Cause Marketers, Be Purposeful in Your Use of QR Codes

I’ve been pounding the table for cause marketers to use QR codes now for about a year now, but too often, a new report finds, we’re using them to direct traffic to our website or Facebook page.

Instead, customers expect the codes to take them to content that’s pertinent to the print piece they just scanned. Taking them to the front page of a website is a missed opportunity, says a report from Direct Marketing IQ.

Customers “don’t have time to waste,” the reports says. “They want to be served content, offers, surveys, etc. that matter to them.”

Certainly customers have proven their willingness to point their smart phones at the codes; scan rates in first quarter 2011 were 4500 percent higher than 1Q 2010.

Where should the QR codes take people instead?

• Augmented reality images on smart phones.

• Promotions and co-promotions.

• Contests and sweepstakes.

• Links to video presentations.

• Downloadable giveaways to certain donors.

• Targeted Facebook/Twitter interfaces.

• Special content on microsites.

• Coupons.

QR codes offer enormous opportunity to cause marketers. But we must be purposeful in how we use it.