McDonald’s franchises in Columbus are integrating beacon technology, powered by Bluetooth low-energy beacon solution provider Piper, to give customers a new and better dining experience. By utilizing Piper’s beacon technology, which is supported by the latest iOS and Android platforms, the franchises can easily deliver coupon offers, timely alerts, employment opportunities and customer surveys right as customers enter the establishments.

“Everyone is looking at their phones, millennials especially, and that’s where we’ve decided to engage,” said Jack Pezold, an owner and operator of McDonald’s franchises for more than 40 years. “We know our customers and Piper’s beacon solution allows us to cater to their tastes, preferences and behaviors, making it easy for them to get more value and enjoyment out of their McDonald’s experience.”

Piper, a San-Diego based beacon solutions provider, partnered with McDonald’s to develop a custom mobile app for the franchises to deliver coupons directly to customers who opt in via their smartphones once they are in a close geographic proximity to the restaurant. Through Piper’s platform, customers can also personalize the types of messages they receive, to help discover deals that are most relevant to them, while blocking out messages that are outside of their interests.

During the initial four-week launch, customers who had the Piper app installed were prompted to save an Apple Passbook offer to their device. This offer is also visible and redeemable with Piper’s Android app. Participating stores are generating strong response for the advertised offers through both mobile and signage, showing more than 18,000 offer redemptions for the promoted items featured (McChicken sales increased 8 percent and McNuggets increased 7.5 percent from the previous month).

“Based on our current performance, we plan to expand our coupon efforts across multiple dayparts through Piper so we can continue to measure consumer response. We’re also adding additional Piper beacons to push employment offers and customer satisfaction surveys, both of which are having early success,” Pezold said.

Employment inquiries and customer service issues are directed via automated text messaging to a responsible party who is able to respond before a customer leaves the restaurant.

“We have to make it safe and easy for businesses like McDonald’s to reach customers where, when and how they want to be engaged,” said Piper CEO Robert Hanczor. “As the customer experience improves, we know that better informed customers lead to more engaged and more frequent patrons.”