New Study Shows 27 Percent of Consumers Ages 27-34 Scan QR Codes

Last Friday, I did my video blog on three different ways you can utilize QR codes. However, I wanted to touch on this subject again since I think many people make the argument that QR codes are a waste of effort, that consumers rarely scan them most of the time anyway.

According to a recent report from Pitney Bowes, QR codes are actually gaining increased acceptance among consumers in North America and Europe. Of the 5,000 consumers who were surveyed, QR code usage currently stands at 15 percent on average, with an average of 27 percent for consumers between the ages of 18 and 34.

While I don’t think that QR codes are appropriate for every product in every industry, I do think that they have a place for companies that are targeting a younger audience. As I mentioned Friday, one method for attracting attention to your QR code is to place them inside a picture. The Pitney Bowes survey found that consumers respond best to QR codes found in magazines as well as on consumer packages and mail pieces.

The great benefit of QR codes, when compared to other aspects of marketing, is that a campaign that utilizes them is highly measurable. If you create a special landing page for the QR code, you can easily measure the number of consumers who are visiting that page. These easy-to-measure results are a breath of fresh air for marketers who struggle to find measurable results in other areas of their marketing efforts, such as blogging or social media platforms.

If you do decide to give QR codes a try, consider implementing the following tips:

1. Focus on placing the majority of QR codes on product packaging or within printed mediums, such as magazines.
   
   
2. Include a message to let the customer understand the value in scanning the code.
   
   
3. Make sure that your landing page is mobile friendly and that your page is set up on Google Analytics or another tool so that you will able to track and measure the results of your QR code.
   
   
4. If you have more than one QR code, implement multiple landing pages so you can measure which ones are more successful.
   
   
5. Thank and reward your customers.