QR Codes – How They Fit Into Your Social Media Strategy

Josh Chiles, President, Engaged Social Media Firm — Have you ever wished you could track your print material? Or give your customers a way to interact with your products? Or maybe you created a DVD for all of your first-time visitors and wish you could find a way to save money and not create that DVD but still deliver its contents. Let me introduce you to QR Codes.

So, what is it? A QR Code (short for Quick Response) is a matrix code or 2D code. Using a smart-phone, a person merely points and scans and they’re launched into the virtual world! You can link a QR Code to a number of different end points. When your customer scans the QR Code, you can send them a text with your contact information, direct them to a video, link them to your website or Facebook page, or give away prizes. There’s no limit to what you can do with QR Codes. You can place QR Codes on a business card and link to a welcome video or video/blog story for each salesperson. Or use stock cards that link to a video or a Web page about that boat. Or place a QR Code on each boat by the helm that when scanned, sends your customer to a start-up/shut-down guide. Be creative, you can use QR Codes for anything.

Now, let’s take a look at how QR Codes can work with your social media strategy …

You just received a beautiful used boat in on trade. You go through your normal process; clean, take pictures, create a stock card and upload the information to your website. But this time, you also create a quick 90 second video walking around the boat and talking about the features. You upload the video to your YouTube channel and create a QR Code linked to your video on YouTube of that beautiful used boat. You put the QR Code on the stock card also.

The next day …

Mr. Smith visits your dealership, he walks around and that beautiful boat catches his eye. The salesman meets him and gives him an overview of the boat and Mr. Smith is falling-in-love. Before Mr. Smith leaves, the salesman gives him a stock card and schedules a follow up appointment when Mr. Smith can bring his wife in to look at this boat, too.

Later that night when Mr. Smith arrives home, he proceeds to tell his wife about that beautiful boat that he absolutely loves. She is enjoying her husband’s story of his visit to your dealership and she would like to see what the boat looks like. Mr. Smith looks all over and he cannot find the stock card the salesman gave him. Then, he remembers his phone. Before the salesman could make it over to him, him scanned the QR Code that was on the boat. So Mr. Smith pulls out his phone and shows his wife the video the QR Code was linked too. She begins to fall-in-love with this boat as well.

After she watches the video, she shares the video on her Facebook profile and says … “Guess who’s going boating?” Now her family and friends are watching the video, commenting and watching your other videos on your YouTube channel. They “Like” your Facebook page and a few of them submit a lead form right from your Facebook page. You’re getting in front of potential customers all because of a little planning and having a social media strategy.

Just think, if it wasn’t for that QR Code on the boat, a YouTube video and a Facebook page – later that night – nobody would be thinking about that boat or your dealership except you. That’s the power of social media. Believe it or not, it’s happening just like that every night. Your customers are going on Facebook, watching YouTube videos, reading blog posts and interacting with their favorite brands. If you’re not using social media, you’re missing an opportunity to grow your dealership, socially.

Scan this QR Code for 3 important factors to consider when using QR Codes. Don’t have a QR Code scanner on your smart-phone? Search your phone’s app store for “QR Code Scanner” to download.

Tell me in the comments below how you’re using QR Codes.