our qr code!

take a look at our new custom qr code!

qr is acronym for “quick response”, and all you need is to open the camera on your mobile device, and you can scan our code. it will quickly add our information to your contacts.  it makes it really easy to get the information that you need in literally a flash.

to get started, we had to make a decision on where we wanted our qr code to direct people. with some qr code generators, their service is monthly paid subscription. i was interested in more of an open source version that i could integrate into my website.

i also wanted to print this on my business cards and wanted to have more control that trusting a 3rd party. i did not want to be limited. so… i looked and looked for a place that seemed to have it together and came across a QR code generator that i could incorporate into wordpress, our website’s choice of content management system.

a simple wordpress plugin called:

QR code MeCard/vCard generator

by stanislav kuznetsov

i could not only generate our own custom qr code that would be ours to keep, but could also direct our code to go where i would want it to go!

i my case, i wanted our QR code on our business card and for it to point to our vCard. imho, with information at our fingertips, it seems to me that for the past several years, really almost no one uses business cards anymore. they either look you up on facebook or instagram and add you there. but with a simple scan of our code, a link would be instantly sent that would contain a vCard that would contain our business name, phone, website, email and the ability to add it to your phone right then. all with a quick scan. i don’t even really need to hand the business card over, just let them scan it and put it back into my pocket.

that being completed, now down to the business of making our custom qr code – well, custom.

we do our own graphics in-house and we wanted a design that wasn’t as stiff as the normal black generic versions.  this one took us a bit longer to customize the pattern and color without losing the real purpose and functionality of the design.

we learned that qr codes can be quite forgiving when being scanned.  you could have a error tolerance as high as 30% and many times your scan would take you to the proper destination.  so some custom custom qr codes actually have the logo branding floating around inside the qr matrix.  but since it was going so slow, i didn’t want to push it, so i just stuck to the basics.  i knew this needed to go onto our business cards too, so i stayed withing the lines a bit.

once i finished, i then sent my design over to the fine people at Bourne Brothers Printing, a locally owned family business, and before i knew it, they had called to say that my business cards were ready.

so, if you were inspired by this, give it a shot yourself.  the possibilities are endless.

here is one of the coolest use of QR codes i’ve seen, integrated with street art.  scan the code, download the ebook free from project gutenberg.