QR Code Marketing Strategies for Today
As has been mentioned many times, knowing your market is key. With that in mind, let’s discuss who the ideal market is. So far, QR codes have seen the most widespread use by males between the ages of 25 and 40. In fact twice as many men as women are using QR codes, and out of the overall usage over three quarters of the people scanning the codes are over 25. In addition to that data, studies have shown that over half of the QR codes scanned were scanned in a person’s home, with the next highest scanning locations being retail stores and grocery stores. A surprisingly small amount of scans took place in public places.
The big question is: what does this tell us? First of all, it tells us the best people to market your QR codes to – men in their 20s and 30s. But, this is not to say that these are the only people you can market to using QR codes. It just means that at this point in the development of QR codes, they are the easiest, because many of them are already scanning. It means that if you’re target audience is women or the younger generation, you need to make sure you are getting their attention with your promotions. This is where discounts, contests, and unique marketing comes into play.
So, what else does this tell us? It tells us that the best place to put your QR code is in portable print ads – like newspapers and magazines. This allows your audience to scan from the comfort of their own home – which is where they are tending to do so. The second best place, is thankfully, in your store. Again, this is not to say these are the only options, they just happen to be the best. If you need or want to market elsewhere, you need to try a bit harder to get that code scanned.
The great thing about QR codes, however, is that they are so new. There is a lot of room to grow and change these trends. Although there are millions and millions of QR code scanners each month, they only make up a bit more than five percent of the available smartphone users who could be scanning. This means that the more readily available QR codes are, and the more interesting they are to potential clients, the more people will scan and the more places they will scan in. Who knows what the surveys will tell us in 5 years?