Where did they come from?

Beacons came around in 2013 when apple released the ibeacon protocol. This allowed beacons to be used as location and proximity tracking devices. This led to them being adopted by warehouses to track the movements of their forklifts, people, and automated robots.

Later the marketing industry used this create research features that would allow a customer to be tracked inside of a store as long as beacons were distributed inside and that customer actively had the retailer's mobile app open. This is still used for customer behavior research to this day.

In July of 2015 Google's Eddystone protocol was released. This is the breakthrough that started what became to be known as proximity marketing. This is what this course will cover, particularly Eddystone UUID, which allows for remote control and advanced nearby notifications features.

Why is proximity marketing a valuable asset?

The ability to send powerful ads and user experience to potential customers that are very near to your locations is extremely valuable. This capability fills the gap that conventional marketing has had for a long time now. You could send Facebook and google ads to people located or living nearby a general vicinity of your target area, with some amount of targeting or you could show commercials to varies regions. What you could not do until now was send ads to the HOTTEST traffic around, people directly near your location. Large restaurants spend a fortune on digital ads to bring people in, when they often have thousands of people walking around them as normal foot traffic. All that foot traffic hasn't been targeted digitally until proximity marketing came along. Now you can target at no monthly cost most of that foot traffic with in ad placed in the most likely place they will see it, their phone.

They have too many creative uses to list

There are lots of creative ways you can use beacons and other proximity marketing technologies. Right now, retail stores are taking advantage of this technology, but a variety of industries can use proximity marketing.

Retail

Retail stores can send out information about ongoing sales and offers. You could even offer exclusive discounts to those receiving proximity marketing messages. These are great ways to incentivize people to come into your store.

Food and drink

Restaurants can use beacons to alert people nearby about how many tables are available and allow them to make reservations. And if the restaurant is busy, you can send the menu to their phones so they can browse it while waiting for their table. Or send a survey as they leave the restaurant to collect feedback.

Your customers benefit from improved and personalized customer service.

Travel

Beacons can help make transportation more convenient, a proximity alert which contains local information or a general help guide that is present on a customers notifications will be a tremendous asset for customer experience and managing a smooth flow of people in crowded areas.

Entertainment

Keep cinema-goers entertained while they wait for the movie to start. You could send them film trivia or quizzes to occupy them. Similarly, stadiums can employ proximity marketing on game days. Guide people to parking lots with free spaces and show them where to go to load up on food and drinks for the game. You can also send them info and offers during the game. Live stats about the game and the teams are sure to appeal to the fans.

Key limitations:

• They cannot push notifications to apple devices, not even if the device has google chrome installed as of mid November.
• Bluetooth and location must be turned on in order for the notification to be received
• Beacons send out “Google Nearby Notifications” which appear in the drop-down notifications  menu. They will not vibrate the phone or cause a pop up alert.
• Using the strongest notification method possible in this course (eddystone UID), you are allowed 40 characters of text as your call to action with an HTTPS URL under.
• Any link used for your nearby notification must be HTTPS, if your website doesn’t use HTTPS it will not show up. You can test this trying https://www.mysite.com If it shows up it means you have a secure site using SSL. If not, contact your host and they will grant you SSL for free or a low charge.
• Some beacons are not waterproof, others cannot  have their battery replaced. Beware of battery life for certain uses like outdoor hard to reach uses.

Do not oversell their capability to a client!

Beacons are incredible, but the limitations of IOS vs Android and Bluetooth + Location Services needing to be activated are things you have to mention. 65% + people keep both those on and android currently has a large majority of the mobile market-share. 100% of people will not be getting notifications. That doesn’t matter, most will and that is more than enough for such a low cost and powerful device.

Rules to beacon placement

1. There should be a straight line from the beacon to the targets phone, obstructions will diminish range.
2. keep it high, an eagle eye view for the beacon will allow direct beacon to phone visibility as opposed to it having to pass thorugh a person from the side.
3. If in public, people will be tempted to steal them for whatever reason. Try keep them hidden or unreachable.
4. Use waterproof beacons only outside, or place smaller non waterproof beacons in a tied balloon first.
5. If you need a beacon with range less than 35 meters, and you have a front desk area customers cant reach, use a usb beacon, they will never run out of battery!
6. You cant go wrong with a beacon placed over a doorway!

