NFC Hackathon triumphs

March 27, 2012 by Leave a comment

Last weekend’s NFC Hackathon showcased the possibilities of the technology: giving media agencies and developers the reigns on creating commercial applications using NFC.

Proxama’s TouchPoint™ platform was opened up to the creative community across the two day event  giving teams the chance to develop an NFC idea that would enhance interaction between consumer and brand. Each team worked long hours, with many working through the night to bring their idea to life.

There were many prizes available including an all-expenses paid trip to BlackBerry World in Orlando, tickets to see Chelsea in the Champions league, Samsung Galaxy tablets, a tour of Google’s office, tickets to see artists at the O2… and Proxama’s prize: a kickstarter fund of £10,000 development time to make the winning idea a commercial reality.

The winner of the kickstarter category was Team Blue Butterfly who built demo, allowing consumers to login to Wi-Fi networks in hotels, restaurnts and other public spaces, simply by tapping their phone to an NFC tag.

The other winners were:

  • BlackBerry Developer Group who created a Tesco’s shopper concept.
  • Team Rollercoaster with an idea to streamline the queuing and paying experience at Theme Parks.
  • PillIt with an idea to use NFC to enhance prescriptions by helping remind people to take medications.
  • StreetScreen created an idea around playing games on large digital screen with players using their own mobile phones triggered using NFC tags to control the game.

Filed under First of its kind, Mobile Apps, NFC Marketing and Advertising, NFC Technology

The Mobile World Congress for NFC

March 5, 2012 by Leave a comment

This year at MWC, near field communication was everywhere. Even the event badges and passes had NFC tags embedded in them (courtesy of key sponsor, NXP) so everyone had access to the technology. There were also a fantastic number of NFC demonstrations going on which showcased both mobile payment and NFC marketing solutions. This was particularly exciting for us, with the launch of Quick Tap Treats last week as it proved both the interest and faith that the mobile industry has in the technology.

We saw some great demos from BlackBerry, Nokia and VISA. It seems that all handset manufacturers now have plans for NFC phones. Apple were once again a topic on the rumour mill, with more and more people becoming convinced that NFC will be in the iPhone 5. With this in mind, we are currently collaborating with Device Fidelity on a version of Tag Center for the iPhone… more details to be revealed in the near future!

Another little snippet of information gathered was that the Google Wallet, although currently a US-only product, is likely to be launched in Europe soon, with Google having learnt some lessons and improving the latest version so that user experience and functionality is even better.

2012 looks like a brilliant year to be involved in NFC, and the Olympics will only make things better. If you’d like to explore the marketing side of the technology, Create London is fast approaching. The 36 hour event will give teams of up to five the chance to enter an idea for NFC and create it using our TouchPoint CMS. The winning team will receive a number of NFC prizes. More information can be found on the Create London website.

Filed under First of its kind, Mobile Payments, NFC, NFC Marketing and Advertising, NFC Technology

Tag Center voted Top 10 App

January 5, 2012 by 2 Comments

Tag Center Application

Nokia N9 users have voted Proxama’s NFC application Tag Center as one of their favourite apps and we couldn’t be happier! 2011 was a brilliantly busy year for us and we released a number of mobile payment solutions and applications into the market. One of our biggest campaigns was for VOX cinemas where we helped bring free movie experiences to Dubai film fans and treated them to some popcorn vouchers as well. Tag Center was a key ingredient in bringing this to life: vouchers, show information and more can all be collected and stored on the app. And we’re so excited about giving everyone a chance to experience NFC and contactless, that we’re giving the app away for free. We want to know what you think works, what doesn’t and how we can make NFC even more accessible and user-friendly.

If you have a Nokia N9, you can find the app here. Another Nokia NFC handset? Click here to see if your phone is compatible. To download the Android version, vist the marketplace.

For the full list of top 10 apps, click here.

Filed under First of its kind, Mobile Apps, NFC, NFC Marketing and Advertising, NFC Technology

Neil to speak at first WIMA USA

November 29, 2011 by Leave a comment

Chief Exec, Neil Garner, will be presenting at the first WIMA USA tomorrow. With WIMA Monaco already fully established as a must for NFC professionals and enthusiasts the world over, it’s American counterpart promises not to disappoint.

Neil’s talk is entitled ‘NFC for Mobile Applications and Enhanced User Experience’ and will explore the difference between NFC URL links and NFC applications. Other speakers at WIMA include the Head of NFC at Nokia and Group Head of Mobile Product Development at MasterCard.

If you’re attending the event and would like to listen to Neil’s talk, you can catch it at 11.30am tomorrow morning.

For more information on what’s going on at WIMA, click here.

Filed under First of its kind, NFC, NFC Marketing and Advertising

NFC World Alliance Formed

September 13, 2011 by Leave a comment

We’re incredibly excited about the pace at which NFC is moving and, not wanting to keep all this excitement to ourselves, we’ve formed an alliance with US mobile marketing expert Blue Bite and industry leader Tapit (Australia) so we can spread some NFC love around the world.

The Alliance will make NFC marketing solutions a reality for businesses the world over. Revolutionising traditional marketing media, the technology promises an interactive, highly measurable experience that will bridge the gap between the offline and online worlds.

