At the same time, more print opportunities surrounding the growth of the technology have started to emerge.
Apple Pay enables iPhone 6, iPhone 6 Plus and Apple Watch users to make a payment at around 250,000 different retail locations in the UK using the NFC chips embedded in these devices. Although the service is initially restricted to a £20 limit for transactions, this is likely to be lifted in the autumn.
But, making payments aside, it is still not possible to interact with NFC-enabled items with an iPhone in any other way, which some industry analysts believe is holding back the technology’s growth potential.
Jack Sage, account manager at RapidNFC, which supplies NFC products to the international market, believes that Apple’s full support of the technology in the future will help its popularity to finally take off.
“We imagine that when it becomes universally compatible there will be many more marketing campaigns using NFC. The iPhone 6 does have an NFC controller, but it’s locked down to payments at the moment,” says Sage.
“Once advertisers and marketing agencies get on board with it, there’s no reason that they wouldn’t use print as a channel for their advertising campaigns.”
Separately, at the end of last month, Barclaycard launched its new range of bPay wristbands, fobs and stickers, NFC contactless devices that can be linked to almost any bank account. Like Apple Pay, these products enable users to pay for transactions up to the value of £20.
Barclaycard confirmed that the NFC stickers were produced in Singapore with further printing done in the UK, although it wouldn’t disclose the name of the printer involved.
Also last month, web-to-print company Moo secured funding from Barclays’ £100m Fast Growth Tech Fund, which it has earmarked for research and development and marketing. This will include further development into business cards featuring embedded NFC technology.
Although the technology is still untested by most UK printers, Heathfield-based Scantech Group branched into NFC around three years ago. Its aim was to capture a market niche and enable it to offer something different and unique, ahead of the competition.
The firm codes the NFC chips with the information requested by the customer in-house and then the chips are embedded within the print job. Methods used include affixing them to a sticker to place them behind a layer of print, or encapsulating the chips into a piece of plastic.
Low profile
Scantech head of marketing Åsa Burke says the biggest challenge for NFC at the moment is to raise awareness of the technology and increase user uptake. Despite this, Scantech has seen an increasing level of interest from a range of industries for a variety of different applications.
“Museums and educational environments are interested in using it for an interactive experience. We’ve also talked to the retail industry about NFC-enabled POS inside the shopping environment and also tagging that to particular campaigns around the product,” she says.
Advertising, direct mail and direct marketing are among the other expected key print-related growth areas for NFC.
The Direct Marketing Association (DMA) says NFC provides a quick and convenient way for consumers to act on impulse. In the UK, its huge potential for brands and in advertising is still just starting to be realised.
NFC-enhanced OOH ad display panels can be used by retailers as an extension of POS, which can entice customers into their stores.
Customers can then use the technology to compare prices and check into their loyalty accounts. Printed product tags could also be NFC-enabled to allow customers to instantly access more information while in-store.
Moving NFC to the next stage is Arjowiggins Creative, which launched its ‘Alive’ paper range, enabled for interactive print, last year.
Brand manager Jose-Anne d’Auvergne says a number of printers in the UK are already using the range. She says: “We are now working with key brands to implement the technology and integrate it in their campaigns.
“They appreciate that it is cutting-edge technology, integrated without compromising on print quality, and environmentally benign compared with plastics used on the market today for added functionality.”
The functionality of NFC can offer additional content, videos, web links and anything else that is available through enhanced connectivity.
D’Auvergne says a particularly significant advantage is the ability to change content by the minute at the link end, which can make a campaign more dynamic.
“Each tag is unique and you can tweak it for each recipient so that targeting of key and individual customers is possible,” says d’Auvergne.
“We are enabling print to be seamlessly connected to the digital world so that the two are married together. This will rejuvenate print by reinventing how it works.”
While there are still questions surrounding how big a part print will play in NFC’s rise, early signs point towards the technology being a potentially significant new revenue stream for printers.
As more advertisers begin to realise the major potential for NFC in marketing campaigns, and when Apple finally embraces the technology wholeheartedly, it is likely that we will begin to see print and smartphones working in tandem on some major multimedia campaigns.
OPINION
NFC offers many benefits but DM costs need to come down
Alistair Ezzy, deputy chair, DMA Mailing Houses Council and operations director, GI Solutions
NFC has many advantages for direct mail and allows marketers to deliver content via wireless communication with a touch from a mobile device. GI Solutions has been monitoring the advances in NFC and to date the limitation for adopting the technology has been the necessity to embed an NFC chip. Recently NFC enabled papers have been released and GI Solutions is in the early stages of sourcing and testing these papers.
QR codes offer similar advantages to NFC as a pathway to online digital content. However, as QR codes can be printed on normal paper and can be personalised using existing laser or inkjet printers, the additional cost of adding a QR code is negligible and requires no change in substrates or processes. This has led to QR codes being more commonly used in marketing collateral. The marketing challenge is to get the consumer to download an app that will read the QR code and ensuring valuable content making the use of NFC worthwhile.
The demand for NFC has been limited at GI Solutions with most clients requesting QR codes or just printing URLs. Our market is split between high volume acquisition marketing campaigns and transaction/billing mailings and both are extremely price sensitive and any increase in unit cost is carefully scrutinised.
One area that the NFC can be integrated into the existing portfolio would be in loyalty marketing to add value and functionality to the ‘card’ rather than just a points collection device. The chip can then be encoded prior to delivery ensuring that it is compatible with any communications or in-store promotions.
I can see the benefits in POS and packaging, where there is a value to the consumer in downloading coupons, recipes, product information, etc, providing the substrates are available to the printers. The testing for mail uses continues…
READER REACTION
How should print best exploit NFC technology?
Åsa Burke, head of marketing, Scantech Group
“I think print will be instrumental in the growth of NFC. You can now have a piece of print or a book that speaks to the customer in a whole different way by using a mobile phone as a channel. We’re seeing it a lot in product related applications, specifically for luxury and high-value products. For example, you could have tags on car dashboards where you could get immediate access to manuals and we’ve also seen it on wine bottles, where you could read about where that particular wine is from.”
Madeleine Kelleyan, designer, Novalia
“At Novalia we use wireless networks as part of our technology. Our Bluetooth platform includes a control module that allows each touch of a surface to be communicated to an external mobile device, and on to the internet. This allows us to directly connect physical printed media to mobiles. I think that print will play a role in the future of NFC as the interface between physical items and the digital world will merge as technology becomes smaller, thinner and easier to embed into more tactile items such as books, newspapers and magazines.”
Adam Unsworth, sales director, Plastic Card Services
“I think there’s a big future for NFC and RFID technology in print. We’ve always thought that if you can be creative and come up with ways of working with this kind of technology, rather than trying to work against it, you stand a much better chance of benefitting from it. The technology is much quicker, easier and more convenient for making payments so there’s a benefit for both retailers and consumers. We’re definitely seeing a lot more demand for the technology now and are benefitting from that.”
