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If you want your business to thrive in the new digital marketplace, then it's essential for you to understand how phygital marketing works. In this article, we discuss how you can develop a successful phygital strategy to help your business reach its goals.

What is phygital marketing?

Phygital marketing is a term that refers to experiences that bring physical and digital marketing together. Phygital marketing tactics take advantage of recent advances in communication technology to create novel and exciting customer experiences.

In today's world, phygital experiences can be found all around us. For example, voice assistants such as Amazon's Alexa are used by thousands of people to activate their alarms and have access to the weather forecast. Additionally, virtually scannable menus and digital kiosks have become commonplace in many restaurants.

What is MySmartJourney?

What does phygital marketing aim for?

The main goal of phygital marketing is to implement physical marketing strategies that are complemented by digital technology. By using solutions such as NFC tags, digital kiosks, and QR codes, one can create seamless experiences that break the line between the physical and digital worlds.

The world is going through an unprecedented digital transformation and we are more dependent on technology than ever before. However, our interest in having close and personalized physical experiences has not dwindled. Digital marketing strategies offered through a phygital medium allow us to have the best of both worlds.

Phygital marketing combines the best aspects of the digital customer experience with the most appealing characteristics of offline, real-world interactions. When appropriately implemented, this marriage between physical and digital marketing efforts results in very fluid customer journeys. 

Why should businesses adopt a phygital marketing strategy?

Phygitial strategies allow businesses to spice up marketing campaigns and shopping experiences with digital content. A phygital solution can bring customer interactions to a whole new level.

Nowadays, customer satisfaction relies heavily on immersive experiences. Companies can use phygital tactics to keep customers engaged without any physical interaction. Since customers can engage with phygital content at their own leisure, businesses can use them to offer personalized experiences.

Another major benefit of phygital marketing experiences is their capacity to provide an easy avenue for communication with the customer. For instance, retail stores can use NFC technology to bring perks of the online shopping experience, such as product recommendations, to their physical locations.

A phygital marketing strategy offers the following benefits:

• Using technology to your advantage: Smartphones, NFC tags, QR codes, and other technologies can improve engagement, streamline customer journeys, and offer many other advantages.

• Creating unforgettable moments: Well-executed phygital strategies can create experiences that stay with people for years on end. Customers will associate the feelings of joy and awe experienced via phygital moments with the brand.
• Learning more about your target audience: A phygital strategy combines several communication channels, allowing a company to gather a vast amount of data about its customer base. By asking customers to provide feedback and write reviews, you can discover the strengths and weaknesses of your business and learn what your audience wants.

What are the benefits of phygical marketing for cities?

7 steps to develop a phygital marketing strategy

1. Do the appropriate research

The best phygital approach for a business depends on the way it normally addresses its audience. A brick-and-mortar shop's phygital tactics will be very different from those of a primarily online business.

For instance, if a company functions mainly as an e-commerce, physical experiences can be provided via pop-up stores. These short-term rental solutions can help bring an online brand experience to physical retail spaces and reach potential customers in the process. Customers can develop stronger brand loyalty with a digital business after meeting them in the real world.

On the other hand, businesses that base their operations around a physical location can use a digital strategy to enhance their real-life experiences. The right digital component may depend on the nature of a business. For example, restaurants and coffee shops can use phygital technology to display their menus, offer discounts, and handle payments.

2. Invest in NFC technology

NFC technology makes it incredibly easy to create seamless customer experiences. Near Field Communication (NFC) is a type of digital communication that uses devices capable of quickly sharing information. NFC is used in electronic identity documents, contactless payment systems, identity access tokens, and even for social networking. The majority of smartphones are manufactured with some kind of NFC functionality in mind.

Retail businesses and pop-up shops can take advantage of NFC technology to bring their phygital strategies to fruition. An NFC tag can play the role of a marketing channel, a digital payment kiosk, a source of information, and much more. The digital experience offered by NFC is only limited by the imagination of the individual who implements it.

Because many modern mobile devices have built-in NFC technology, phygital retail can make use of a device's functionality to deliver text, images, audio, and video directly to a customer. Users can use NFC to learn more about specific products, gain access to discounts and special offers, and enhance their shopping experience, all directly from their smartphones.

