01. Introduction to QR Code Generation by MindFire

Modified on Wed, 19 Jun at 1:43 PM

MindFire enables direct mailers to add Personalized URLs (“PURLs”) and Personalized QR Codes (“PQR”) to each piece of printed direct mail.

When typed or scanned, the PURL and PQR (respectively) enable the recipient of the direct mail to respond online, which is a rapidly growing preference for both B2B and B2C markets alike. Because the PURL and PQR make use of MindFire technology, all subsequent activity performed by the respondent is tracked and making the work of improving response rates, conversions, and sales much easier.

As illustrated below, the PURL and PQR are often woven with the mailer’s call-to-action (“CTA”). The representation below is a simplistic view meant to illustrate how the fictitious recipient, the illustrious Mr. John Sample, can respond to this highly engaging direct mail piece by either typing in his PURL or by using his cell phone’s camera to scan the QR code.

The subject of this tutorial is creating the QR code, for which there are a few options based on your use case, capability, and workflow.

How to Create Personalized QR Codes in MindFire

There are multiple ways a QR code can be generated from the MindFire solution. Before we go down the path of which option is best, you have to ask yourselves a few questions. But before we do that, let us outline the options here - a detailed description of the options will follow.

Please note that the terms that are italicized are described in the Glossary section at the end.

Before getting into the details of each option, let us provide some information about which one you should select, based on your particular situation.

Which option is best for you?

We will go through a series of questions about your QR code project in order to arrive at the correct answer.

Q1. Does your VDP Software make use of a QR code font to print the QR codes? If the answer is YES, you are going to use either option 1 or option 3.

Q2. If the answer to Q1 was NO, then you need to ask yourself a second question. MindFire will generate the QR codes as image files and link each QR code image to a contact record. Do you have the necessary infrastructure to mail merge a large number of images, depending on the volume of data that you have? Remember, the larger your list size, the more the need for a robust asset management system and the corresponding disk space required in your VDP system. For example, if your list size is over a million records, you are storing and manipulating over a million images during this print job. We, therefore, recommend using a system with QR Code fonts for high-volume printing.

Q3. If the answer to Q1 was YES, the next question is whether you are directing the respondents to a PURL when they scan the QR codes or whether you have a more complex logic such as vCards, Google Maps or anything else. If you are using PURLS, then you can use either option 1 or option 2. Ideally, if you have been exporting QR Code Strings from MindFire’s legacy Studio product and using them successfully, you should probably continue to use option 1. Otherwise, if you are a new customer, or have a use case to use other than PURLs, you should choose option 2.

Q4. If the answer to Q1 is NO, and you are able to manipulate a large number of image files during the print process, you should pick option 2 listed above.