Considerations

1. Signal will pass easily through air, glass, thin plastics or paper.
2. Signal will have medium difficulty through drywall, ,plant foliage, water, wood, crowds, and furniture (if you place it low).
3. Signal will not pass or barely pass through solid stone, metal, or more than an inch of dirt.
4. some beacons are distorted by strong wifi, do not place within 2 yards of a router.
5. Microwaves, high voltage transformers, and powerlines will significantly mess with bluetooth quality, keep them 5+ meters away from these sources.
6. some beacons like the radbeacon dot are not waterproof but they seem like they are. Do not use them outside because they will resist splashes but not ambient morning dew or frost.
7. Place Beacons

Tips

1. Adhere to line of sight as much as possible!
2. Near exit signs but not on the sign are great locations.
3. over a doorway is usually an ideal location.
4. Avoid hiding it behind plants, posters or thin framed wood paintings are fine.
5. Allow your beacon to blend in, don’t single it out as you don’t want passerby’s tampering with out.

Tips:

1. Use waterproofed units
2. For busy streets, keep line of sight all the way up and down the street for maximum reach.
3. do not place it where people can get to it, try getting it higher up where foot traffic will not be able to reach
4. Hanging outdoor overhead signs are an ideal location for your beacons
5. When covering large tree filled open campus, beacons set to max range should be dispersed 50 meters apart for full coverage accounting for the loss of range from bushes and trees.

Balloons?

Put your cheap non waterproof units in a balloon, Easy waterproofing and you can fit the color to the surroundings.

Where will beacons start to pop up in the next two years?

• First off, mostly everywhere. Anywhere that would need foot traffic driven from outside, or anywhere that needs loyalty program sign ups from existing customers on premises.

Where will they see the maximum value in their use?

• Restaurants, to drive traffic and loyalty opt ins
• Events industry, to reach their target audiences where they gather most
• Any food or drink establishment on a busy center street.
• Large public gatherings, you can expect small business owners to begin carrying a beacon with them when they go out.
• Trade shows
• Just like google ads pays a website owner to host their ads, the rise of widespread beacons will allow a system for people to rent out their beacon space and get paid per beacon link click.

Where is the industry headed?

Mass Adoption.

Google and Facebook have a dedicated beacon team while Apple pioneered the tech. These three companies basically cover the majority of the digital to physical connection to the internet. With all three pushing the acceptance of this tech, especially with google giving out thousands of their beacons, it will soon go mass viral. Now is the time to profit the most from them, use them for your own business and be among the first to do so, as they get more popular the effectiveness will slightly drop. For digital entrepreneurs, knowing how to use proximity marketing technology makes it an absolute breeze to profit from it. You will be one of the only people to know how to set them up, and do so in advanced ways. Proximity marketing can be offered as both an up-sell or initial small trust building sell. White label a minewtech beacon, sell them at a profitable price, while charging a monthly fee to maintain their beacons for them and change them as per their request. This can be an easy $150 monthly for 3 beacons you can charge.

A beacon is a small Bluetooth radio transmitter.

It’s kind of like a lighthouse: it repeatedly transmits a single signal that other devices can see. Instead of emitting visible light, though, it broadcasts a radio signal that is made up of a combination of letters and numbers transmitted on a regular interval of approximately 1/10th of a second. A Bluetooth-equipped device like a smartphone can “see” a beacon once it’s in range, much like sailors looking for a lighthouse to know where they are.

How do beacons connect to the web?

You’ve probably heard of Bluetooth. It’s present in 90% of all phones and has been around since the 1990s. So what’s changed? Why is it so important now? While many consumers don’t use Bluetooth on a daily basis, it’s hugely important to the Internet of Things. Being in 90% of the world’s phones, Bluetooth technology means beacons are compatible with devices consumers use on a daily basis around the globe.

Bluetooth provides the infrastructure for the entire beacon ecosystem. It’s a standard for sending data over short distances, a wireless technology not so dissimilar from WiFi. This is why beacon hardware can be simple. There is already a web of Bluetooth around you that can connect beacons and smart devices and almost anything else.