3. Don’t neglect your social media platforms

Your social media sites should be an integral component of your phygital strategy. Having a solid social media presence has many advantages, including being closer to your customers and their opinions. Social media also offers a wealth of information about your customer base and the things that make them tick. By reviewing and analyzing this info, you can gain a clearer view of your business's strengths and weaknesses. This way, you can keep doing the things that work and iron out the ones that don't.

4. Develop an omnichannel strategy

An omnichannel strategy combines brick-and-mortar locations, social media platforms, websites, email, and mobile to create a cohesive customer experience. When all communication channels are working efficiently and together, customers gain access to a complete phygital content marketing experience.

5. Map the customer journey

The purpose of a phygital experience is to create seamless transitions between the physical and the digital worlds throughout the customer journey. To make the best out of it, you should put yourself in the shoes of the customer and navigate through the multiple steps of a successful purchase. Identify the roadblocks that keep customers from going further along their journey and devise phygital strategies to circumvent them.

What is a digital customer journey?

6. Prepare your staff to handle phygital experiences

As retail and marketing change with the times, so do the required skills of your workforce. If you implement phygital tactics into your business, you must make sure that your in-store staff is well versed in how your newly appointed digital services work.

Understanding the capabilities of the phygital features in place will allow workers to use them to complement their assignments. For instance, if a customer asks a staff member for a specific product, they can use a phygital solution to provide more in-depth info with images and video. Likewise, staff should be ready to provide assistance to any customer who is facing technical difficulties with digital products.

7. Consider implementing wearable tech

Depending on the nature of your business, you may use NFC-powered wearable technology to create engaging experiences. When implemented by hospitality services or during events, the technology can be used to easily exchange contact information and perform other activities.

NFC wearable devices are able to:

• Help attendees navigate an event
• Bookmark places or sessions
• Allow or deny guests and personnel access to restricted areas
• Enable contactless signups
• Provide staff with a clear communication channel
• Manage the flow of traffic, thus preventing bottlenecks
• Handle secure transactions
• Provide companies with metrics and analytics

Phygital marketing in museums

Create personalized phygital experiences with MySmartJourney

MySmartJourney offers you the best tools to implement your phygital strategies. Our contactless technology is an easy, quick, and fun way of creating innovative experiences.  The MySmartJourney platform is 100% web-based. This means that users can use it from any sort of device without the need to install an app. 

With MySmartJourney, you are empowered to create unique phygital experiences without needing to learn any programming or wait long development times. The technology is read-to-deploy and can seamlessly integrate into your plans and strategies.

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As the travel industry continues to evolve, keeping up with changing trends becomes essential for both travelers and tourism businesses. In this article, we explore the key travel trends in 2023, from budget-friendly stays to immersive experiences and technological advances.

10 Best tourism and travel trends of 2023

1. Bleisure travelers

One of the most exciting new trends in business travel and tourism is the rise of the bleisure traveler. The word "bleisure" (a portmanteau of business and leisure) represents a growing number of global travelers who willingly extend their business trips to leave time for leisure travel activities. As globalization paves the way for a new generation of digital nomads, we can expect more bleisure travelers in 2023. 

Travel companies can take advantage of the attitudes of bleisure travelers to offer services which are ideal for them. While many bleisure trips are pre-planned and scheduled, other people travel to meetings, conferences, or other work engagements and only start planning their leisure time afterward. Tour operators can offer packages designed for these individuals, giving them tourist experiences tailor-made for their extended stays.

2. Automation in the travel and tourism industry

Digitalization has changed the face of the travel industry. Back in the day, one had to make a phone call or speak face-to-face with a service provider in order to plan their vacation. In 2023, it is possible to make all your bookings online, allowing travelers to plan their escapades from the comfort of their preferred devices. In fact, mobile booking can change the way the tourist industry operates.

Specialized, mobile booking systems offer many benefits to tourism and hospitality companies. Not only is it easier to sell services to customers, but implementing technology also eliminates the need for spreadsheets and pen and paper reservations. Because mobile booking systems can handle organizational tasks automatically, companies can save time, and money.

What is MySmartJourney?

3. Personalized travel experiences

Many modern travelers are interested in unique experiences tailored to their personal sensibilities. From the moment they see an advert on the Internet, they set a particular set of expectations of what their trip should be like. While some individuals want to travel somewhere to relax, others want to find the best places for a night out.

