I was watching television and a commercial for a product I had never heard of before came on the air.  The ad was for a Skanz bracelet or band as they call it, with a QR code containing personal information.  As I watched the commercial I was totally confused – the message was that it would now be easier, than ever before, for me to share my personal information – but was this something I’d been missing in my life?   

Hmmm, do I really need a QR coded bracelet with my personal information?  And if I don’t, who does?

Skanz is a new company that allows you to put your entire online persona, contact info, Facebook page, Twitter feed, LinkdIn profile, Tumblr account, etc. in one place accessible via QR code. You can place your personal QR code on an iPhone case or Skanz band in any of the styles below:

Sporting one of these turns you into a walking advertisement for yourself. When you meet someone new, all they have to do is scan your code and they have instant access to everything you want them to know about you.

I knew immediately that that this was not going to work for me.  But still, I was intrigued, and I quickly identified a handful of uses for the Skanz technology.

One thing that came to mind is the ease with which medical history would be made available for emergencies.  It certainly could replace the current medical alert bracelet.   For marketers, if an ad contained the right code, the wearer of the Skanz band could flash their personal QR bracelet and either order the product or get more information about the product without much effort.   Two truly one-to-one experiences brought to you by Skanz.

From a research viewpoint, we are still hungry for source data that can more closely connect the consumer, their media behavior and product purchase.  Today, there are research companies that are asking their participants to carry pagers and even a specially modified Smartphone with which to record their behavior.  Perhaps we could take advantage of the QR code technology to tell us which media, and more importantly which advertisements, the wearer is exposed to on a very timely basis.  

Skanz has created a product for a problem that never before existed.   But I wonder if some smart research company is not thinking how they could take advantage of a respondent’s willingness to wear their own QR code and truly change the measurement of all advertising regardless of the medium used to convey the message.  All it would take would be for the medium to have the technology to read the Skanz information on the research participants’ hand.

There are several barriers to widespread adoption of Skanz and other QR Code-based technology.  As a research instrument the technology would have to be easy to use for all age segments of the population.   For marketers who are familiar with the benefits of using BAR codes this technology might offer more immediate return path information about their customers.  It took some time for the now familiar BAR codes to gain widespread adoption and only time will tell if there is interest in moving to Skanz QR codes to enhance our information on consumer behavior.

As the desire for content control continues to increase and the cost of internet-connected TVs continues to decline, penetration of Smart TVs is predicted to reach nearly half of American households by the end of the holiday season. Just in time for the growing adoption of the new technology, LG is teaming up with online video advertising network YuMe to bring advertising to TV sets in a new way. Without needing a separate device such as a Roku or Boxee, people who own LG internet-connected TVs will see ads not only while watching programs, but also while searching for programs to watch.

Toyota Motor Sales USA will be the first sponsor, but we expect to see more as companies like Samsung, Panasonic and LG are beginning to develop partnerships with YuMe and/or Tremor Video. Spreading use of the technology, plus consumers’ shifting tastes to over-the-top video options with more control and substantially less advertising, challenges marketers to reach and engage this audience without annoying them.

Advertisers must remember the importance of providing ads that are interesting and relevant to the consumer. The new technology conveniently lends itself to this objective, something LG and YuMe intend to capitalize on. The application providers will also get a cut of the revenue, as well as approval of the ads that will air while their product is loading. Ad networks, TV manufacturers and content publishers working together to make internet-connected TV ads contextually relevant for the consumer means that everyone wins, including the advertisers gutsy enough to take a chance with new technology.

In advertising we are always talking about putting the right message, in front of the right person, at the right time. The rapidly evolving advertising technologies online allow us to get closer to this goal then ever before. When it comes to search marketing people are typing in exactly what they want, and therefore giving you as an advertiser an opportunity to capitalize on this.