What are all these numbers?! (reading beacon specs)

What is a beacon packet? Do you need those? Here are some notes on beacon specs and details.

• Battery life: Most beacons start with an 18-24 month battery life. However, some beacons with certain requirements and uses last some 6-8 months. Beacons with energy-saving capabilities can last over 5 years. How can beacons last so long with such tiny batteries? Easy! They don’t actually work that hard. They let Bluetooth do all the work, and Bluetooth is incredibly energy efficient.
• Supported format: Does your beacon use the iBeacon protocol? Eddystone? Beacons usually support both of these and sometimes the hardware manufacturer’s own format (like AltBeacon).
• Interval: How often can the beacon transmit its message? How often you need your beacon to transmit depends on your specific scenario. (ms=millisecond)
• Tx Power: The Transmission Power describes how far a beacon can transmit data. This can be as little as 4 meters, but many reach some 50-90 meters. However, it is not necessary that this number be humongous. A 50-meter range beacon can be just as useful as a 90-meter depending on the specific use.
• Packets: A beacon’s “packet” is the data it transmits. This just describes the kind of information it is able to transmit. For example, iBeacon contains one packet (iBeacon itself) while Eddystone has three separate ones.
• Sensors: Now, beacons are coming out with extra capabilities. They may include accelerometers, light or movement sensors.
• NFC / RFID: Beacons are still very new. For some users, it’s highly important that legacy technologies (like NFC and RFID tags) and beacons work together.

Eddystone is King of the Beacon modes

Eddystone UID – A unique beacon identifier meant to be recognized by an android device. Once recognized, it will ask google cloud what that beacon is attached to. When you set up your ads in google cloud, you are tying the UiD of your beacon to the ad you set up in google beacon cloud.

Eddystone URL – A very simple no internet required version of UUID. You can set up a Eddystone URL inside the beacon set up app without touching google beacon cloud. Just activate Eddystone URL on in the app once connected to the beacon, make sure all other protocol are turned off, and simply enter the https:// URL you wish for your beacon to display as a nearby notification. This is an inferior method because a 40 character call to action and advanced app  opening cannot be used.

iBeacon

iBeacon differs from some other location-based technologies as the broadcasting device (beacon) is only a 1-way transmitter to the receiving smartphone or receiving device, and necessitates a specific app installed on the device to interact with the beacons. This ensures that only the installed app (not the iBeacon transmitter) can track users, potentially against their will, as they passively walk around the transmitters.

iBeacon is mainly used as a device protocol for an indoor positioning system, which helps smartphones determine their approximate location or context. With the help of an iBeacon, a smartphone’s software can approximately find its relative location to an iBeacon in a store. Brick and mortar retail stores use the beacons for mobile commerce, offering customers special deals through mobile marketing, and can enable mobile payments through point of sale systems.

AltBeacon

AltBeacon is simply an open sourced beacon protocol invented by radius networks. It has its users in the developer community but it serves no purpose for proximity marketing and has no common adoption.

What are all these numbers?! (reading beacon specs)

• Battery life: Most beacons start with an 18-24 month battery life. However, some beacons with certain requirements and uses last some 6-8 months. Beacons with energy-saving capabilities can last over 5 years. How can beacons last so long with such tiny batteries? Easy! They don’t actually work that hard. They let Bluetooth do all the work, and Bluetooth is incredibly energy efficient.
• Interval: How often can the beacon transmit its message? How often you need your beacon to transmit depends on your specific scenario. (ms=millisecond)
• Tx Power: The Transmission Power describes how far a beacon can transmit data. This can be as little as 4 meters, but many reach some 50-90 meters. However, it is not necessary that this number be humongous. A 50-meter range beacon can be just as useful as a 90-meter depending on the specific use.
• Sensors: Now, beacons are coming out with extra capabilities. They may include accelerometers, light or movement sensors. Most beacons call this protocol "Telemetry"

My Reccomended Settings

Maximum range Setting 70-120 meters depending on beacon model

Tx level (transmission power): maximum, usually +4dbm

Interval: .5 second or 500ms

Medium Range 30-50 meters:

Tx level (transmission power): maximum, usually -4dbm

Interval: 500ms

Short range 15-25 meters (indoor room coverage):

