Thanks for John Spyers for pointing this out to me. I’ve heard a lot lately about the “contextual” experience. By that I mean, an up to the minute completely personalized experience based on more than just what a company knows about you. Now you can take into account all of the usual items like how good a customer they are, do they have a shipment on the way, and did they just call customer service. You can add to that things like, where are they and do they have a reservation. Where are they depends on mobile technology usually. iOS engineer Andrew Frederick answers the question on the difference between beacons and geofencing.
Here’s the really short version:
Geofencing – use of GPS to determine where you are. It’s useful and can pinpoint you pretty well but can be really tough on battery life
Beacons – use of low power bluetooth and a small “beacon” at a particular location. When you come within 50 feet of that beacon signal, your phone can react to it.