According to Thinking with Google, more than half of U.S. travelers consider that brands should tailor their information to their personal preferences. Over 30% of U.S. travelers would be likely to pay more to have their personal preferences or past behavior considered by travel companies (source).

Businesses can keep up-to-date with current trends in travel and tourism by offering flexible experiences that are tailored to a traveler's needs. Using platforms like Google and Facebook, travel companies can listen to customers to learn more about what they are looking for in their next trip.

4. Emerging technologies influence travel

Using new technologies is one of the most exciting ways to create immersive experiences for travelers. NFC technology, QR codes, virtual reality, and many other marvels of digital origin can be used in real-life environments to give visitors an unforgettable escapade.

Thanks to Near Field Communications (NFC) technology, it is possible to provide digital journeys to visitors. Using this type of technology, users can instantly receive text, images, audio, and video directly to their mobile devices. This way, travelers can interact with the places they visit and engage in a myriad of activities.

What is phygital marketing?

5. Sustainable tourism

In 2023, there is a considerable incentive for tourists to make sustainable travel decisions. Taking care of the environment ensures the beautiful vistas and exotic locales that attract visitors are still available for future generations. 

Sustainable travel choices can go beyond taking care of the environment. Through sustainable travel practices, visitors can positively influence cultures, economies, and the lives of the people they visit. Responsibly planned and managed tourism supports job creation, conserves biodiversity, and improves human well-being.

6. Active ecotourism

Active ecotourism is another growing sustainable travel trend. This type of tourism combines a love for travel with taking action to preserve local cultures and environments. Eco-travel is very advantageous to local economies. It promotes conscious land development while protecting biodiversity. Active ecotourists understand the importance of preservation and wish their favorite tourist destinations to stay alive and beautiful.

People who practice ecotourism are concerned with their environmental impact and the effect their activities have on local communities. While interested in exploring the outdoors and performing activities such as hiking, biking, and kayaking, eco-travel enthusiasts also want to value local traditions, interact with the local language, and learn more about different cultures and beliefs.

7. Transformative travel

Transformative travel combines leisure time, introspection, and volunteer work to create a new, authentic experience. The purpose of transformative travel is to create a positive impact in the lives of others and one's own.

While travelers on a transformative journey still enjoy a vacation, they set some time aside to volunteer at their destinations. During their free time, they may join a retreat, join a yoga class, visit nature-filled locales, or learn a new skill. A person's diet is also meant to be transformative as travelers are to avoid unhealthy meals and opt for nutritious and organic foods.

How museums benefit from QR and NFC technologies

8. Wellness travel

Wellness travel is one of the fastest-growing tourism trends. A considerable number of hotels and resorts are taking the initiative and offering customers daily cognitive health scans, nutritious food options, and relaxing amenities. More often than not, the wellness travel market is associated with providing healthy experiences. However, travel companies can also reach out to wellness-inclined clients with the promise of invigorating physical activity. Physical wellness activities can include hiking trails, pickleball courts, and skiing trips. 

9. The return of extended, long-distance trips

The coronavirus pandemic had an overwhelmingly negative impact on the tourist industry. Not only were international travel restrictions very dire for the industry, but a considerable portion of the population was averse to even leave the house. Many people have opted for staycations instead of traveling in recent years. Nonetheless, in 2023, tourists are yearning to go on adventures once again.

According to Evolve's travel forecasts, the vast majority of respondents are eager to travel regardless of the pandemic's aftermath. Over 85% of respondents are looking forward to booking vacation rentals, and the average trip length is estimated to be around 5 to 7 nights (source). A factor that contributes greatly to this increase is the appearance of hybrid and mobile work models. As these give employees more flexibility to get their work done, they have more time to stretch their legs and see the world.

10. Experience tourism

In the past, the job of a tourism agency was to help people reach far-off destinations. However, international travel in 2023 should provide more than that. To keep up with the times, travel companies must provide their customers with life-changing, authentic experiences.

According to research, 72% of millennials are more interested in spending money on experiences than on materialistic things. Rather than going to the Bahamas to impress their in-laws, millennial customers would rather tour Vietnam on a scooter, rock out at a music festival, or hike Machu Picchu (source).

