Almost 1.6bn coupons will be delivered annually to consumers via Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) beacon technology by 2020, Juniper Research forecasts. Furthermore, spending on digital retail marketing is set to increase from USD 174bn in 2015, to USD 362.1bn by 2020.
The key differences between BLE & NFC are that both beacons and NFC support mobile payments in-store; Beacons are small wireless sensors that talk to smartphones via Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE), while NFC uses short-range radio waves to allow two devices to exchange information between each other at a short distance, without the need for battery power; iBeacons have a 50-meter range, NFC’s optimal range is 4 centimetres (164 feet, 1.5 inches).
Furthermore, Beacons can push content, such as offers, location data, or personalised recommendations based on a customer’s preferences or shopping history. A customer must initiate interaction with NFC.
Also, not all phones have NFC, but most have Bluetooth although Bluetooth needs to be activated to work with iBeacons. NFC supports encryption, and its hacking risk is minimal due to its close proximity between devices.
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