Many companies take advantage of this and deliver highly tailored ads to match the search queries. The result is that people expect their ads to be targeted so when you see an advertisement that doesn’t fit with your search query, it can be quite offensive. I was researching some text ads for a campaign when I ran across a perfect example from Wal-Mart of why you should make sure that your agency is using negative keyword targeting for their search campaigns.

It would have taken 30 seconds to add “coping” as a negative keyword to prevent this from happening.

This ad represents two failures. Firstly the ad clearly shouldn’t be displayed for this search query. Secondly the ad itself has a typo, which is a minor detail given the offensive nature of the keyword it is paired with but it is yet another sign that their QA process failed.

This is particularly bad given that the company is Wal-Mart, which people are far more likely to pounce on for blunders such as this. When a person types in “coping with a death in the family” I don’t think they want to see this message from Wal-Mart, especially not at this time.

It has been estimated that in the first weekend since its introduction Apple would sell 4 million iPhone4S phones; the only forecasted hurdle would be ensuring supply/availability of the product would meet the expected demand.  Then came a collective sigh of disappointment from the technophiles and early adopters who closely monitor development of new gadgets.  It turned out that there was quite a bit of downgrading of iPhone4S sales estimates attributed to its lack of major enhancements from the current iPhone4.

We thought it would be fun to take a look at other new technology products and examine how their launch sales fared in the early days after their introduction.  Some of these new products have been tremendously successful, but it is also amusing to look at those that did not quite live up to expectations.

Recent technology introductions initial sales results:

2011-2012 Broadcast Season – early disappointments:

Reminder of some product misfires:

What does this mean for marketers?  Obviously it takes more than company reputation to gain and sustain public interest in your products.  Products must live up to the hype, provide a positive user experience and of course, be supported by impactful creative and well targeted media plans developed to introduce these new products to the marketplace through the most appropriate channels.

In a recent New York Times article, Mickey Meece describes her news consumption routine: pick up the paper, toss it on the table with intentions to read later, get the news on her iPad instead. She lists out her regular rotation of news sources, which are different than mine and probably different than yours as well. Unlike the days when everyone received the same newspaper and without the myriad additional sources available online, our consumption of printed news is becoming more instant, customizable, and as a result, more segmented.

But this comes at a price. Not only for the newspaper industry feeling the pressure from an ever increasingly digital world, but also for the consumer. Meece points out numerous news aggregating apps for tablets that were created as a way to access all the information a newshound could want, all in one place and exactly how you want it…if you’re willing to work for it. Until the day when apps can read our minds and know what we want, we still have to go through the manual labor of telling the app to build something full of must reads while leaving out the clutter.

Is it worth it to today’s ever-on-the-go consumer though? We could be content to sit back and have the news companies deliver to us, either physically or electronically, the stories their editors deem important enough to print and simply pick and choose which sections we want to take in. Or we could be proactive and use those electronic sources to become our own editors to get precisely the newspaper we want, thus becoming more engaged and empowered readers.

These one stop shops are not only a convenient way to gather all of our favorite news sources and content sections, it should also be a way for advertisers to conveniently target interested consumers. Yet while sampling 5 of the aggregating apps Meece mentions, I was not served a single ad unless I clicked through a headline to read the story on the source website. A lack of ads seems such a waste since I am consciously handing the apps my interests along with my attention. The increasing customization available through these apps will benefit consumers as well as advertisers, if only they’re willing to put in the effort.

This debuted earlier in the week but still worth viewing. The PayPal show what future-shopping might look like their their new payment platforms.

The options include everything from “bump” payments and transfers where consumers need only bump their phones to transfer funds to the always popular QR code check-out.

As part of their integrated campaign in support of the company’s 2012 Versa Seda model, Nissan is leveraging a previously widely unexploited Apple iAd feature to help deliver the campaigns’ young, tech savvy target consumer.

The Versa iAd utilizes gyro technology–offered on the iPad and iPhone–to allow the user to take in a 360-degree view of the car as they pan their device to the left or right while viewing the ad.  True to its name, the iAd also offers elements of jazzy interaction to the experience: when a viewer shakes their phone, for example, the people in the ad will put on different hats. 

