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As more and more Americans turn to their mobile phones for information, the potential for QR codes grows ever larger. (Smart phone proliferation surged above 50% in early 2012). So, rather than wait for QR codes to die or, conversely, assume they’ll be just fine, marketers should take proactive steps to use QR codes more effectively right now.

First, businesses need to have offers that are QR code-specific.

Second, there is a difference between using QR codes in unique ways to get noticed, and using QR codes in unique ways just to be weird.

The holiday shopping season has officially begun, and a new survey has revealed that shoppers are going mobile to find the perfect gifts for their friends and loved ones.

More than half of respondents report they are making purchases using their mobile devices, and nearly a quarter have used mobile devices in the past to purchase holiday gifts. The results also show that during the holiday season: -- 56 percent of respondents had made a purchase from their mobile phone; -- 58 percent of respondents will use their mobile phone to compare prices while shopping; -- 48 percent will use their mobile phone to find store locations that carry the products they seek; -- 90 percent of those who had made a mobile purchase said that convenience was a major factor, and 47 percent said ease of use was a primary reason they had made a purchase.

Because there are various types of phones, with various types of communications technologies on them, there are also many types of mobile marketing: SMS MMS Mobile Web Apps Bluetooth Location-Based QR Codes Banner Ads Mobile Websites

Mobile Website is an optimized website for viewing on a mobile phone.  Since smart phone screens are generally around three inches wide by four inches tall (or thereabouts), viewing a regular website often displays the text and images too small to read. By optimizing websites for mobile devices, your company can deliver a better web experience for the small screen user, thus increasing the chances that user might interact with the site the way you want them to.

A perfect example of a well-done mobile website is that of pizza maker Papa John’s. Pick up a smart phone and browse to papajohns.com. (It won’t work in a web browser, you’ll have to see it on your phone.) The site is designed so the on-the-go visitor has just a couple of options and can quickly do the most likely thing a mobile user will want to do on papajohns.com: Order a pizza.

Pew also found that 53 percent of Americans who use their phones to go online do so at least once per day. That's more than 47 million daily mobile internet users in the U.S.

Age matters. About 65 percent of U.S. cell phone users ages 18-29 go online from their phones, compared with 43 percent of those aged 30-49.

The Pew survey also showed that the majority of cell phone users experiencing glitches are African Americans and Hispanics. “This might be tied to the fact that African-Americans and Hispanics are more likely than whites to rely on their cell phones as their primary or exclusive phones for calling and for Internet access,” a note in the survey said.

The survey revealed that 72% of mobile phone users have complained about dropped calls, with some of them having the problem more than once a week. Some 68%, on the other hand, reported spam messages and unwanted sales and marketing calls. When it comes to mobile web browsing, 77% of people surfing the Internet using their cellphones have been struggling with slow download speeds.

Nearly half (46%) of American adults are smartphone owners as of February 2012, an increase of 11 percentage points over the 35% of Americans who owned a smartphone last May. As in 2011, our definition of a smartphone owner includes anyone who said yes to either of the following two questions: 45% of cell owners say that their phone is a smartphone, up from 33% in May 2011 49% of cell owners say that their phone operates on a smartphone platform common to the US market,1 up from 39% in May 2011

1. Mobile Shopping Doesn’t Equal Mobile Purchasing

2. Men Are More Likely To Consult Their Phone

3. Mobile Devices Often Trump Computers

A demographic analysis of those who scanned a QR code with their mobile phone in June revealed an audience that was more likely to be male, young to middle-age and upper income. Men were 25 percent more likely (index of 125) than the average mobile user to scan QR codes, representing 60.5 percent of the scanning audience. More than half of all QR code scanners were between the ages of 18-34 (53.4 percent). Those between the age of 25-34, who accounted for 36.8 percent of QR code scanners, were twice as likely as the average mobile user to engage in this behavior, while 18-24 year olds were 36 percent more likely than average (index of 136) to scan. More than 1 of every 3 QR code scanners (36.1 percent) had a household income of at least $100,000, representing both the largest and most over-represented income segment among the scanning audience.

Age: 18-24 2,402 16.6% 136 Age: 25-34 5,317 36.8% 211

Grocery store 3,546 24.5%

It suggested that 34 percent of smartphone users have bought a product or service with their mobile device, whereas only 20 percent of standard phone users had done the same.

Across all of these device users, there has been an 8 percent increase in interest for using a mobile device as a part of the overall shopping experience and to make a purchase over the last two years. Again, among both feature phone and smartphone users, 38 percent feel that being able to buy products using a mobile device is at least somewhat important. In this, smartphones feel more strongly that this is the case, as 59 percent of them believe that it is as least somewhat important to be able to buy something using the device.

“A year and a half ago, mobile users tended to spend considerably more time — an average of 64 minutes per day — using the Web browser on their phone or tablet. By comparison, they spent only 43 minutes per day in apps. Now mobile users now spend an average of 94 minutes per day using apps, but just 72 minutes browsing the mobile Web…”

“In March, the web browser accounted for just 18.5 percent of time spent online among US smart-phone users. Mobile apps accounted for the rest. Now we know why Safari for iOS capabilities advance so sparingly: Apple sees it as irrelevant. Stated differently: Safari is to mobile what Internet Explorer 6 was to the desktop 10 years ago. Apps matter more to both developers.”

Don’t include EVERYTHING on your mobile site. That means if you have 15 different pages on your main site, it might only be three or four series for the mobile version. Make it really easy to find the phone number and physical address. It is surprising how hard it is to find address and phone number information on many Web sites. Avoid unnecessary graphics that make the site slower to load.

The consumer uses his/her mobile phone to scan a simple QR code at the cash register terminal. The terminal is connected to Seamless' transaction platform and the QR code identifies the cash register that the customer is using. Seamless' platform then responds with a list of items entered and an amount to be paid. The consumer can thereafter pay directly using his/her mobile phone. The transaction takes approximately half the time of a standard card payment transaction.

The retail and grocery trade sectors currently pay high fees to credit card companies in order to use their services. In addition, they are required to invest in new card payment terminals every time a new standard is introduced. In the US, retailers pay $49 billion each year in credit and debit card fees. With Seamless`solution, retailers have a chance to halve their current costs.