In the office we are trying out a new bluetooth device /toy, seeing how we can integrate it into our business and hopefully increase sales. There are major differences between bluetooth and SMS advertising that need to be understood from a marketing perspective.

Bluetooth as a technology has been around for a while, its uses have been varied from transferring small files from one mobile phone to another to wireless office applications. An example of the later is the bluetooth printer. Instead of plugging your printer into your computer, the request is transferred wirelessly to the printer.

So back to my project, the device we have pushes bluetooth messages constantly to newly discovered devices. The battery lasts about 6 days and weighs a tonne. We have placed it on the road outside the business it is promoting.

We are running with one message at the moment but the capability is there to send out a different message each day. We just have to set it up before we send it out into the field.

For those who may not know a lot about bluetooth/sms technology in a marketing capacity, the main issue one has to consider is privacy and ideally not invading anyone’s! SMS works by you signing up, therefore allows yourself to be targeted. You can then unsubscribe to the service to stop receiving messages. Bluetooth however is an automatic targeting system so it needs a way to protect users from being spammed. Prior to receiving a bluetooth message you receive a notification asking for permission to target you. If you say yes the bluetooth message with be sent, if not (you reject) you won’t receive any further messages from the sender in question.

The main benefit of bluetooth over SMS is location and cost. Firstly it is totally free to send and receive infinite bluetooth messages. SMS carries a fixed cost for senders. Secondly, customers are only targeted in the vicinity of the seller hence making the content more relevant for the user.

Time will tell if this will have a meaningful impact on sales. But it certainly is fun finding out!