One of the newest ways of mobile marketing is through a device known as Bluetooth. If you’re not familiar with Bluetooth, it’s time to get out from under the rock and back on top of the mountain of advertising. Bluetooth is a method of transmitting wireless information from one device to another. If you’ve ever heard of wireless mice and keyboards, the secret to their magic is Bluetooth – when a key is struck on a wireless keyboard, the Bluetooth connection registers the information and transmits it to the computer wirelessly, much in the same way that a wire would function to move information in a traditional computer setup.
This method can also be harnessed effectively for advertising purposes, particularly with the development of smartphones. All smartphones these days come with Bluetooth programmed in so consumers can use wireless headphones and transmit information from the device in a way other than traditional wireless communication. This Bluetooth toggle is nearly always on, so the smartphone is receptive to information that could be casting around the area.
This is a perfect way to step in for advertising. Bluetooth advertising works by setting up “hubs” in areas where you believe that interested consumers might be hanging out. A good example of a Bluetooth hub might be at a mall, or a dining hall at a busy college campus. Any place where there’s a high density of people is a great place to set up a Bluetooth hub. When a customer with a smartphone walks by that has Bluetooth activated on his or her phone, the hub will pick up on it. At that point, the hub sends a query to the customer’s phone, asking if he or she would like the information that the hub is sending.
The information sent by the hub can be anything from a screensaver to a coupon to a link to your website to ringtones to a multimedia display. Anything that can be sent wirelessly can be sent to a consumer through Bluetooth. The range of an individual hub can be between 200 and 300 feet – so if you’re at a convention or any place where there are a lot of people wandering around, think of all the customers that can be queried by your hub!
If you’re a startup who doesn’t have a whole lot of money to spend on constant mobile marketing campaigns, using Bluetooth technology can be a great way to get started, since it doesn’t require constant costs. If you’re heading to a convention or you have a booth in a mall, you can have a Bluetooth hub set up for that particular event. Even better, you can track the amount of people who accept your Bluetooth-sent queries, so you can effectively figure out how interested consumers are in your information and make adjustments regarding the broadcasting of information and your Bluetooth offerings.
