One of the ongoing and vexing challenges of localized marketing is attribution. You know the story: most commerce happens offline but most influence happens online (read: mobile). So the name of the game is connecting those dots (cue John Wannamaker’s ‘half my ad dollars’ quote).
But of course, nothing is easy in life. Though a digital end-to-end consumer purchase path is easy to measure, we can’t all be Amazon. The purchase funnel – or purchase pretzel as it’s come to be known – more often involves disparate digital media and offline behavior. Connecting dots? Good luck.
Of all of the possible paths in that funnel/pretzel, broadcast media is often present at some stage. This throws an additional wrench into the attribution dilemma given trackability detriments in the airwaves. The move to streaming and CTV entertainment alleviates that to a degree but challenges still persist.
This is where GroundTruth and a few others have focused attribution efforts. And the latest from GroundTruth brings the good-old QR code into the mix as an attribution mechanism. As you may have heard, the company recently launched GT QR Codes in partnership with Flowcode.
Attribution Bridge
Going deeper on GT QR Code drivers and dynamics, we recently had the chance to catch up with GroundTruth. According to SVP of Marketing Dan Silver, it’s all about following demand signals and tapping into elevated usage and comfort with QR codes, especially among younger generations.
Stepping back for those who missed the announcement, GT QR Codes are delivered during TV ad spots. When users scan the code, it creates an attribution bridge between streaming media and their mobile devices. Subsequent foot traffic can then be tracked using GroundTruth’s core product.
This activity is – again – increasingly prevalent and comfort-advantaged. Consumers know what a QR code is when they see it. As for their delivery in a streaming or broadcast context, the biggest validation came with Coinbase’s Super Bowl ad, which saw 205,000 engagements and 27.5 million impressions.
Of course, that’s Super Bowl scale and real mileage will vary. But the campaign validated that QR codes delivered in streaming media can be effective… and consumers know what to do when they see them. GroundTruth acted on that demand signal, and several others, to launch GT QR Codes.
“Scanning a QR code has become very natural over the last couple of years, said Silver. “It helps satisfy that instant need for more information. Capturing that level of consumer interest at the moment of curiosity completely changes the dynamic between marketers and customers.”
Information Gap
As for the offline attribution that can follow behind the above scenario, GroundTruth’s technology kicks in to then attribute relevant offline behavior (which wasn’t the case in Coinbase’s ad). For those unfamiliar, GroundTruth has an MRC-accredited technology for tracking store visits.
“Going beyond standard TV audience targeting, GT QR codes offline behavioral targeting ensures that engagement isn’t wasted,” said Silver, “by giving marketers a way to reach customers based on meaningful attributes such as the stores they visit and their local real-world behavior.”
Moreover, QR codes could grow in efficacy, given ongoing consumer evolution. As consumers continue to gain comfort and confidence with QR codes – especially ones that show up on their televisions – this attribution modality will only improve. And Super Bowl ads could accelerate that cultural acclimation.
So altogether this becomes another tool in the toolbox to solve the ongoing challenges of online-to-offline (O2O) attribution. And it jumps in where there’s traditionally been a big information gap – television. This should bring elevated attribution capabilities to the $85 billion spent annually on TV ads.
“What used to be a single touchpoint of awareness can now be the start of multiple measurable engagements that ultimately lead to a physical store visit or an actual purchase,” said Silver.