Tx level (transmission power): around -10dbm

Interval: 500 ms

The Radbeacon dot is easily my favorite large beacon fleet option. Its cheap, has a replaceable common battery, and its range goes over 100 meters on a full charge. Also, its simple to set up, no online dashboard configuration required, just open the smartphone app and a minute later its set up. The added accessories are a huge bonus for those who would care to use them. No other manufacturer offers these. This is the EXACT same unit as the Royaltie Gem

Another all star unit here is the USB beacon. If you’ve got a need for a small short range (30 meter) solution, and have a place to plug it in, either a USB port or a wall plug, grab this. you’ll never have to worry about replacing the battery.

The X4 unit uses the exact same chip as the radbeacon dot, except it has a large and bulky case to fit 4 AA batteries. If you need a long lasting outdoor solution thats being mounted in a hard to reach spot, you can go for this. Otherwise, waterballoon your dots! This unit is larger but actually has a slightly shortrange.

Overall

Radius Networks is the ideal option for those not seeking a online management platform for their beacons, and those who want performance on a budget,

The Ferrari of beacons

Their beacons are the best looking ones by far, made out of a slightly squishy silicone. their shape is very aesthetic and will look great placed anywhere, they will also stand out with their funky colors. You cannot choose the colors, they will be selected for you. The location beacon is the highest performing proximity marketing beacon currently on the market with a feasible range of 200 meters, almost double what others can claim.

Estimote is a coders paradise. They offer an incredible infrastructure for software development using their beacons. They definitely have the most advanced platform and beacons on the market. With that being said, there are two models suitable for proximity marketing.

The proximity beacon  is their standard performance model. a 2 year lifespan and 70 meter range is fine for most, although a radbeacon dot comes at half the price and has a range over 100m

The location beacon is the powerhouse of the beacon industry. With its 5 year+ battery life and 200m range, its unbeatable. While 100$ for 3 seems like a lot, you can think of it like they do the job of 4 beacons at once. It looks great placed anywhere and I recommend that these beacons be used anywhere where absolute maximum range is needed, even at a greater cost. I don’t recommend you use these as a main beacon for a large fleet, but as a single beacon placed inside or outside of an establishment broadcasting up and down a busy street.

•  Beacon

  The best deal kontakt has, all have the same range, and very high battery life.  The incredible battery to price ratio is the major benefit of this unit.

     

• Beacon Pro

  A slight upgrade in range, but not much. This one will interfere with your wifi if near a router.

     

• Card Beacon

     A fun unit designed for trade shows to be hung on lanyards. Its range isn’t great but its form factor offers unique uses like being kept inside a folder or worn on a lanyard. It has an on/off button, so if you turn it off when you don’t use it.   

• USB Beacon

     The ideal USB set it and forget it solution for larger establishments. Put it behind the front counter at max power and let it be!

• Tough Beacon

     less battery life in exchange for a tough form factor that is waterproof and shatter resistant. This is the old Asirvia beacon before they switched to a Minew Beacon.

Batteries are non replaceable in these units!

Minew is the Chinese leader in beacon technology.

Minew has a wide selection of beacons, with only 3 currently that are Eddystone compatible. Their i7 unit is the exact same unit the Asirvia Go unit is. They are an incredibly well built product at a low price. Their E2 unit is comparable to the Estimote Location beacon, but half the price and double the size. They are a trusted manufacturer and will ship promptly after ordering via DHL. Expect a 1 week delivery time to your door, be wary of Chinese holidays which may mean they are frequently out of office.

i7 – The current Asirvia Go unit, for only $10 each. They’ll slap your logo on there for only 1$ more per unit. The performance is great too, 100 meters range and a 2 year battery life. They look like mini smoke detectors and nobody will bat an eye if they see it on the ceiling.

E2 – If size isn’t an issue, this is the unit to go for. Its incredible 300 meter range(more like 200 actually) and insane 8 year battery life is incredibly appealing. If you need a powerhouse to broadcast up and down the street incredibly far, this is it. The battery life is great, just max this thing out and let it go.

C7 – Another credit card type lanyard beacon. It has the same performance as the kontakt unit but for half the price. Get your logo in it for trade shows!

