Apparently so.
If you don’t see a gigantic OPPORTUNITY written all over this situation, you should head back to business kindergarten. And, what now makes this “Opportunity” even sweeter is the launch of Blink Capture’s Dynamic Mobile Marketing Platform. With tools like this; with a mobile marketing platform like Blink Capture – here absolutely no reason now, not to step up and make the smart decision.
With Blink Capture, getting a mobile site up and running just takes a few minutes, customizing it a few more. And unlike other mobile site services, Blink Capture throws in so much added value. With powerful, responsive and easy-to-use mobile marketing tools, this platform can easily become your daily go-to for building leads, collecting and qualifying data, and effortlessly beginning the dialogue with new customers the moment they hit submit from any of the dynamic forms on your mobile site. Yes, this is a shameless plug. Shameless because you can only ever feel good about passing on something that is genuinely ahead of the curve; something that will genuinely add exceptional value to your marketing strategy and your business overall. The only shameful part about this is that not more businesses are jumping on before the real scramble to go mobile begins. (Which should be another green light for you if you’re reading this post right now .
If you’re still not sure what the big deal is about Blink Capture’s Dynamic Mobile Marketing Platform, or why this collection of mobile marketing tools is something to do cartwheels about, here’s an extensive but simplified list of frequently asked questions, key features and in practical terms, some key points on why these features are potentially so powerful:
In our very first post on the Blink Capture blog, we ended off with a lead-in to one of the key features of the Blink Capture Mobile Marketing Platform….Content Managed QR Codes. To recap quickly, in that post we loosely covered the fact that most of the current options available for mobile marketing fall short, and that Blink Capture’s Dynamic Mobile Marketing Platform is unique new product that is here to help bridge the gap. These fully traceable mobile sites, equipped with dynamic content management features, and a data capture platform that allows interaction, engagement and instant follow up via custom auto responders, this mobile technology could already be considered a game changer based on these features alone. When you factor in the power of auto-generated QR Codes for every mobile site that is created, you now have a much more complete Dynamic Mobile Marketing Platform.
Let’s take a quick peek back down memory lane at traditional marketing and advertising in the not too distant past. For the most part, outside of your rent and staff, most companies put a significant chunk of their capital investment back into marketing and advertising – newspaper ads, magazine ads, and other print media – which till today is still very difficult to measure accurately. Traditional marketing and advertising processes were time and money intensive, with no real guarantee on outcome or result or way to track the actual reaction or response to the campaign outside of decent sales numbers following a campaign. And because they were so time and cost intensive, you really only had a finite amount of campaigns you could conduct in a given fiscal year. Yes, painful times where big ideas and smart design played huge roles in advertising success.
Sure, there’s a lot more to be said about that story, but for the purpose of this post and current available technology and methods, we’ll keep it short to help illustrate our point: the Blink Capture Mobile Marketing Platform can deliver qualified, accurate feedback and results, quickly and effectively, all at an incredible cost. The QR Code that’s tied to your Blink Capture site is like a bridge from the physical world to your digital world. With the Blink Capture mobile platform, this connection becomes even more valuable because of the ability to manage the content of your mobile site, or described in another way, your QR Code’s target destination – same difference right? Most marketing, advertising or sales professionals should already see where this is going and understand the power and benefit of this system.
Here’s a quick hypothetical scenario: Armed with a Blink Capture mobile site tied to a QR Code, I could theoretically place an ad every day in a different print medium or publication with my QR Code for an entire week and come out with some very interesting intelligence, not to mention the possibility of ad viewers actually submitting a Request for Information form from my mobile site. At the very least, a simple experiment like this could give you insight on what publications not to advertise in, or help you bump it down on your list. Yes, there’s the argument for the possibility that no one would scan the code, but it’s not the technology’s fault if the marketing professional cannot attract people to their ad or product. Having the “ability to” is much different than having the “ability to” and not knowing how to properly use it…right? If your target audience just isn’t the type to scan a QR Code, Blink Capture mobile site URLs are all shortened anyway, so accessing the URL posted in your ad is just a quick…either way, the end result is market intelligence captured.
Stay tuned for more upcoming posts…we’re going to get into even more detailed scenarios on how to leverage the Blink Capture Dynamic Mobile Marketing Platform and how you can leverage content managed QR Codes to help your business’ marketing initiatives.
In the meantime, test out the Blink Capture Mobile Marketing Platform… sign up for any account and try it out for 15 days at no cost. If you’re not happy at the end of the Trial, just hit the cancel button in your admin area. It’s what you call a Win-Win situation.
Never has our World been more connected than we are today. With the advent of the Mobile Revolution, the global market has seen the rise of a truly savvy “new age” consumer – a consumer who is “plugged-in”, connected, wherever-whenever, 24/7-365. Today, being “in-the-know” is as easy as pushing, touching, submitting or hitting send for any average person who owns a smartphone. Digital Mobile Culture is real, growing, and is definitely here to stay… Yet, a staggering 79% of businesses still don’t have a mobile presence or strategy. Why?
The simple answer is that there still really isn’t an “easy button” when it comes to mobile marketing. Sure, agencies everywhere now list that they can build you a mobile optimized site as part of the design, marketing and brand services they offer, but the truth is, these static mobile sites just don’t offer the same level of engagement we have all become accustomed to surfing the web via browser-based deskptop or laptop personal computing devices. And, more importantly, most of these mobile sites do not offer the same level of technical funtionality critical for online business success. The inability to interact, track, collect market intelligence and capture data easily has been a big shortcoming to date for digital mobile marketing.
Until now. Blink Capture’s mobile marketing technology finally offers both the general consumer and businesses big and small, a savvy, intuitive product that comes with all the technical bells and whistles you need to hit home runs and knock the marketing ball out the park. Consider the new-tech-versus-consumer gap bridged.
With Blink Capture mobile technology, you can have that optimized and engaging, database-driven mobile site, and you can have it up and running in minutes. Yes, it’s as easy as it sounds – really. But, there’s more to it. Blink Capture mobile sites are not your average run-of-the-mill, static digital destinations. With a Blink Capture mobile site, you can easily manage your content in real time from a login protected User Admin panel, any time and as frequently as necessary, from anywhere you have access to the Internet.
Sure, we can understand that dynamic content management isn’t as thrilling of a feature as it used to be, which is okay because with Blink Capture, you’re getting more than just a dynamic mobile site. With Blink Capture, what you have at your disposal is a Dynamic Mobile Marketing Platform.
So you’re asking yourself….what exactly is that? What is a Dynamic Mobile Marketing Platform?
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Never has our World been more connected than we are today. With the advent of the Mobile Revolution, the global market has seen the rise of a truly savvy “new age” consumer – a consumer who is “plugged-in”, connected, wherever-whenever, 24/7-365. Today, being “in-the-know” is as easy as pushing, touching, submitting or hitting send for any average person who owns a smartphone. Digital Mobile Culture is real, growing, and is definitely here to stay… Yet, a staggering 79% of businesses still don’t have a mobile presence or strategy. Why?