• by Chuck Martin , Staff Writer, March 6, 2016

Beacon business is getting bigger.

When beacons first started out a while back, the focus was on a company that had beacon capabilities marketing to a business, such as a retailer, so that the beacon buyer could better target their customers based on more precise location.

Back in 2013, Boston-based Swirl sponsored some research that showed that women shoppers love it when reminded of in-store sales by a sales associate and that a majority (58%) would be ‘thrilled’ to receive personalized offers on their phone, as I wrote about here at the time (Mobile Shoppers To Meet In-Store Micro-Targeting).

The well-funded Swirl then rolled out its national platform, one of the first, so retailers could deliver such messaging.

Since then, the market has matured and some significant partnerships are being created to take beacon-triggered activity to the masses. Here are a few of the recent partnerships:

• Mobiquity Networks, which specializes in beacons for shopping malls, just inked a deal with the Coupons app to send beacon-triggered promotions to consumers. Citing research showing that 84% of millennial shoppers respond to push notifications, Mobiquity Networks intends to leverage the partnership for messaging shoppers in shopping malls, retail stores and movie theaters.
• Mobile advertising platform Opera Mediaworks teamed up with beacon network Unacast to provide beacon proximity data for ad retargeting. Rather than using GPS data, the partnership intends to leverage beacon-gathered customer data for ad targeting later, based on locations frequented, such as at the store or product level. The idea is to extend the life of the beacon data beyond the store.
• Scanbuy, maker of Scanlife, still one of my favorite in-store code scanning apps, partnered with beacon-networking company InMarket to add beacon proximity advertising capability to its product line. I’ve been tracking the QR code scanning pioneer for years, even before when they took over Microsoft’s failed scanning business (Sticking It Out In The World Of Mobile Commerce). The platform extension is intended to provide more opportunity to reach consumers when they shop, at the right time and location.

For marketers, beaconing has been one of the most visible component activities in The Internet of Things. And with the current pattern of major partnerships, beacons are going to be getting even more of a workout.

We’re moving to an all-sensing world.