July 11, 2013

Time Inc.’s This Old Home is switching up its yearly sweepstakes this year with augmented reality, after using mobile bar codes for several years up to now.

The augmented reality contest is running within the August issue of This Old House. This is often the fourth year of This Old House’s annual Great TOH Giveaway, which lets users enter to win greater than $50,000 in prizes from brands equivalent to Kohler, MasterBrand Cabinets and Da Vinci Roofscapes.

“The main difference [from last year] is that we switched technology and at the moment are using Blippar versus Microsoft Tags,” said Scott Omelianuk, editor in chief of This Old House, The big apple.

“Microsoft Tags performed well, but we predict that Blippar is a technology which may let us do more,” he said.

“Rather than simply being a print-to-mobile tool that drives to an online page, Blippar permits a more multimedia experience that we’re excited to use.”

Mobile sweepstakes
In the past, This Old House has placed Microsoft Tags in the course of the issue to activate its pages, however decided to exploit augmented reality in the course of the third-party application Blippar this year.

This Old Home is the primary of Time Inc.’s brands to include the Blippar technology in the course of the magazine as part of a magazine’s signature platform.

To interact with the print content, consumers ought to download the iPhone or Android Blippar app.

A full page within the front-of-book part of the magazine walks users through the steps excited by using the technology.

Mr. Omelianuk’s editor letter also contains a mobile call-to-action inside the bottom right hand corner of the page.

Throughout the difficulty, calls-to-action encourage consumers to scan the page with the Blippar app for a raffle at winning the product featured at the page.
Scanning instructions inside the August issue

Once the picture is recognized, users are taken to a landing page where they’ll enter their email address to take part within the sweepstakes. From there, users can view all the products within the sweepstakes and check off which of them they need to go into to win.

Readers can enter the sweepstakes daily through August 31.

This Old House first tested augmented reality within the July issue of the magazine. Consumers could hover their mobile devices over the duvet to create a custom cover by snapping an image in their own homes and adding a custom headline.

The cover could then be saved to their device’s photo library or shared via Facebook, Twitter or email.

A call-to-action for readers to apply the Blippar app

Mobile engagement
Every year since its inception, This Old House was upping the ante with its Great TOH Giveaway.

Last year, the magazine increased the cost of its prizes and plastered Microsoft Tags through the issue (see story).

Microsoft Tags were extensively utilized inside the 2011 sweepstakes, raking in 234,000 bar code scans (see story).

According to Mr. Omelianuk, the initial engagement numbers point to augmented reality as being successful thus far.

This Old House also has an enormous choice of video content from its television series, which augmented reality may be effective at leveraging one day.

“Unlike quite a lot of magazines, This Old Home is a multimedia brand, and we have now a number of assets for individuals to milk,” Mr. Omelianuk said.

“Most importantly, we’ve lots of video assets,” he said.

“Despite its name, our readers overindex on technology, and our readers have an interest in using the sort of stuff.”

Final Take
Lauren Johnson is associate reporter on Mobile Marketer, New York