The notion of using 2D barcodes, or QR codes, in mobile marketing campaigns seems to be generating a lot of chatter in the advertising industry, but what’s the real story behind these blotchy little black and white critters of product packaging? And, how will QR codes really work in an economy where many people are still using feature phones? From a 25,000 ft. view, 2D barcodes sound pretty bad-ass… put a medium sized, funky looking barcode on a magazine ad or billboard and customers will instantly be able to connect to your brand’s offering.  Sounds great, right? Not so fast.

In almost every meeting, clients and partners ask us what we think about these nifty little codes and we always respond with the following: “2D barcodes have done well in geographically small, highly saturated, and highly controlled or monopolized advanced markets, such as South Korea and Japan, but the U.S. wireless market is a lot different and requires an understanding of what actually makes the codes works. More importantly, you need to understand the nuances of how the barcodes are interpreted by mobile devices to calculate how successful (or not) the technology will be for your specific needs. There are a couple of important reasons why 2D barcode campaigns do well in South Korea and Japan, but will cause significant issues among consumers in the U.S. and most of Europe.  It has to do with standardization – or, in the case of the U.S. and Europe, the lack thereof.  Standardization of a minimum set of hardware requirements on camera phones, standardization of the barcode reader software on the phones, etc. etc.” While the technology behind 2D barcodes is old and quite simple, the barriers to entry for the mobile consumer are high.  2D barcodes were invented in the 1990’s and have since been applied to the mobile market to varying degrees of success and failure.  Basically, they are a souped-up version of the traditional barcode you see on just about everything.  As one can trap more data in 2D barcodes, this makes a great argument for marketers looking to apply things such as: hyperlinks to mobile sites, scan-to-call, scan-to-coupon, or other product/service related content.