This past Holiday season we witnessed location based marketing starting to fulfill its promise
The huge growth of Smartphones feeding the empowerment of proud, app wielding bargain shoppers. For those retailers who focused on how to make location based marketing work for them, the Holiday season was a wondrous experiment of what is possible in the present and the future of how the physical world meshes with the connected customer experience. Shoppers using location based apps like Foursquare, Facebook Places, GeoQpon, Coupon Sherpa and Yowza browsed location based deals and discounts, and in some cases instantly shared their smart deals by broadcasting it across their social networks. (true story: a competitive shopper I know saved several hundred dollars this Holiday Season just because she downloaded GeoQpon, and it happened to work in nearly every store she walked into).
For those that relied on beefing up holiday staff and churning out marketing campaigns as usual, the Holidays were more like getting called out and ganged up on during recess. Shoppers armed with Google Shopper, TheFind, RedLaser and Price Check by Amazon demand price transparency. They instantly compare prices and complete purchases by scanning a barcode and clicking purchase, rendering an unsuspecting retail clerk speechless with the flash of a screen. You could practically hear “Gotcha!!” every other aisle.
Finding the best deals, enabled by geolocation can be a competitive sport and it made me think about the other ways location based marketing can and will change the customer experience in other industries.
Ever seen a QR code? I’m sure you’ve seen a few lately in magazine ads. These little boxes can hold any digital media you desire. They are a real-world link to a virtual destination. By tagging an object with a QR code in the real world, a marketer can reveal the history, details, and of course, the marketing message for any given product or service. The possibilities are endless.
Other industries could make use of location based technology to truly make a difference in a customer experience Here’s a short list of some possibilities:
Pharma:
Imagine a drug maker uses a location based strategy that includes a QR code. When the pharmacy fills a prescription, that drug maker produces a custom QR code to stick on the label. That code instantly takes the patient (via a quick scan using redlaser or any other free reader) to a library of documents and videos that educate me about how to manage or manage a health challenge. Take it further – since the phone knows where I am, how about suggesting some smart choices at the grocery store and including a few coupons to help incent me to make healthy choices…. If I stay on this train of thought, I eventually share that code with my physician, and create a space where the patient and physician can dialogue care.
Healthcare: From an excellent report from mobilestorrm.com) “Looking ahead, advanced solutions such as implanted wireless sensors and robotics inside patients, combined with an always-on mobile data connection, can open a wealth of opportunity in terms of real-time care, emergency response and remote monitoring. Imagine having a health condition that’s monitored and managed remotely to where your physician can easily know of problems before you do. Care can be administered in real-time, without the need to schedule appointments or wait until it’s potentially too late, and much more expensive, to treat effectively.”
Service repair:
Let’s say something in my house breaks. Perhaps it’s the water heater. If the manufacturer or reseller used a QR code tied to their inventory and service center, and I scanned it with my phone, they could direct me to a page where I can instantly purchase a replacement on the spot. One step further, they could direct me to a service portal that knows what the part is and asks me to schedule the service call at my preferred time. (Side note, if the service company in the above example had used our Swyft for Mobile App, they could simultaneously push that service call to the closest service agent in the field – but we can save that for a different post.)
Airlines:
It’s already happening with mobile boarding passes. You see it more and more at the airport. But what about using my location in the airport to help make the experience even better? The best example enhancing the travel experience with real time information today is the Denver Airport . They provide security wait times and parking lot updates right on the home page, and they even have a scavenger hunt you can play if you’re stuck there for a while. But I’m talking about using my physical location in real time. I think the airlines could get in on this game by delivering location-aware information to enhance my travel experience. For example: if I have a long flight – remind me to get some reading material, and maybe provide a 10% discount at the news store in their terminal. No meal on this flight? Make sure I know that, and suggest a restaurant in the terminal… you see where this is going.
How do you think your location could affect the way you interact with brands. How much will be too much?