How to buy them?

They don’t have an easy to use online store, so you must message them over email stating what you want to buy and how many. Its a minimum order quantity of at least 3 units of one type. Payment is done via Paypal exclusively. Go ahead and email one of their salespeople listed below with our template. Keep in mind that Chinese business hours start around 9pm central time. Many of their beacons have non Eddystone versions so make sure they confirm the sale is of the Eddystone compatible version, also do not forget to add the invoice # to the note inside your Paypal payment or there will be a shipping delay.

Minew email template:

Subject: Sample Purchase Request

Hello, My name is name and I represent Company.

I would like to request a sample purchase to inspect quality, performance, and compatibility with my needs. I need all units to be Eddystone UID compatible. Can you please confirm that the units you will send will be Eddystone compatible before shipment. Can you also tell me the name of the IOS and Android app I may use to configure these units.

I see on your website the sample pricing so this will be my order.

3 units of model i7      – 10 usd each

shipping charge: $35 express

The total should be $65

please confirm your Paypal address and invoice # with me so I may send the payment.

The items should be shipped to this address:

111 example rd,  Beacontown, 10101 NY, USA

My paypal address is (myaddress@email.com)

Thank you very much for your time.

Sincerely,  name

Set up a google cloud project.

 go to the google cloud console.

1. make a gmail account if you do not already use one

2. go to console.cloud.google.com

3. sign into your primary gmail account

4. on the top bar click “Select a Project”

5. On the top right of the new window click the + symbol

6. Name your project! something along the lines of my beacon project or a company beacon fleet name

7. add an extension to your name under project ID like “name – 123456” This is for added security.

8. Click Create!

9. Wait 30 seconds and go back to “Select a Project”, if it appears and you can click it leading to a new cloud dashboard, you have succeeded!

Download the Radbeacon app in your app store

1. download the RadBeacon App from your app store.
2. Turn your beacon on by clicking the soft side, one green flash means on, one red means off
3. Open the app, and make sure bluetooth is enabled on your phone
4. When on, press and hold for 3 seconds until it flashes green times. Now its in pairing mode.
5. You beacon will now appear on the app dashboard, click on it
6. Turn off all types of signals except UID off,
7. Generate a namespace to represent your beacon fleet, this should ideally be consistent across all your beacons but it is not necessary, Click generate from URL.
8. Enter your website domain, or if you not have one just make on up to represent you or your business. Ex: www.myname.com  Use this url to generate the same namespace for future beacons
9. For instance ID: type a unique set of up to 12 numbers for your beacon. Each beacon must have unique instance ID or they will end up being clones and not be able to have individual custom ads.

Calibrated Power: Does not effect proximity marketing, leave it at -36. It only effects location tracking features for custom software.

Advertising Rate determines how frequently a signal is sent out

Do not set it more than twice per second as this will eat away your battery life at zero benefit. The law of diminishing returns applies here, faster is not better.

Transmission Power determines range.

3dbm =100-125 meters

0 dbm = 90 meters

-3 dbm = 70 meters

-6 dbm = 50 meters

-9 dbm = 40 meters

-12 dbm = 30 meters

-15 dbm = <20 meters (not recommended due to weak signal penetration)

-18 dbm = <10 meters (not recommended due to weak signal penetration)

10. Hit apply and enter the default radius networks pin to save the changes

PIN: 00000000

Go to Estimote’s site

1. click sign up in the top right

2. sign up with the email you purchased the beacons with, your beacons will not show up otherwise.

If your beacons show up, you’re all set to configure them in app. If not contact support and give them your order id, they will promptly assign them to you account.

That’s It move on the Estimote part 2 for mobile set up!

