Mr. Ives’s article clearly highlights the issue our business partners all know very well – our image recognition software has the ability to recognize barcodes, tags, QR codes or any other symbol – but there is absolutely no need to use them.

As Mr. Ives cites, our barcode-based competitors see only a few thousand (in some cases only a few hundred) consumer responses with their campaigns, whereas in one campaign alone our partner saw over 600,000 consumer responses. Frankly, there is no comparison, nor can there be.

We look at something like this:

and we scratch our heads and ask, “Why would someone do this?” As a CEO, if my marketing department presented this to me, knowing (1) how much money is spent on ad creative and placement, (2) the importance of conveying the optimal message to consumers and (3) how crucial brand image is in the attempt to positively influence consumer behavior, I would seriously question whether I had the right people in my marketing department.

What exactly is the message this advertisement is attempting to convey to potential consumers?

What is that thing which occupies 50% of the page and what does it have to do with the image of the brand or the content of the ad?

Barcodes play a critical role in the supply chain of every product, but have no need to do so in areas which are consumer-facing. No matter how colorful or clever one tries to make them, barcodes of any kind are, simply-put, unattractive. They do not enhance an image in any way whatsoever:

They are also completely unnecessary. We have spent years building proprietary patented technology which works by recognizing the entire image and returning whatever kind of information or experience the advertiser, broadcaster or retailer wants their consumers and users to receive – from special promotions to coupons to videos, augmented reality, games and more.  An enormous amount of time, resources and money is spent on every piece of marketing collateral. Our technology works with it as it was intended to be seen, with no changes to the creative.

Please click HERE to view a recent Case Study about our wildly successful partnership with Woman’s Day referenced in Mr.Ives’ AdAge article.

This is what an advertisement looks like which employs our technology:

Note the absence of any kind of intrusive symbols. Users simply take a picture of the ad with their phone and we allow the advertisers (in this case our partners Coty and Gwen Stefani’s Harajuku Lovers fragrance line) to return any kind of information they would like.

Our technology works on any phone with a camera, requires no downloads and works across all carriers. Of course, we also build highly sophisticated and successful apps for smartphones, as an app can provide a much richer user experience, and apps do need to be downloaded. Our Barnes & Noble app, for example, currently has over 1.5 million users and remains a top ten application in Apple’s iTunes App Store, 8 months after launch. However, our technology does not require an app to work – it only requires a phone with a camera.

Mr Ives’ AdAge article addresses the point a rapidly growing number of our new customers have come to realize: barcodes are garnering a lot of attention, but they are really not the best solution. Our technology works because it disrupts neither the creative nor the workflow itself – all that’s needed is the original ad.

Advertisers and retailers continue to experiment with the various alternatives, and we see some customers moving amongst the different competitors in response to artificial pricing or corporate pressures. Our results speak for themselves –Recognition accuracy in excess of 96% – Conversion rates of 25% – and more than 600,000 users interacting with a single campaign.  These are the kind of results we want to help you achieve.

To find out how, please contact us! We want to ensure your ads don’t turn out like this:

Image Credits: (1) STA Travel/JagTag (2) Esquire Magazine (3) Coty/Harajuku Lovers & (4) Mad Magazine (in order)

These posters were displayed in Clear Channel malls across the U.S. in Los Angeles, New York, Philadelphia and Miami.  After a consumer emailed their photo of the ad to the specified address, our technology would recognize the image (with a 96% accuracy rate!) and return a coupon directly to their phone. The message instructed the person to show their new coupon at the fragrance counter of the Macy’s department store in the mall they were in — and they would instantly receive a free deluxe Harajuku Lovers fragrance sample set!  Pretty cool.  The point of the campaign was twofold.  First, to see if consumers would interact with in-mall advertising if it was link-enabled with our technology — and second, could we actually drive retail traffic sales if we offered something really fabulous?? (i.e. free samples!!)  Even we were surprised with the success of the results.

At the end of the campaign, we surveyed the participants.  We discovered that a staggering 25% of mall shoppers who took a photo of the ad and received the mobile coupon made purchases at Macy’s after they got their sample — 7% of people made purchases over $20.00 and 18% made purchases over $40.00. To date, the only other similar campaign of its kind used Bluetooth to deliver mobile coupons to mall shoppers.  The average number of consumers that purchased product after receiving the Bluetooth coupon totaled 7% — ours totaled 25% — big difference!  An additional 7% of the participants in our campaign said they would purchase more Harajuku Lovers perfume — and more products from Macy’s — in the future, but that they wouldn’t have done so if they hadn’t been introduced through “this cool campaign.”  It became obvious from the results of the campaign that people really liked interacting with brands by taking photos with their phone — especially if they would receive great stuff (e.g. coupons, specials or samples) in return.

The ages of people who interacted with the ads were also fascinating – as young as 15 years old and up to 54. In rating their overall experience, consumers told us it was “A Fun Way To Use The Phone!” and “So Simple!” as two of the coolest things about the experience.  64% told us they wanted to be part of more interactive campaigns using their mobile phones – and a whopping 86% said they would recommend LinkMe Mobile campaigns to friends and family.  We could have never dreamed for such fabulous results.

LinkMe Mobile is always on the cutting-edge of new ways to use our patented image and voice recognition technologies.  Keep in touch with us and we’ll let you know where you can find LinkMe Mobile in your world!

If you’re interested, please click here to read the full Case Study about the LinkMe Mobile, Coty, ClearChannel project.

And click here to contact us by email if you’re interested in a similar campaign for your company.  We’d love to hear from you.

Image Credit: Coty & Clear Channel

We see an increasing number of competitors in this sector — mostly companies attempting to use bar code scanners or some form of QR codes or other odd, unattractive symbols. The problem with every one of these is that no matter how clever the symbol, ultimately they are very ugly and they alter and ruin all the efforts put into brand creativity and advertising. They’re also completely unnecessary. Besides the fact that nearly all of these infringe upon our patents, our technology consistently achieves over 96% accuracy recognizing any naked image – without the need for adulterating symbols or embedded watermarks. Again and again, ours is proven the best choice for both retailers and consumers.   In Japan — where QR codes originated and are ubiquitous — we’re now constantly being approached by people telling us they no longer want to use them and much prefer the flexibility and results we can provide.

All of this has taken us to the point where we felt it time to start reaching out directly to consumers, as more and more of them are downloading our applications and using our technology every day. We’ve therefore added this blog into our site — and integrated Facebook, Twitter, RSS feed and Share This options — to better serve our customers and consumers. We’ll be using these social media outlets to keep the dialogue open and flowing in both directions — most importantly, to ensure we provide the best service we can. We believe every mobile phone should be a Discovery Device ™ and with your help and ideas we’ll continue creating, learning and growing our technology and our apps to answer your needs. I invite everyone to connect with us and let us know what we can do with our technologies to make your life better.

All the best,

dwm

President & CEO

Image Credit: Paul Rumohr, www.prpic.com