QR Codes: 10 Years to Overnight Adoption

You've probably been seeing these square black & white codes showing up in a lot of new places – QR codes are on your restaurant table, in-transit ads, and on product packaging that wants to serve you up more information. In fact, a recent study by The Drum reports that 75% of Americans are currently using, or plan on scanning codes with their phones.

QR codes aren't new tech, in fact, there was a moment about 10 years ago when they were the hottest buzzword in marketing. The idea that you could connect something offline directly with the online world sounded too good to be true. Unfortunately, at least at the time, it was.

Back in 2012, phones didn't come with code scanners built into their cameras, so using QR codes meant downloading a third-party app, opening the app to scan the code, and then clicking through to get wherever the code was trying to take you. The problem wasn't the technology, it was the user behaviour and the use cases. We weren't used to using QR codes because there weren't good reasons to use them, and brands weren't creating good uses for codes because not enough people were using them.

Fast forward to the last chapter of the global pandemic, and the tech has become easier to use (most phones now have built-in scanners) and there's a compelling reason to use the codes (hands-free information).

So what, right? We can now open links with our cameras – what's the big deal?

First, it's a huge deal for those of us who are interested in tracking the efficacy of our various touchpoints. For example: If we run a hotel and are looking to get more guests to sign up for our email newsletter, it's good to know the rate of new subscribers, but what convinced people to take that action? By using QR codes we can know whether it was the in-room brochure, the poster in the lobby, or the thank you card they received at check-out.

We can apply that same type of thinking any time there is an offline call to take an online action.

We should also see the QR code adoption journey as a lesson that we can apply to other forms of digital and social technology. Just because something makes sense doesn't mean that people are going to use it right away. And just because they don't pick up on it this month, this year, or even longer, doesn't mean that they won't – sometimes the conditions just need to be right.

There are several areas of emerging technology that could easily become as, or more, prominent than the QR code, and we may all look back and wonder why we didn't see how obvious it was at the time, the way that QR code menus are today. A few that we're paying attention to include:

Written by Conner Galway, Junction Consulting

TagsQR Codes