A classy convergence of technology and targeting!

Talk about a back fire. Only one month into the company split of Netflix (into Netflix – Streaming and Qwikster – DVD’s), the once skyrocketing video entertainment powerhouse has lost over 1 million subscribers. Also, they have employed a more than backwards business strategy. Netflix CEO is effectively eliminating his core business prospects from the funnel, making it more difficult to convert new users. If Netflix remained as just Netflix, cross selling opportunities or possibily upselling opportunities would have remained from DVD to Streaming. Now, a user of Netflix DVD is automatically enrolled in Qwikster DVD, not only losing brand loyalists, but also making it more complex to be signed up for both services. Two companies. Two contracts. Too many issues. Without the brand Netflix for the DVD business, there is an increased concerned that users will become brand agnostic and switch to a different provider.

Check out the articles here

Yesterday Google released their Wallet app, a handy tool they originally announced back in May.  The app makes your phone a quick and easy means to pay for virtually anything payable by credit card and provides an answer to the George Costanza wallet.  Google Wallet is made possible through a partnership with Citi, MasterCard, Sprint and First Data.  Currently, it is only available to Citi Mastercard holders as well as holders of the Google Prepaid Card (fundable through any “existing plastic credit card”).

Google’s goal is to make it possible to add all payment cards to Google Wallet, and as a thank you to early adopters, it is offering a $10 free bonus to the Google Prepaid Card when users set it up in Google Wallet before the end of 2011.

Read more…

Rather than succumb to the supposed print-killing tablet, newspapers are trying to figure out how to make the device work to their advantage. Tribune Co., owner of the Chicago Tribune, Baltimore Sun, and Los Angeles Times among others, is currently rumored to be developing a tablet device of their very own.

According to a CNN article, the tablet will reportedly operate on a version of Google’s Android operating system, feature software customized to local newspapers, and include other functions expected of tablet devices such as downloading apps, playing games and surfing the internet. Tribune wants to give the tablet to consumers for free (or at very low cost) in exchange for an extended 2-year subscription to their paper.

Whether people choose to take this offer will likely depend on the technical specs of the Tribune’s tablet compared to powerful computing devices like the iPad. Price points are sure to also be a factor. Counting the estimated price for a 2-year subscription as the cost of a “free” Tribune tablet and using the aforementioned newspapers as examples, the price comparison is as follows:

*Software providing total access to digital copy of full paper, not an app. Price from Barnes & Noble Nook store.

Since this device release is still in the rumor phase, it is unclear whether Tribune would charge the extended subscribers the same price they do now or move to the digital price to entice customers. Consumers will no doubt be aware that a digital copy will greatly reduce printing, distributing and other costs for the paper and expect to see those savings passed on to them.

The Philadelphia Media Network will begin testing their own tablet promotion this week by providing 5,000 discounted tablets preloaded with three newspaper apps and three sponsors: Comcast, Wells Fargo, and Main Line Health, a regional hospital network. If this trend continues, Apple may see a new wave of tablets in the marketplace starting to encroach on its overwhelming share of the tablet pie. After all, why would someone need to purchase a $500 iPad when they can get a comparable multi-functional device by simply extending a subscription to their local newspaper?

Because newspapers depend on advertising as well as newsstand sales for their revenue stream, these new tablet devices offer an opportunity for advertisers to get creative. Imagine placing an interactive ad for a clothing store in the style section of a digital newspaper. Consumers can have the opportunity to browse and get information about featured articles of clothing then easily connect over to the store website to make a purchase. Moving from print to a digital medium encourages ads to be interactive and engaging, improving the consumer’s experience with the brand. Whether it will be because of Tribune and other newspaper companies, or the organic move of content to tablets, if the reader is present, advertisers need to be there to engage with them.