Experiential travel goes beyond the mere purchase of plane tickets and hotel bookings. Modern travelers wish to develop an emotional connection with the places and cultures they visit. Instead of looking for traditional, cookie-cutter vacations in tourist hot spots, more and more people are looking to travel as a means to learn more about the world and themselves.

Travel companies can cater to this new breed of tourists by offering locally sourced, unique experiences. For example, businesses can help tourists interact with local customs by providing food sampling experiences and teaching customers how to prepare some of the local dishes.

Create unique experiences with MySmartJourney

Design and deploy engaging digital journeys for tourist destinations and cultural sites with MySmartJourney. Powered by NFC technology and QR codes, MySmartJourney is a 100% web-based application that can work on any mobile device without the need to install an app.

By using the MySMartJourney NFC functionality, tour builders can broadcast text, images, audio, video, and 3D content directly to users. The platform's flexibility allows it to be implemented in local attractions and remote locations alike.

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In the era of the digital revolution, museums and cultural sites are facing important challenges. The question is how to take advantage of technological innovation to bring the visitor into close contact with heritage. Digital cultural mediation projects are part of this approach and offer avenues for proposing interactive and attractive content to a new audience that is familiar with digital tools.

What is digital cultural mediation?

Cultural mediation consists of establishing spaces for dialogue between the participants in a cultural experience, the artists and the cultural organization. It aims to stimulate public participation in cultural life in order to encourage forms of personal and collective appropriation.

Digital cultural mediation is defined as a set of digital technologies and computer supports implemented in physical or virtual places to meet the objectives of cultural mediation. It is important to distinguish between the use of digital technology to create traditional presentation objects such as digitized guidebooks in PDF format or audio guides and forms that exploit digital technology to create an interactive interface between the user and the cultural content. 

In this second case, it is an aid to the visit. These digital mediation devices are developed through computer programming using networks and software applications such as websites, mobile applications and social networks, and different media forms (image, video, text and audio).

What are the challenges of digital cultural mediation?

The development of information and communication technology (ICT) is a major challenge for cultural institutions. Digital mediation is increasingly appreciated and used by a wide category of the public, including single people, elderly couples, young people and teenagers. Multimedia tools complement the traditional text-based narrative. This leads us to ask some fundamental questions:

• How to enhance cultural content through digital devices?
• How can digital technology be used to serve the visitor and the educational discourse?
• What impact will digital mediation have on the visitor's experience of a museum or other cultural site?

The difference between teaching and cultural mediation

Museums and cultural sites are ideal places for learning and discovering historical and artistic heritage. Teaching through cultural visits provides useful information for learners to better understand museum collections or works of art. This is in addition to transmissions based on static documents or the intervention of a guide-lecturer to create a friendly atmosphere between the visitor and the cultural environment.

Cultural mediation aims to make the educational experience more dynamic and active by acting on emotions and feelings. Cultural mediation activities should:

• Accompany the visitor throughout the learning process;
• Reinforce the visitor's motivation to learn by himself;
• Stimulate critical thinking;
• Create a pleasure of learning;
• Adapt to the various expectations of visitors.

How to implement cultural mediation in museums?

From cultural mediation to digital mediation

In order to strengthen the links between the public and the cultural space, it is important to make the visitor's journey more attractive and immersive. Static observation of a work of art or cultural heritage can lead to a form of passivity despite the presence of content written on a label or the distribution of audio guides.

Digital mediation is at the service of cultural mediation. It fully engages the visitor through interactive screens, QR codes, NFC technology and applications that engage users to explore, search, compare, feel, act and express themselves. Digital mediation practices offer an excellent opportunity to activate perceptual memory.

Digital mediation in museums

Cultural mediation devices are evolving to take advantage of technological development. They can be classified into two types:

• Mobile tools that accompany visitors throughout their visit (web applications, NFC technology, etc.);
• Fixed tools installed such as tactile tables, lighting devices, video projections, etc.);

Digital mediation also includes fun activities such as games to animate the visit of children or virtual logbooks to keep n unforgettable memory of the visit. There are many ways to create a new experience in a museum. The common interest is to help the public to appropriate the work, the place and to explore its history. Augmented reality (AR) is one of the most popular modern digital devices. However, there are many other effective techniques for achieving these goals.

