What a great article of Todd Wassserman in Mashable about QR codes campaigns that completely failed!

We are about 23 hours after its publication and it already got re-tweeted 4,801 times, including a tweet by me of course.

While the brands that ran these campaigns might mourn over the money spent, we thankfully turn their misfortune into free lessons on QR code campaigns.

5 Big Fails and 5 Absolute DON’Ts in QR Code Marketing

1. Don’t place your QR codes in areas with no mobile phone connectivity (like Red Bull did by placing them in the subway)
2. Don’t send your audience to a landing page not optimized for mobile browsing (like Continental blocking the click through on their QR code landing by a pop-up.)
3. Don’t limit the usage of the QR code landing page to a proprietary scanner (as The Washington Redskins did)
4. Don’t place it on printed material where the QR code will later on be covered by a label (happened to the Esquire magazine)
5. Don’t let crazy designs of QR code rule over scanability ( as Nirvana’s Nevermind 20th Anniversary Edition

Special thanks to Mike McGuinness, VP of sales for QRblaster.com, who selected these great examples. QR Blaster is QR Code Generator website offering a free code generator and premium services. Sorry, Mike, I was not a able to locate your original list published anywhere, otherwise I would have linked to it. BR, Ursula.

Education needed here and there

Honestly, I’d rather thought that low familiarity and acceptance of QR codes within the targeted audience is the biggest problem of QR code marketing. [You for sure saw them - the QR code campaigns along with a friendly URL for downloading the scanner app.] But it seems that also we marketers have still a long way to go.

Just to make it clear: these examples made us smile, but these are all great companies and brands with certainly great marketing teams. So if it happened to them, we just could fall into the same pits. I take my hat off to them for getting a QR code campaign up and running, despite the mistakes done on the way.

Closing with a smile – Enjoy, my friends, enjoy!



Here are some more posts about the usage of QR codes on our blog.

---


About the Author



Dr. Ursula Ron joined Kampyle in spring 2011 as marketing manager. She is old enough to remember the time only a selected bunch of people had an email address and Altavista was THE search engine.
You can follow Ursula on Facebook, Twitter @ronursula or LinkedIn.
If you are into online chess, don’t hesitate to challenge her.

---


For more information about Kampyle – contact us today!



New to Kampyle? Request a Demo!

You are welcome to request a tailored live demo to meet your business needs. Our experienced consultants give you actionable advice and a thorough
overview of Kampyle’s Feedback Solutions.