How to perfectly... spoil your QR code "campaign...

QR codes are quite hype currently. Look at retail shops, touristic guidelines, cereal packagings or newspaper advertising.
A lot of them are figuring out QR codes in an attempt to facilitate off-line / on-line conversion and to enhance customers access to additional background information, videos, pictures, release notes...

Some weeks ago, Inside Digital Media issued an interesting paper on the usage of QR codes, asking some of the most prominent digital market experts to give their opinion on the exact role of QR codes in the marketing landscape. Interesting stuff for you to read if you want to know more about it !

Waow, a great promotion !

Last week-end, I have discovered another "OMG, I-thought-it-was-a-good-idea !" promotional campaign. You know, this everyday-promotion campaigns you find on your coffee package, corn flakes box, soft drink can or milk bottle. The one that just say "Enter your unique code somewhere on our website and win something exciting" (like a coffee cup, a cereal bowl, a soft drink glass or milk mug...).
Usual business for MarCom agencies, you may say. Indeed.

But, there was probably a kind of 'Harry Potter' in disguise somewhere in the briefing. The guy or girl who has probably jumped out of his/her chair saying something like "What we need to do is to generate traffic to our website in an efficient way... Let's stick a QR code there and allow people to easily access the website !". "Oh yeah, wonderful. Great idea, Bob ! That's just the innovation we were looking for !". Business as usual for a marketing team. Business as usual for the MarCom agency probably.

Cécémel is a very popular drink brand in Belgium and the Netherlands. They are supplying delicious choco-milk since years to generations (including me a long time ago) of children (and their parents...). Winter is a quite ideal season to see an increase attention drawn towards choco-milk because it could be drink cold or...warm. A promotional action has been build around the seasonal peak and a nice - flash based - website has been build to support product information and as a hub for promotions (www.cecemel.be).

Easy, a QR code to scan !

Ooops ! WTF is this ?!

Let's go back now to our QR code campaign idea...

The products holds a sticker with a call to action to win a patio heater. When the foil is opened, it dispatches a QR code and a unique code allowing consumers to participate on the website.

But... what do you think is happening when you are scanning your QR code with your favorite scanner on your favorite smartphone ? Yes, you are getting it... You arrive on a page which is just non readable for iOS users ("please download Flash Plug-in") and not optimized for smartphones. As a resulted, the excited customer that was prepared to scan and participate is just doing what I did... Giving up ! No conversion, no data capture, and a frustrated customer.

Lessons learned ?

1. QR codes are made for mobile ! The primary access device in a QR code campaign is always a smartphone. Make sure you integrate this into your user experience approach. Don't overlook the way people use their smartphones : make easy to reach links and buttons, avoid overloaded pages, highlight action steps in a way which is logical to the end users.
2. Always think on the digital journey as a whole. A digital campaign is not only ending when the traffic has been generated. Think about the full  conversion journey...
3. Optimize landing pages. Make sure that when people arrive, they are welcome in a way they could easily understand. Asking for a plug-in installation or presenting a landing page that looks like the one above is just wasted money.
4. Test, test, test ! A quick testing of the campaign results on different mobile devices would give you an immediate warning on some  awful renderings as the one shown above... Just test thoroughly before going on air...