Discover the historical context of heritage in augmented reality

AR makes it possible to restore missing elements of historical heritage and make them visible in 3D. This facilitates the understanding of the significance of physical monuments (buildings, collections of objects, works of art, archives, etc.) as well as aspects of intangible heritage (languages, ways of life, skills, beliefs, customs, etc.).

Revealing the secrets of a work of art with augmented reality

Through applications designed for digital arts, AR allows the visitor to discover a work of art in depth by focusing on its size, the identity of its characters, its artistic complexity and its symbol. It is a unique audiovisual experience that immerses the visitor in the universe of the artwork.

Phygital marketing in museums

What kind of organizations benefit from digital cultural mediation?

Digital cultural mediation is integrated in different places and sectors of activity. It serves as a tool for social inclusion and for integrating the arts into public environments to make them more enjoyable. 

As an example, here is a list of organizations that benefit from digital cultural mediation:

• Cultural institutions: libraries, cultural centres, art galleries, etc;
• Museums and heritage institutions: museums, historic castles, cathedrals, archaeological sites, etc;
• Schools;
• Parks and public places;
• Circuits and tourist routes;
• And so on.

Examples of innovative digital cultural mediation tools

Many cultural venues around the world have invested in innovative digital cultural mediation tools to make their visit memorable and unique:

• QR codes and NFC chips to access the content of the city of Le Mans and learn more about its historical heritage;
• The "Our Territory, Our Identities" digital platform" digital platform digital platform, co-created with five school boards to showcase cultural objects and collections from the Bibliothèque et Archives nationales du Québec (BAnQ). The platform is mainly intended for teachers;
• Mobile applications like the American Museum of Natural History in New York;
• A 3D video game designed to make young people discover the Egyptian collections in the Royal Museum of Mariemont in Belgium;
• The interactive holograms of the Museum of Illusion in Madrid;
• The Escapes games of the Henri Dupuis Museum in Saint-Omer, the Mucem in Marseille or the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam;
• The Histopad used to visit the Palace of the Popes in Avignon, the Chambord castle and the Conciergerie in Paris. The tool is wonderful to project yourself into medieval life by moving the tablet in the majestic rooms of the castles;
• Virtual visits of the Louvre Lens thanks to the Uby robot;
• The immersive sound trail at the Château de Vaux-le-Vicomte in Maincy, Paris
• The visit of the Hôtel de la Marine through the Confident connected headset with binaural sound technology, Paris;
• The immersive 4D films of the Cité du Volcan on Reunion Island, a French department in the Indian Ocean;
• The rediscovery of Vermeer's artistic painting The Girl with the Pearl (1665) using X-rays to reveal details of the original design of the work;
• An entirely digital exhibition created by the Arab World Institute to resurrect the thousand-year-old sites of Palmyra, Aleppo (Syria) and Mosul (Iraq) and explore the history of the Middle East.

Other digital cultural mediation devices

NFC technology

Proximity communication technology allows data to be exchanged between two devices, such as an interactive kiosk and a mobile phone, using a small chip. NFC technology offers access to contactless content via an Internet connection and in complete security.

QR codes

The QR code is a type of two-dimensional barcode. It can be read on a mobile device to quickly trigger an action such as visiting a website, displaying a phone number or making a payment, among others. 

Video mapping

Video mapping is a technique that consists of projecting light onto static objects to create an optical illusion. Video projection on monuments is the best known form of video mapping.

Virtual reality 

Virtual reality is a technology that uses a dedicated headset to immerse oneself in audiovisual content in 3D and with a 360° perspective that simulates reality.

Do you have a digital cultural mediation project in mind?

MySmartJourney is a digital platform specialized in the creation of digital cultural mediation projects. We use simple and interactive technological devices to make your visitors' journey enjoyable, entertaining and useful. Our goal is to provide visitors with a memorable experience and to encourage them to revisit and share your cultural site.

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Nowadays, the digital customer journey has become complex and difficult to trace. However, it is important to be able to trace the path taken by your prospects in order to offer them a positive visitor experience.

What is a digital customer journey?

The digital customer journey refers to an individual's journey through multiple touchpoints within your organization (e.g., website, mobile app, social media) that will ultimately result in a conversion event. 

