In this lunchtime #WPQuickies, I show you some great ideas on how to use QR codes to drive traffic to your WordPress website.
Quick Response (QR) Codes
Because of COVID-19 QR codes have had a resurgence.
With the Australian government standardising business entry check-in’s using QR codes, you can pretty much guarantee that every adult here now knows to scan and use a QR code.
So, now is the best time to use QR codes to drive traffic to your WordPress website.
Generating QR Codes
Generating quick response codes is pretty easy and there are a bucket-load of free online QR code generators.
My three favourites are https://www.qr-code-generator.com/, https://www.websiteplanet.com/webtools/free-qr-code-generator/ and https://www.qrcode-monkey.com/.
You can sign up for free to avoid ads and download the QR codes as transparent PNG, JPG, SVG, EPS and even PDFs for embedding in your marketing materials.
Both websites allow you to generate a range of different looking QR codes with colours and logos to match your brand.
Using online sites is fine if you drive traffic to a few pages on your site, but you don’t really want to be typing in URL’s all the time.
That sucks and is prone to human typo errors.
Free Plugin: Kaya QR Code Generator
This fantastic free plugin generates a QR code for every post type on your WordPress website.
Kaya QR Code Generator
It displays the QR code at the bottom of the post – you can download the image or embed it elsewhere using shortcodes.
You now have a QR code that points to anywhere on your website.
The QR code design is the one with basic black squares, and you can change the colour to match your branding.
Paid Plugin: UQR Code
This is a paid plugin $15 USD from CodeCanyon.
It also generates a QR code for every post type on your WordPress site.
https://codecanyon.net/item/u-qr-code-generator-for-wordpress/28863341
This plugin provides more QR code designs types – allowing you to embed icons and pictures in the middle of the QR code and some different eye-catching designs.
Well worth paying the small cost to get a QR code design that will stand out from the basic one.
Where To Use QR Codes?
If you are trying to drive traffic to your website, there’s no point displaying QR codes on your website. The exception may be your contact page – allowing people to contact you via email or voice call on their phone by scanning the QR code.
Yes: tel: and mailto: href links work with QR codes.
That reminds me of a time when I worked in a hotel bar. The owner just subscribed to Sky Sports to attract more people into the hotel bar.
He printed out laminated signs and posted them.
Guess where?
Yup, only in the bar.
What a waste – he was marketing to regulars and people who were already coming to the bar!
So, where can you use these QR codes?
Pretty much anywhere, other than your website. It needs to be something physical that people can scan with their phones – so don’t add them onto emails or social posts unless you are specifically displaying your socials on an external monitor somewhere.
Posters and flyers work very well.
Business cards are an excellent choice. They are pretty cheap to purchase, so you could print a batch out for a specific event and drive customers to a greeting landing page for that event – a nice personal touch.
What Posts To Link To?
The obvious page to link to is your website homepage.
Is this really the best URL to use though?
For brand awareness, maybe, but the value of QR codes is in the specificity. You can literally send somebody anywhere on your website.
Here are some ideas on where to send your visitors,other than to your homepage:
- Shopfront – give them a chance to buy something.
- A Product – directly target a specific product for customers to purchase.
- A single blog post – an article you are trying to boost engagement from.
- A blog category – have you been giving a talk on a subject? Send them to the blog category where they can get more information about that topic.
- A Landing Page – get your visitors to perform a specific call-to-action; sign up for this free resource.
- A Great To Connect With You page – I love this idea. It’s a great way to connect with people after a networking event or a conference. Record a couple minutes video telling them how great it was to connect with you at the conference – add social buttons and an email list signup
- A contact us page – engagement and connections.
- A file to download (after email signup).
- Google Maps links for directions to your premises.
What Posts To Link To? Phone # and Emails
A telephone number tel:+61280913634
An email mailto:[email protected]?subject=QR WPQuickies
Go on, give the above QR codes a scan now to see how well they work.
Tracking QR Code Sources
Don’t just use a plain URL in your QR codes – add Google campaign tracking parameters.
Help on setting up campaign tracking:
https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/1033863?hl=en.
Campaign Builder also has a useful article at https://ga-dev-tools.appspot.com/campaign-url-builder/.
Within Google Analytics, you can view your campaign data at:
Google Analytics > Acquisition > All Traffic > Source/Medium.
Conclusion
There you have it.
That’s a wrap for using QR codes to drive traffic to your WordPress website.
Experiment with QR codes for your next website marketing campaign and let me know how you used them in the comments below.
#WPQuickies
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