‘Touch Point Browsing’ Provides New Proximity-Tech Possibilities

Touch point browsing offers a seamless way to browse digital information about nearby products and services by opening convenient gateways to the mobile internet, where shoppers can interact with and share digital content.

For most, shopping is a journey of discovery. Shoppers want to find the right gift, a special deal, some hot new product their friends don’t know about, or a new use for a familiar product.

And they also want to share these discoveries. Daily, we hear friends discuss the new things they discovered while shopping.

Touch point browsing combines the physical journey of moving from product to product with the familiar experience of web browsing. It offers a seamless way to browse digital information about nearby products and services by opening convenient gateways to the mobile internet, where shoppers can interact with and share digital content.

Digital touch points are these gateways. They include the three devices that are designed for different types of user-initiated interaction: wireless physical Web beacons, visual QR codes, and touch-activated NFC tags. This choice of interface makes it easy to find the right type or mix of types for any environment.

Touch point browsing leverages all of these digital touch points. Each one connects shoppers directly to location- or product-relevant content. These direct connections to the internet further enhance the shopping experience by merging physical and digital with easily accessible information, videos, promotions, and expert interactions.

For users, it satisfies curiosity. It both eases and empowers purchase decisions. It enriches the overall experience of interacting with in-store products. And in this world of social media we live in now, it simplifies sharing.

Touch point browsing is different from other proximity technologies because it is customer-directed, meaning that the user controls the pace and subject of interactions. As such, it integrates smoothly with the existing path of the shopping journey.

For marketers, rather than relying upon intrusive push messages, the interaction begins with a customer inquiry. Because it is customer-directed, the marketer learns both shopper location and shopper intent, rather than just location.

Of the touch points embraced by touch point browsing, each is already supported by a range of common applications.

• Physical Web beacons can be detected by popular browsers like Chrome and Samsung.
• QR codes are read by a host of scanners, browsers like Chrome and Samsung Chromium, and social apps like Twitter and Snapchat.
• NFC tags are natively supported by most Android devices.

Another key element of touch point browsing is that it is platform-enabled. Just like web browsing, where servers enable fast, safe previews of available websites, touch point browsing leverages cloud servers to give users speed, security, and previews of nearby content.

Centralizing the content management of customer-directed touch points (PW, QR, NFC) into a single platform has many advantages:

1. It creates a powerful in-app browsing experience for any mix of touch points.

• At the same time, it maintains visibility through popular browsers and social apps.
• Different content can be delivered to different audiences from any touch point.
• Results of location-aware impressions and click-throughs can be measured.

Touch point browsing is positioning to complete the merger of physical and digital for on-premises shopping. The combination of empowered shoppers, convenient gateways to the mobile internet, and dynamically managed content is a powerful solution that augments the shopping experience.

Touch point browsing creates new experiences and fulfills expressed needs. For on-premise shoppers, it offers a powerful way to discover interesting offerings that are not sitting in front of them on the shelf.