Download the Estimote Configuration App

1. download the Estimote App from your app store.
2. open the app and click the gold colored configuration section
3. click log in in the top right and sign in with the email and password used to get into estimote cloud
4. make sure bluetooth is on, estimote beacons are by default turned on and will be discovered in the radar screen
5. click the color of the beacon you wish to configure.
6. wait for the info to load up
7. disable all protocols except Eddystone UID
8. adjust advertising interval to 500ms-1000ms
9. adjust the transmit power to the range you need, there will be a visual guide on screen

Advertising Rate determines how frequently a signal is sent out

Do not set it more than twice per second as this will eat away your battery life at zero benefit. The law of diminishing returns applies here, faster is not better.

start.kontakt.io

1. Go to the link above
2. Click “create free account”
3. Once signed in, on the left, open the beacons tab and select overview
4. Inside your box is a green cd case sized piece paper, open it up and find your order ID
5. Click add devices, and type in your order ID, your beacons will automatically be added  to your inventory now
6. Now you can see your beacon inventory, set up your individual beacon ranges according to how you wish to use them
7. You dont need to add notes or change its name, these steps will be done in the google beacon management dashboard
8. Adjust the interval to between 500-1000 ms. This is how often the beacon will beam its signal. 500ms is twice per second, 1000ms is once per second.
9. Adjust your TX power to determine the range of the beacon

TX Level  Range Chart:

Level 7 – 80-90 meters

Level 6 – 70-80 meters

Level 5 – 50-70 meters

Level 4 – 35-50 meters

Level 3 – 25-35 meters

Level 2 – 10-25 meters

Level 1 – 5-10 meters

Level 0 – 0-5 meters

10. Scroll down and make sure only Eddystone UID is enabled, turn the rest of the modes off. The namespace and Instance ID are pre-configured by kontakt to be unique to you so do not adjust them.

11.  Set up the remaining beacons you purchased as needed, once thats done, move on the Kontakt.io part 2 to upload these settings into the beacon via bluetooth.

App portion of configuration

1. Sign in with the account you created for the web dashboard.
2. Make sure your devices’s bluetooth is enabled
3. open the menu bar inside the app, click “bulk configuration”. This will apply the profiles created online
4. You can make the same edits you made on web dashboard in app also if you find it more convenient

Minew App Only Quick Configuration

1. Turn on your phone’s bluetooth
2. Turn on your beacon which you wish to set up, hold the on button until you see a blue light flash from inside the beacon
3. Swipe down to refresh the screen and you will be able to see the beacons info, currently set to factory default
4. Click your beacon, enter the default password “minew123” to enter its settings
5. Enter every slot in the general tab one by one except 2 or “UID” and delete them by selecting “frame type” >”empty”
6. With UID being the only slot active now, go to namespace and randomize an EXACTLY 20 character code consisting of only numbers and the leters “abcde”
7. For instance id create a 12 character numbers only code to symbolize your individual beacon. No beacon should have the same instance ID as another. Ideally but not necessarily, all beacons should have the same namespace.
8. set up advertising rate to between 500 and 1000 ms.
9. set up Radio TX power according to the guide below for your proper range, RSSI @ 0m is not important and can be left at anything, but leave it at default.

Advertising Rate determines how frequently a signal is sent out

Do not set it more than twice per second as this will eat away your battery life at zero benefit. The law of diminishing returns applies here, faster is not better.

Transmission Power determines range.

4dbm =100-125 meters

0 dbm = 90 meters

-4 dbm = 70 meters

-8 dbm = 50 meters

-12 dbm = 40 meters

-16 dbm = 30 meters

-20 dbm = <30 meters (not recommended due to weak signal penetration)

-40 dbm = <5 meters (not recommended due to weak signal penetration)

Download the official google “Beacon Tools” app

1. download the official google “beacon tools” app
2. sign in  the app using the gmail account with which you created the google cloud project, and select the name of that project.
3. make sure your phone’s bluetooth is enabled, and your beacons are active
4. swipe down in the unregistered tab to scan for beacons, all configured and active beacons will show up
5. to claim them, simply click them and add a description you can use to identify them. Do not worry about provisioning errors or messages up top.
6. use a description unique to each beacon so you can pick it out easily, by manufacturer label, color, or handwritten note. I label all my units with a sharpie for mine and my clients convenience (1a, 2a, 3a…) so i can quickly look and identify what i’m going to be editing in module 8.
7. Once all your beacons pop up under registered, they can be found in the google beacon dashboard! Here you will create your nearby notification ad. Move on to module 8 to learn how!

