Article

CETW: Retailers can locate their shoppers via smartphone

April 27, 2011

Location-based marketing is the latest way to touch customers, according to Philip Stanger, CEO of Wifarer, the company behind a software-only indoor positioning system. The system works on users' smartphones to pinpoint their location in real time in an indoor environment, similar to an indoor GPS.

"Our innovative IPS system utilizes the venue's Wi-Fi and our cloud-based system executables to locate a user to within 1-3 meters of their actual indoor location," Stanger said at Customer Engagement Technology Worldtoday in San Francisco. "Once they are located, we can serve them wayfinding, location-relevant content and provide the venue with analytics of movement patterns within their venue."

This means a museum owner, for example, will know when a customer is approaching a specific exhibit and could send information about it to her phone. Another application Stanger described was in a mall setting, allowing a restaurant owner to text a coupon to someone walking toward the food court.

"Wifarer provides a visitor with a personal guide through a venue and the venue with a way to monetize, analyze and optimize their visitors' journey," Stanger said. "There are considerable targeted-advertising possibilities inherent in the system."

Retailers must pay Wifarer to be included in the service, and a user only has to download the free Wifarer app once. The system, according to Stanger, was designed to automatically sense a user's location and to display only the maps and content for the venue he is currently standing in, presented within a customized app that is branded for each venue.

Stanger said the technology represents a quantum leap forward for the indoor wayfinding industry.

"Just as GPS revolutionized how people navigate outside, Wifarer's IPS is revolutionizing how they navigate inside," he said. "Wifarer is poised to become the default app for indoor navigation and location-based services in large venues around the world."

The latest venues to deploy Wifarer are The Gaylord Opryland in Nashville, the Prudential Center in Boston and the Boston Logan Airport. It will soon be in several convention centers, universities, museums and airports throughout the United States and Canada.