Publishers using smartphones to increase magazine sale
By siliconindia   |   Monday, 11 January 2010, 22:40 IST   |    3 Comments
Printer Print Email Email
Publishers using smartphones to increase magazine sale
Bangalore: The recent increase in the number of smartphones and cameraphones has motivated magazine publishers to experiment with bar codes and icons that could take readers to Web sites. Smartphones have apps which can easily read the bar codes, thus allowing publishers to add new ways of increasing revenue. Magazines like Esquire and InStyle are adding interactive graphics to their articles, while Entertainment Weekly and Star are including them in ads, according to New York Times. In its March issue, Esquire will print Scanbuy codes in a spread on "The Esquire Collection - the 30 items a man would need to get through life," said David Granger, Editor in Chief. Printed near each item will be a small code that looks like a group of black and white squares. Readers scan the code into an Internet-enabled phone, and the code takes them to a mobile menu that provides Esquire's styling advice for the item and information on where to buy it. An application called ScanLife, widely available online as a free download, turns a phone into a bar-code reader. Versions exist for the iPhone and BlackBerry as well as Android-based handsets, and the app comes preloaded on many Sprint phones in the United States. "We kept hearing about different technologies that enabled people to close the gap between the inspiration of seeing something in a magazine and then going to do something about it," Granger said. Though Esquire will be giving readers information about stores where they can buy items, Granger said, for now the magazine would not be seeking a percentage of sales resulting from use of the technology. "I'm not sure we have a smooth way of getting a cut yet," he said, "but it would be nice if this takes off." Granger added.

Votal AI: Redefining Workforce Efficiency Through Ethical AI