News of our alliance has spread far and wide with articles from the Washington Post to Adweek and NFC World, and the response has been incredibly positive. We’re excited to be moving forward with NFC and the Alliance will make global implementation of the technology quicker and easier for all involved.

For the full story on the NFC World Alliance, click here.

Filed under First of its kind, NFC, Uncategorized

Getting up close and personal with Basketball Wives

July 27, 2011 by Leave a comment

We love this video of our Basketball Wives campaign in action. Click below to have a look!

Filed under First of its kind, NFC, NFC Marketing and Advertising

Hypertag delivers USA’s first marketing campaign

July 20, 2011 by 2 Comments

Basketball Wives

Following the success of our X-Men NFC campaign in London this May, we’ve launched the first NFC marketing campaign in the US. VH-1′s latest series of Basketball Wives is to hit our screens soon, and those of us with NFC phones can get a glimpse of the action just by touching a poster.

The poster sites are in bus shelters around the cities of Los Angeles and New York, and link through to exclusive video content as well as the show’s Facebook page. As more and more NFC phones come to market, we’re seeing an increase in advertisers, retailers, brands and network’s interest in NFC campaigns. NFC means traditional marketing media is transformed into something interactive and measurable as well as offering the consumer a more engaging brand experience.

For the full story on the campaign, visit our news page.

Filed under First of its kind, NFC Marketing and Advertising

World’s first NFC Murder Mystery Event

June 24, 2011 by Leave a comment

NFC Forensics

Yesterday evening a number of the Hypertag team had the pleasure of hosting the world’s first NFC Murder Mystery Game at Norfolk Network’s birthday event. The game was a huge success, encouraging delegates to interact with both the technology and each other. We wanted to do something different, and showcase how NFC can not only be an effective advertising and payment tool, but also incredibly fun.

Over 100 people at the event participated in the game. Delegates teamed up to take on the challenge, and each team was given a Nokia C7 as their ‘forensic tool’ for hunting out clues. Clues were hidden around the venue and the teams followed the trail, tapping items with embedded NFC tags to hunt out more information. They could revisit clues as often as needed to mull over the finer details of the mystery. Once they’d got an idea of the culprit, they returned to the start of the trail and accuse their suspect by tapping the phone to a Smartposter.

Murder Mystery Poster

The game was made more complex by the fact that some clues, when tapped, offered participants a choice of three pieces of evidence. They could choose to view any of the three but, once a choice had been made, they could no longer view the other two options. This increased the variety of clues between teams by giving them different pieces of information on which to base their final guess.

Participants said that the game was a ‘superb showcase [of the] technology’ and ’really enjoyable’ and many of the business delegates could see how NFC could help them reach the consumer in both a fun and effective way. NFC truly is the technology of tomorrow and we hope our Murder Mystery game has helped showcase just how far-reaching and adaptable NFC solutions can be.

Watch this space for more NFC fun! If you’d like to know more about what NFC can do for events, let us know. Likewise, if you’ve got a brilliant idea on how to use NFC and want to see it become a reality, get in touch.

Filed under First of its kind, NFC

NFC hits the mainstream

June 3, 2011 by 2 Comments

NFC is really starting to hit mainstream marketing and advertising. With the launch of the UK’s first NFC advertising campaign, and the interest we saw at Screen Media Expo in marrying existing DOOH with groundbreaking NFC technology, marketeers are about to bring a whole new experience to the brand and the consumer.

The first few months of this year have seen a number of exciting developments in NFC; evidence that 2012 is turning into the breakthrough year for NFC that market leaders predicted.

 

When CEO Neil Garner spoke at last month’s Screen Media Expo on DOOH, advertisers were interested to see the advantages that NFC can bring to traditional screen advertising. Past experiments in interactive advertising, including the Lynx Excite: Angel Ambush showcasing augmented reality, are a clear demonstration of how consumers react more positively and have a more memorable experience when advertising encourages interactivity. Augmented reality is just the start, however. NFC can allow for the consumer to take this interactive experience away with them, in the form of vouchers, coupons, videos, information and more. NFC means that the advert can reach further than its geographical location because consumers can share it with friends and social media sites. It also allows brands and agencies to monitor participation with the promotion, allowing for continuous improvement across subsequent campaigns.

 

X-Men CampaignProxama launched the UK’s first NFC advertising campaign in May, with collaborators Posterscope and JCDecaux. This campaign allowed for the end-user to interact with posters for the eagerly anticipated X-Men: First Class film, accessing exclusive video footage and having the option to ‘Like’ the film on Facebook, increasing awareness of the film amongst their peers. The NFC tags used on the posters were compatible with every NFC phone and included optimised mobile content, so the campaign allowed for maximum impact.

 

And it’s not just NFC proximity marketing that’s creating a stir. With Barclaycard and Everything Everywhere, Google and even more big-name brands releasing news of future mobile wallets, m-payments look set to become a reality very shortly. Proxama and Tuxedo’s wallet can already be used in outlets with contactless infrastructure nationwide, including Caffe Nero, Subway and, more recently, McDonalds. The photo below shows our Chief Exec ordering a Big Mac meal quickly and simply, using our mobile wallet.

Mobile Wallet at McDonalds

Filed under First of its kind, NFC

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