Every company can use a customer's browsing history, transactions and contacts with the brand to understand their behavior. This allows them to create personalized offers, to better accompany the Internet user, but also to improve his buying experience and to set up a more adapted after-sales service.

The influence of digital on the customer journey

The advent of the digital world has changed the customer journey by adding new features, creating new steps and greatly altering customer behavior. The emergence of television commercials and websites have complemented the services offered by physical stores, newspapers and catalogues. 

With the rise of social media, instant messaging and apps, the digitization of the customer journey has completely changed the game. The digital journey has become more complex, bringing together a multitude of digital channels that allow them to discover the products and services offered by your company.

What are the stages of the digital customer journey?

The digital customer journey goes through three fundamental stages: 

• The discovery phase
• The evaluation phase
• The selection phase

1. The discovery phase

This first phase represents the discovery of a problem or the awareness of a need for the Internet user. The needs differ from one customer to another, but invite them to do research. It is therefore essential for your brand, organization or institution to stand out from the first searches by offering the answers they are looking for.

This help can be in the form of blogs, e-books, analysis reports, tutorials, etc. These publications offer the user a clear and detailed answer and allow them to better target their research. On the other hand, it allows your brand to stand out by showing that you understand the needs of your audience and by offering them free and accessible resources.

Market your on-site experience

2. The evaluation phase 

The second phase consists of conducting several searches. This way, the Internet user has a better idea of the products and services available on the market. This allows him to compare the various offers based on the opinions of other customers, the services, etc. But also by going on site to confirm his intuitions or the information he has gathered beforehand. At this stage, the customer journey becomes phygitalized and offers new contact points through digital applications, guides or paper documents.

At the same time, any company that wants to showcase its services at this stage must create engaging and unique content as well as share customer testimonials both on the web and in the locations where the experience is offered. The content should be both educational and entertaining to show your expertise to your customers.

3. The selection phase

At this point, the Internet user has armed himself with all the necessary information and now knows exactly what he needs. The customer's choice depends on the efforts made by each brand to highlight the benefits of its product or services. 

This can be done by offering a demo of the solution, a period to test the product, or by offering a warranty period. The most important thing during this stage is to be able to meet the expectations of the target audience and to respond specifically to their concerns. It is therefore necessary to create high value-added content that stands out from competitors. 

Why analyze the digital customer journey?

Analyzing the digital customer journey allows us to better understand their needs and identify their behavior in order to provide them with content adapted to their searches. This mapping also allows us to note all the friction points experienced by the Internet user in order to improve his experience. 

On the other hand, a good analysis of the customer journey helps any company to detect its weak points as well as the levers of its marketing and to make the necessary modifications to be more effective and profitable. This analysis involves the collection of various information on Internet users, such as: 

• Sales data 
• Navigation data on the website or on the web application
• Data from social networks
• Responses to customer satisfaction surveys
• The possible loyalty of the customer to your brand
• Etc.

Guide to digital cultural mediation 

3 tips to optimize your digital customer journey

1. Build on teamwork

The digital customer journey is constantly changing, and to ensure that you respond to these changes effectively, it is critical to engage all members of your team. Adapting to trends, staying operational at all times and delivering the best performance while being attentive to the specific needs of your customers is necessary to optimize your customer journey.

Each department of the company receives different feedback from the customer, between the purchase process, satisfaction surveys and interactions on social networks. Gathering all this data and sharing the answers received between the different teams allows tracing a clear digital journey, to detect the points to improve and the levers to optimize. Constant teamwork allows you to unify your brand image with your customers.

2. Create a personalized interactive customer experience

When you have in-depth customer journey analysis, you can build a clear profile of your personas and ensure that you deliver a personalized experience. This gives you a clear picture of your buyers, including age, preferences, geolocation, interests, behavior, buying process and impressions of the experience. When customers feel that the journey they are offered is personalized, they identify more with your brand and tend to become more loyal.

3. Be present through the different communication channels

The digital customer journey passes through various channels and supports that serve to answer the questions and requirements of the Internet user. It is therefore important to be present in all these channels in order to make the customer's path more fluid. An omnichannel digital strategy guarantees an interactive, harmonious and attractive experience.

