Meet Project Beacon – Google’s New Program
We were lucky enough to receive a beacon from Google’s new program: Project Beacon.
This exciting new program is now available for businesses in the US and the UK and it
helps make businesses with physical locations more visible (like a beacon) to customers with mobile
devices (read pretty much everyone.)
The setup was laughably simple: requiring only that you remove the device from the box,
place it somewhere in your place of business, then activate the device via this website:
goo.gl/beaconsetup. Activation requires a code that is conveniently located right on the
shipping label. The device itself is small and white with a triangular prism-shape and
rounded edges. It also comes with an adhesive covered by a strip that you simply peel off
to apply.
So how exactly does this thing work? After installation, the beacon transmits a unique,
one-way code to your customers’ mobile device. If they have their location services
turned on, your business will appear at the forefront of relevant searches that they make.
For example: if Joey searches for “bars near me,” within range of your beacon, the
chances of your bar showing up in his search is drastically increased.
The beacon itself does not store customer information and does not tie particular visits to
the individuals that made them. This is to ensure that your customers’ privacy is given the
respect it deserves. Once enough of your visitors’ devices have detected visits to your
store, you unlock even more aggregated features such as popular times to visit your
business.
This new program may prove especially useful to businesses that want to make better use
of Google’s current location-based services such as having higher visibility on Google
Maps, helping to provide more insight on how customers interact with your business, and
allowing user-generated content (like reviews and photos) to be gathered right from the
people that share them.
Best of all? The program is completely free! That’s right, all you have to do is contact
Google and request a beacon for them to send one right to you. With mobile devices
being more prevalent than ever, this device could help provide insights for your business
that would have been impossible before.
