Tag: qr codes

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QR Codes Might Be Proven Useless

It seems that more and more people are talking whether or not QR codes are useful. As some people pointed out, QR codes pretty much drive nothing to anyone. Well, in order to test this there is an experiment in Reading, England that will decide what the English think of QR Codes. In fact, according to these guys, QR Codes will retire completely this year,

Outdoor media owner JCDecaux and media firm Kinetic have installed 325 posters all over the area, near Heathrow Airport to see if the technologies work and actually engage consumers.

During the trial, 12 brands–Test the Near Future, are EA Games, H&M, ITV2, Lucozade Sport, Lynx, Magnum, Mercedes, Morrisons, Toni&Guy, Universal DVD, Universal Special Projects, and Vaseline–will take turns to providing content for consumers to download  using NFC contactless technology, or via a QR app if their handset does not support NFC.

Hopefully some real number will come out of this, and find what many people are already know, that no one really does care about snapping photos of pictures to get to a website. Still, will be an interesting study. However, it will only show what people driving while traveling to Heathrow which might not be much of a study in itself.

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QR Codes to Retire in 2012

According to bieMedia, and online marketing and media company, the QR code will die before it really took off. They are claiming that these codes will actually be replaced by mobile video search, which according to them, is faster and provides a better interactive experience.

“QR Codes were introduced as a quick extension to modernize the bar code,” says bieMEDIA CEO Jon Barocas. “The issue is that these ‘squares’ take up valuable real estate on a business’ marketing collateral or even act as an eye sore to the storefront.”

While its understandable that he believes this, because his company has invested in Mobile Acuity, which is a mobile visual search company, it makes perfect sense. QR codes have gained some minor popularity with marketers, but more and more research shows that most consumers don’t really give a damn about the product. In fact, this survey says that even those who scan mobile QR codes, don’t do anything with them.

Business Inisider seems to have already declared QR Codes Dead:

But in practice, they don’t often work out that way. Mobile barcodes can be confusing and can waste time. And as mobile technology progresses, they probably aren’t even necessary. Most people, before scanning their first barcode, have to download scanning apps manually and figure out how to use them. Then, each time there’s a barcode to scan, they have to make sure they’re using the right scanning app for the right barcode. That’s because different types of barcodes, like Microsoft’s “Tag” codes, don’t always work in all the same apps.

Since technology is growing so fast, it makes a lot more sense that just normal images will replace QR codes. Visual search makes a lot more sense, since a almost any company can use a unique logo or photo to represent themselves and direct consumers to any site they want with that image.  In fact, Google has even has their own visual search product.