6 ways to make your destination stand out

3 examples of digital customer journeys

1. Customer journey for visitors to a cultural or historical site

Thanks to MySmartJourney, historical sites as well as museums and art galleries can create a fun digital journey by engaging visitors with rich and varied multimedia content. These contents are highlighted and accessible to all tourists or travelers thanks to NFC technologies and QR codes. A memorable and unique experience for each visitor guarantees their loyalty to your content as well as their active participation in your marketing strategy by sharing the memories of their visit on social networks. 

How museums benefit from QR and NFC technologies 

2. An unforgettable experience for travelers 

Travelers are often thirsty for new experiences and want to make the most of their trip. Therefore, a great digital journey requires a deep understanding of travelers. This analysis allows you to offer personalized services through your platform, direct them to the right tourist attractions and facilitate their journey.

Phygital marketing as a strategy to connect travelers

3. An exceptional journey through the city's parks

To provide visitors with a sensory experience, you can develop games and scavenger hunts that link the virtual world to the physical world. Creating a digital journey that encourages the user to connect with their environment provides an unforgettable and personalized experience for each user. It's a guarantee of quality that optimizes customer engagement and promotes loyalty.

Tool for creating digital paths

MySmartJourney is a digital journey creation tool that includes various features to personalize your customer journey. With our platform, you can develop a phygital marketing strategy to boost your visitors' engagement. 

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MySmartJourney is a digital content management platform that provides a simple and intuitive solution for creating interactive multimedia experiences in public spaces. It can be used to enhance the customer experience, provide statistics on visitor behavior, boost visibility on social networks and manage queues, among other things. Our tool is fast and easy to use, all in a low cost per visitor formula.

Our goal is to make the user's experience as memorable as possible thanks to the various tools and functionalities of our platform that are specific to the animation of a public place. Contactless technology can be deployed on all devices, allowing you to let your imagination run wild in order to invent experiences and create memorable links with your customers or visitors.

What is the Selfie Booth?

The Selfie Booth is aMySmartJourney initiative that allows the user to create souvenir photos and share them on social networks. In an innovative and dynamic way, this feature encourages the tourism and cultural manager to actively participate in the design of the visitor journey. They can personalize the memory that the visitor will keep of his experience, thanks to this photo souvenir.

The Selfie Booth offers the visitor the possibility to personalize their photo by adding a watermark of the organization's logo and stickers. They can share their photo on their personal Facebook page as a testimony of their experience or as a souvenir.

With the rise of information and communication technology, it is important for cultural and tourism institutions to develop their customer journey in order to feed the evolving needs of their audience, seasons, political pressures. 

Guide to digital cultural mediation

What is the advantage of the Selfie Booth feature for businesses?

The Selfie Booth feature allows companies to provide customers with a variety of personalization options specific to their brand. When users of a company's website or visitors to a museum or even a national park use this feature, they are helping to create the company's brand image and participate in the collective marketing effort.

Thanks to the Selfie Booth, each user has the opportunity to create a personalized and unique photo that will mark the experience with your brand or institution. This memory can then be shared through various social networks such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc.

This publication, accompanied by a caption and a hashtag, will link to a direct promotion of the experience, thus encouraging more people to try your experience. Thus, the user is no longer just a passive consumer, but becomes an important pillar in the marketing strategy by giving visibility to the company through its networks.

Whether it's a museum, an art gallery, a hotel or a city park, this feature maximizes visitor engagement and optimizes satisfaction. The Selfie Booth also fits perfectly into a phygital marketing approach that promotes brand loyalty while giving a real and entertaining dimension to the digital journey.

Phygital marketing as a strategy to connect travelers

Does the Selfie Booth save pictures?

The Selfie Booth is a tool that can be used in many ways. Users can choose to save the photos, upload them to their mobile devices or share them through various social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc. 

How museums benefit from QR and NFC technologies

How do I create a memory with the Selfie Booth?

To create a memory on the Selfie Booth, simply access the appropriate link through the QR Codes and NFC tokens provided and use this tool to upload a photo or take a new one. Once the photo is taken, you can make various modifications to incorporate stickers to create a special look. These photos, once shared on social networks, include a link to the MySmartJourney platform showing a free advertisement from the client.

Test the Selfie Booth

Personalize your photos with MySmartJourney

MySmartJourney offers the ability to create interactive experiences for art galleries, historical sites, museums, hotels, etc. to enhance their customer journey. We provide our clients with several features, such as the Selfie Booth, which allows you to create personalized photos. 

