Bluetooth ‘Beacons’: What Marketers Need to Know

Bluetooth ‘Beacons’: What Marketers Need to Know

Content- While the marketers want the prospects and customers to take favorable decisions, it is often difficult for them to even reach their target audience. However, BLE (Bluetooth Low Energy) Beacons might be the solution to these problems. Popularly known as proximity beacons, these devices can transmit targeted information and messages to mobile devices which are within its proximity.

For instance, a retail store can use the beacons to send exclusive offers and deals to the customers when they are inside their store. And apart from the retailers, even airports, concert arenas, conferences, museums, trade shows and even schools now use these beacons to learn more about their customers and engage them. In this post, we’ll have a detailed look at what these beacons actually are, the platforms they use, and a lot more.

What are Bluetooth beacons?

Beacons are just like lighthouses. They only have a single purpose of sending out a signal which determines their location. They don’t even know anything about the mobile devices within their vicinity. The beacons cannot connect to the mobile devices and can not even steal or browse through their data. Just like a lighthouse, it just sends out a signal of its position. That’s it!

Moreover, beacons do not have any kind of data in them. They are simple devices which generally do not connect to the internet. They only feature a major and minor universally unique identifier. They can be hardware devices which are just used as a beacon or they can even be battery-powered devices. Also, mobile devices and tablets too can be used as beacons as they have low energy Bluetooth antennas.

What are the different Bluetooth beacon platforms?

Two of the most popular beacon platforms are Google and Apple and they have their own beacon implementations. It was Apple’s iBeacon which was the first BLE beacon platform. Apple introduced the technology in 2013 and in the same year, the company installed beacons in all of its stores in the USA. With the help of this beacon, Apple can send special offers to the customers who have Bluetooth-enabled, iOS devices within their stores.

In the year 2015, Google launched their BLE beacon technology, Eddystone. While it is just like iBeacon, unlike Apple, Google’s beacon technology is available on GitHub and is open source. However, marketers do not need to worry about selecting between iBeacon and Eddystone as they work across both the platforms.

Who manufactures these beacons and are they expensive?

Many vendors manufacture beacons which use Google’s or Apple’s implementation standards. Some of the popular options include Estimote, Radius Networks, Gimbal, and Aruba.

Beacons are not really expensive and cost around $5-$30. The prices differ on the basis of their signal range, batteries used, battery life, etc. Moreover, Facebook too manufactures BLE beacons for businesses and offers them for free to businesses that have their pages on Facebook. These beacons are exclusively designed for triggering Facebook Place Tips and to deliver business information to the smartphones of the users.

Why should marketers use beacons?

The proximity data from the beacons can provide organizations with physical personalization and targeting features which they generally find online. The beacons can help them gain more insights about the customer.

For instance, with the help of a beacon, a retail store can know how much time the customers generally spend in their store and the particular aisles they prefer. When you find that the customers spend more time on particular aisles, you can retarget your ad network to promote that aisle and can even send offers related to the products on that aisle to the customers to further increase sales.

Do the beacons have any disadvantage?

Just like any other marketing tool, beacons too have a few shortcomings. For instance, the overhead cost of installing beacons can be high, you might be required to match the color of the beacons to that of your store, keeping them stuck to the wall and knowing whether or not a particular beacon is working as the devices generally do not have individual serial numbers.

The limited range of the beacons can also be a problem. If you have a large area, you’d need a network of beacons to adequate cover the area. If you have purchased expensive beacons, there will be firmware upgrades as well as other management tasks which you would be required to take care of through Wi-Fi. And if you have purchased inexpensive ones, you’d be required to regularly check their whether they are working and are properly charged.

Businesses often get excited about every new tool or method which can help them reach their customers. For instance, if we talk about these beacons, several businesses get them installed without thinking about the overall implementation cost, who will manage these beacons, how will the problems be resolved, etc. The reality is that this technology is still pretty much new and marketers are still trying to figure out how they can use it in the best possible way.

It is important for a business to ensure that they are offering a better experience to the customers with the help of beacons and not annoying them with several messages. Moreover, there are also security and privacy concerns with regards to the use of beacons as they often transmit to the mobile apps on the smartphones of the users and ask permission to access things which people generally do not understand. This can affect the business negatively.

While the beacon technology has been around for a couple of years now, it is still in a nascent stage. They are currently being used in a number if innovative ways and are actually helping businesses who are using it in the right way. So, if you are planning to use them in near future make sure that you thoroughly understand how they work, how their problems can be resolved, etc. to use them in a way that can actually help your business.

Ref Link- http://www.cio.com/article/3037354/marketing/6-things-marketers-need-to-know-about-beacons.html?nsdr=true&page=2, http://www.infoworld.com/article/2608498/mobile-apps/what-you-need-to-know-about-using-bluetooth-beacons.html, http://academy.pulsatehq.com/bluetooth-beacons,