A new study from comScore reveals that 14 million Americans scanned ‘QR codes’ or standard barcodes on their mobile phones in June 2011. The data comes from the company’s comScore MobiLens service. It means that 6.2% of US mobile users scanned a barcode that month.
Users were most likely to scan codes found in newspapers, in magazines and on product packaging. In addition, the survey revealed that most of these people were male (60.5%), in the 18-34 age group (53.4%) and had a household income of $100,000 or above (36.1%).
Mark Donovan, comScore senior vice president of mobile, said “QR codes demonstrate just one of the ways in which mobile marketing can effectively be integrated into existing media and marketing campaigns to help reach desired consumer segments. For marketers, understanding which consumer segments scan QR codes, the source and location of these scans, and the resulting information delivered, is crucial in developing and deploying campaigns that successfully utilize QR codes to further brand engagement.”
| |
Number of people scanning QR/barcode |
Percentage of ‘scanner’ audience |
| Magazine/newspaper |
7,138,000 |
49.4% |
| Product packaging |
5,101,000 |
35.3% |
| Website on PC |
3,957,000 |
27.4% |
| Poster/flyer/kiosk |
3,393,000 |
23.5% |
| Business card/brochure |
1,940,000 |
13.4% |
| Shop-front |
1,850,000 |
12.8% |
| TV |
1,693,000 |
11.7% |
[Source of scanned QR/bar code June 2011; comScore MobiLens study]
A QR (‘Quick Response’) code is a square two-dimensional bar code that was first used in 1994. The QR standard is often used to encode a web address or contact details that can then be read by a smartphone camera.