Why beacon again in market…..?
Beacons are small, wireless transmitters that use low energy Bluetooth technology to send signals to other smart devices nearby. They are one of the latest developments in location technology and proximity marketing. Put simply, they connect and transmit information to smart devices making location-based searching and interaction easier and more accurate. In retail parks, office buildings and sports grounds around the world, these simple devices have proliferated. monitoring traffic flows around conference centers and offering special discounts when a user enters a particular venue.
And, of course, all of the major manufacturers have collaborated on a single, standard protocol which works across all platforms with no issues. Just kidding! There are three major standards to consider: Apple’s iBeacon, Google’s Eddystone and the open source Alt Beacon from Radius Networks.
How Do Beacons Work?
They usually broadcast a unique identifier UDID(and some other payloads), allowing Bluetooth enabled devices (principally smartphones and tablets) to sense when they are near one.
The identifier is a unique ID number that your smartphone recognizes as unique to the beacon.Once connected, the beacon will carry out whatever function it has been programmed to perform. We will go into more detail later on some of the many functions beacon can carry out.
Important benefits for retailers & Users
Here are some important benefits that retailers will be able to measure big data with the help of beacons, allowing them to make informed decisions and offer better customer experience:
- Accept payments in order to make billing easy and on the go.
- Send proximity-based notifications to customers at a certain time point and at a certain location
- Collect customer information on time and location for further analyze.
- Improve customer loyalty with special offers created with the use of background information.
More importantly, beacons allow mobile apps to interpret the users positions on a micro-regional scale and delivers content to the users based on locale. Overall, beacons are used for a variety of reasons.
- Proximity marketing for retailers to push notify their customers with content, promotions and offers.
- User analytics in which marketers collect and examine consumer data and behavior for improvements.
- Contact less payments in which the technology allows customers to make hands free payments.
Beacon Technology is change our lives
Beacons can be used for numerous objects including your vehicle, pets, children, camera, keys, laptop, senior, luggage, wallet or purse, tablet and much more. Anything that can be lost or stolen can be secured with a beacon. You can track using beacon. While this won’t actually prevent a theft, it will alert you.
Beacons can make finding the location of classes, labs and other venues easier. This is especially great for new students who have a hard time locating their class. Navigation also comes in handy for visitors, parents and during inter-school/university fests.
Beacons can help automate internal operations at hospitals. Hospital staff can be notified about their daily duties and other emergency duties on their mobile phones when they reach their assigned work areas in the hospital.
Beacons also use in hotel business. hotel guests can receive messages with welcoming, informative or promotional content during their staying at your hotel, via push notification. These tailor-made redefined messages can create real-time interaction with your customers with the aim of increasing your hotel’s engagement and revenue.
Airports can use beacon technology in conjunction with mobile apps to deliver real-time “day of travel” information directly to passengers in the airport, be it a gate change or flight delay. For passengers connecting to another flight, beacons can help the airport communicate directions straight to the traveler’s smartphone.
Beacons in the store, brands can collect data about customer’s behavior and sends personalized push notification to the customer’s device. For instance: Customers can receive “welcome back” messages from retailers when they enter stores or send special offers based on their shopping preferences.
Further Reading
We’ll post a write up on the specific Beacon App in Flutter & Swift implementation next week — check back here for links soon.