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These simple black and white squares are a type of matrix or two-dimensional barcode. Quick Response Codes, are used to promote in-store purchases by providing more information than can be offered in simple shelf signage, billboards, magazines, and email marketing newsletters.
These were first designed by the Toyota subsidiary Denso Wave in 1994 to facilitate high-speed component scanning to track vehicles during manufacturing. In the last few years, this coding and information sharing system has become popular outside the automotive industry due to its fast readability and greater storage capacity compared to standard UPC barcodes.
Older one-dimensional barcodes were designed to be mechanically scanned by a narrow beam of light and are sufficient for storing and providing limited product, inventory, and pricing information. In contrast, the QR code is detected as a 2-dimensional digital image by a semiconductor image sensor. This information is then digitally analyzed by a programmed processor, which locates the three distinctive squares at the corners of the image and then uses the smaller square near the fourth corner to normalize the image for size, orientation, and angle of viewing. The small dots are then converted to binary numbers and their validity checked with an error-correcting code.
QR codes have become common in consumer advertising. Smartphone users can install an app (application) with a QR-code scanner that can read the displayed code and convert it to a URL that directs the smartphone’s browser to the website of a company, store, or product associated with that code providing more specific information.
QR codes, as of 2013 are being used for a wider range of applications, including entertainment and transport ticketing, product/loyalty marketing. Using QR code-related information alongside its alpha-numeric text data can be observed in the Yellow Pages directory and it is now used widely storing personal information for use by government.
QR codes store addresses and Uniform Resource Locators (URLs) and work as sales drivers in magazines, on signs, on buses, on business cards, or on almost any object about which users might need information. This act of linking from physical world objects is termed hardlinking or object hyperlinking. QR codes also may be linked to a location to track where a code has been scanned. Either the application that scans the QR code retrieves the geographic information by using GPS and cell tower triangulation (aGPS) or the URL encoded in the QR code itself is associated with a location.
As a result, the QR code has become a standard tool for advertising strategy, since it provides quick and effortless access to the brand’s website. Beyond mere convenience to the consumer, the importance of this capability is that it increases the conversion rates by directing potential customers, without delay to landing or sales pages.