It is a simple-to-use tool that allows you to take or upload photos and then make the appropriate changes to create memorable souvenirs. Merging the physical world with the digital world becomes child's play, but above all an accessible tool to entertain, educate and amuse your visitors and customers.

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In January 2022, in Quebec City, MySmartJourney received $100,000, the first Excellence Grant offered by the Mt Lab's Tourism Innovation Program.

This grant, made possible by the $10 million fund granted by the Ministry of Tourism, "aims to strengthen young innovative companies with high growth potential in tourism that have shown strong signs of success and to offer additional support to help them improve their product or service," said the Mt Lab.

At the heart of the tourism revival

Heavily impacted by the COVID pandemic, the tourism industry is going through a period of crisis that requires profound transformations. How to respect sanitary measures without degrading the visitor experience? How to deal with the shortage of manpower? How do you attract visitors and get the word out when you are a destination?

These constraints that are forcing the industry to reinvent itself, MySmartJourney saw them as an opportunity. The startup born in 2018 challenged itself to understand the new constraints of its industry to evolve its service offering and provide a unique combination: a solution that addresses more economic and health constraints while providing an enhanced experience for visitors.

What is MySmartJourney?

The MySmartJourney platform is a simple tool for delivering multimedia information in public places. It serves as an interactive signage, docking station, audio tour or relay to reservation systems. Visitors can instantly access the content with their cell phone. 

The platform is used by several clients such as the Quebec City airport, the Huron-Wendat museum or the Monville hotel to rethink and automate service processes while enriching the user experience by offering more simplicity and efficiency. 

Over 100 projects

The solution is also used in over 100 tourism projects to create compelling interactive multimedia experiences that surprise and engage visitors. At the heart of the platform is a library of features that creators can combine to design their tour scenarios: audio, video, augmented reality, quizzes, photobooths, etc. And all this with a contactless experience that respects health constraints. 

In a context of strong uncertainty, the MySmartJourney solution meets the industry's need to implement quick solutions, to experiment, to test things, to be able to easily improve or abandon them and this, at a lower cost. To adapt to a crisis, flexibility is a must. 

"We observe that the easier, more adaptable and flexible our technology is to use, the more our clients take it to innovate", says Isabelle Lopez, founder and president. 

What is MySmartJourney's next objective?

Develop the French market

"We have the ambition to become a global reference in interactive communication in public spaces," she says. The company proved to the jury its potential for growth and innovation, as well as its desire to grow further.

MySmartJourney began investing this major sum to develop the French market, which remains the world's leading tourist destination. "Since the beginning, we wanted to establish ourselves in France, especially since we already have two clients there, the Écomusée de Saint-Nazaire and the city of Le Mans. Now, we plan to open an office there and to seek a market share.

Innovate to improve

The Tourism Innovation Program is made possible by a $10 million fund from the Ministry of Tourism. As announced in May 2021, this new financial program "aims to democratize innovation for the entire tourism industry in Quebec and to accelerate the realization of structuring projects to enhance the quality of the offer of tourism businesses. 

The president of MySmartJourney, Isabelle Lopez, was delighted with this initiative, which came to support 18 other Quebec businesses at the beginning of 2022. "This fund provides a vital boost to growing companies that are agents of positive change; with this program, the Quebec government is sending a clear message about the importance it places on innovation at the heart of our industry," she concluded. 

What are the benefits of the excellence grant?

Thanks to the grant, MySmartJourney was able to conduct several commercial missions in France and Europe. Among the events in which the company was able to participate are the Hacking de l'Hôtel de Ville, IFTM Top Résa, PiXii in France and the Kikk festival in Belgium. 

The exchange also gave the company the opportunity to meet with players from tourist offices, museums and cultural organizations who are now familiar with MySmartJourney's value proposition. 

At the 24h of Le Mans, the technology was used to enhance the mythical race, offer more information on the program and popularize the technical terms. In La Rochelle, during the PiXii Festival in the spring, the solution was deployed to accompany visitors during their waiting time before participating in the experiences. 

And since July 2022, Destination Rennes has become a client of the company.

Thanks to this grant, Isabelle Lopez was able to validate the relevance and usefulness of the solution on the French market.

So much progress accomplished