1. Sign into the gmail account you’ve used for the cloud project at developers.google.com/beacons/dashboard

2. Skip through their little three page info pop up about beacons.

3. Select the name of the cloud project you created.

4. Now you can see all the beacons you’ve configured and registered with the beacon tools app.

5. click your first beacon you wish to set up.

6. fill out all the relevant info on this page to help you keep track of its ownership and locations.

7. Be sure to add its exact location and owner in the description, and then its general location in “place” and as a dot on the map.

8. When you have a lot of beacons, adding properties can help you greatly by allowing you to sort through all your beacons quickly. I add a property for what kind of beacon it is, and whether its mine or a clients, and whether its active or in inventory.

9. CLICK SAVE on top or the info wont save!

10. move on to section 8.2 to get your nearby notifications running!

Setting Up Your Nearby Notifications

1. Click the beacon you wish to insert a nearby notification for.
2. On the top left click the dropdown menu that says “view details” and select “nearby notification”
3. Add a “title” this will be you call to action and should be under 40 characters to prevent cutoff. This is the text that appears over your link in the notification.
4. In the “language” field, write “en“. make sure it is lowercase or your notification wont work.
5. In the central dropdown menu make sure “web url” is selected.
6. The production mode slider should be green, signifying the ad is enabled.
7. Test to make sure your website link is https enabled. If your website is www.myname.com , type https://www.myname.com and try view your own site in the the browser. If it works, you have a SSL secured site. If it doesn’t, contact your web host for a free or low cost SSL certificate, they will enable it quickly. having an SSL certificate on you website is the difference between “http://” and “https://”. Beacons only work if the link is “https://”. SSL is a form of encryption and is what makes a website safe to enter payment details or personal information. Note: never enter private details like payment info into a http only site while on a public network.
8. for “web url” type your link in the https format. If your website link is www.yourwebsite.com/yourlink , type https://www.yourwebsite.com/yourlink
9. On the bottom right, click the green “create” button. You should see the nearby notification on top now.
10. On the top click the green “save button” to finalize all the details you entered.
11. Your notification is now live! refresh your bluetooth or notifications and it will pop up!

How To Track Link Clicks On Your Beacons

-More Accurately Than The Royaltie or Asirvia Platform-

Consideration: Both Asirvia and Royaltie’s built in click tracking is heavily inflated and is a blatant misrepresentation of data and a lie. What they do is they add +1 view for every time the add is pulled to a phone, not every time it is clicked. So every time somebody with a phone walks by, it adds +1 even though most of those people did not even see or click the notification.

Bit.ly is a link shortening service with built in analytics. You can track all sorts of data about target engagements using bit.ly and it is extremely simple to use and get started. They have a mobile app which is great and simple to use, I recommend you download that and use it to track clicks and create links.

1. Register an account on Bit.ly

2. in the bit.ly web app management console simply create your short links by clicking create bitlink and entering the url you wish to shorten. It is Extremely Important that the link you enter is https:// enabled or else it will not work.

3. insert the newly generated bitlink into the URL field in the google beacon dashboard inside nearby notifications instead of the original website link. copy and pasting the link is not enough, make sure the bitlink is https://bit.ly/2paPdci and not just http://

4. Anytime you want to track clicks just go to the web dashboard or the mobile app to see detailed statistics. The app is fully functional and more convenient, so go ahead and use the primarily.

Mobile Phone Beacon Workflow

Once your beacons are purchased and configured. You will need to set up your links and nearby notifications in the wild for your clients. It is often inconvenient to carry around a laptop to do this.

1. Your beacons should be pre-configured and added to your google beacon dashboard already, or they should be configured and awaiting to be added via beacon tools to a clients gmail & google cloud projects you have or will create for them.
2. You can adjust your clients needed beacon Transmission power on the spot using the configuration mobile app for any of the manufacturers
3. Download a “desktop view” browser, meaning it shows the web page on mobile as if you were on a desktop or a laptop. You need this because google beacon dashboard does not work properly on mobile devices.
4. Use this browser app to access the google beacon dashboard in desktop view and then zoom in and out as needed to access the sections you need. If you did a walk in sale to a client and they want their beacon right there and then. Go to into google beacon dashboard and set up the notification for them on the spot using only your smartphone.

Android “desktop mode” browser

IOS “desktop mode” browser