POPWings, NFC Business Card

POPWings is getting ready for the digital revolution.

Another POPWings Experience. World is going NFC !

Furquan Ahmad CEO  of  TechCountry present this Popwing reviews,  NFC business cards.

Google has been a faithful supporter of NFC (Near Field Communication) technology, and this feature might not stay exclusive to the Search Giant’s Android devices! The Chromium OS team has recently started working on NFC support for Chrome OS devices. This means our Chromebooks will soon be able to take advantage of all those cool features we currently enjoy with our smartphones and tablets.

If you’re a follower of our Twitter page or a fan on Facebook (and if not, why not?) then you’ll know all about our favorite film scene, Christian Bale’s turn as Patrick Bateman, discussing business cards.

There’s a lot we could learn from some movies about networking. I recently read a great blog by Lisa M. Gerry, highlighting her seven top networking tips from movies including The Social Network, Legally Blonde 2 and The Devil Wears Prada. You can see the full list here.

A few of these in particular stood out for me. Firstly: Contacts Are Everywhere. You simply do not know when or where your next useful contact will come from. I was traveling on the other side of the world and bumped into an old friend from school; a friend of mine chatted to someone she met in a dentist waiting room who later provided the catering at her wedding. Business is so international these days that it’s so important to capture a new contact when you can. You never know when it might come in useful.

This leads nicely to Lisa’s example from The Devil Wears Prada, where Meryl Streep’s Miranda Priestly had her two assistants memorize everyone who would be at a big event so she could give each guest the impression that she knew them personally. Most of us have some form of social presence online (which you can add instantly to your POPWings NFC business card), so it’s even easier to make an effort to get to know your prospects and increase your chances of success.

First impressions are important. It only takes seven seconds before someone has made an opinion on you, according to body language expert, Carol Kinsey Goman. It’s not a lot of time to make a good impression, but you don’t need the bass-driven tones of Barry White to make a connection with someone. Here are a few simple tips from Forbes that can help you get it right, and if you can get off to a good start, you’ll go far.

But it’s also important that you leave people with a lasting impression. Take, for example, the example of what Matt Cutts called ‘the greatest business card ever’ on his blog back in 2008: http://bit.ly/16K8DRB. The creativity and mystery on the business card made it stick in Matt’s mind, creating a lasting impression.

What better example of this than one of my favorite film scenes of all time, with Christian Bale as Patrick Bateman swooning over their new business cards in American Psycho:

After making a connection with a new contact, if you can do something original, you are more likely to be remembered. Fans of our Facebook page will recognize this in some of the unique business card designs we shared earlier this week. I know personally if I experience something out of the ordinary, it will always stay in my mind, long after the event or meeting has occurred.

Annette Shaff / Shutterstock.com

Facebook yesterday announced a major new mobile development for the social platform, called Facebook Home. Sitting almost in between an OS and an app, the software will act as the homepage hub on your Android device. Facebook says it wants to ‘put people first in your phone,” putting feeds from the social network on the home page of Android phones. 

The software will be the main way to use the phone, as notifications, images and messages will appear on the main screen of the phone instead of being accessible via a downloadable app. See Farhad Manjoo’s balanced summary of the news here.

Facebook has seen huge growth in users accessing the network via mobile devices, so this is a logical progression for the company, helping to bring its fan base closer together and stay better connected than better before. As you might imagine, we at POPWings share a similar belief that the mobile devices we always have with us offer the best and easiest ways to meet people and stay in touch, so we’ll be following uptake and development of Facebook Home with interest.

In 2011, Juniper Research predicted that one in five phones will be NFC-enabled by 2014 (equivalent to 300 million smartphones). This week we saw new predictions from ABI Research, who expects the number to surpass 500 million in 2014.

Android and Windows phones are still growing in popularity and more and more of them have NFC capability built in. This form of communication can allow you to access your hotel room, thanks to Nokia, Openways and Nordic Choice Hotels; it could also help you get dressed in the morning, thanks to BLACKSOCKS; and it could provide your boarding pass for your next flight, thanks to Japan Airlines:

There are so many possibilities and as it becomes more common in our smart devices, more and companies will come up with innovative ways to provide us with cool, quirky ways to interact and share. Ultimately this will benefit the consumer. Let’s take another scenario: you’re out and about this weekend, and though you’re thirsty, you have no change to buy a drink. If you’re in Salt Lake City or Austin, thanks to Coca-Cola’s collaboration with Isis, you’ll be able to simply walk up to a vending machine, tap your phone, and take a sip! What could be simpler?

“You’re only as smart as the people around you,” writes Monika Bylehn on Ericsson’s Networked Society blog. As human beings, we’re wired for cooperation and interactivity. So much so that we've wired this into our modern world via social networks, one of our main uses of the internet.

Monika explains how new research has found that our species’ burst of creativity coincided with the growing concentration of human beings living in the same area. Being around others gives us the chance to share ideas, helping us work out what works and what doesn’t, progressing our research, knowledge and development. It helps us see things from new angles that we might not have considered before, and is the natural incubator for ideas that can change the world.

POPWings itself started in this fashion. Born in Gemalto’s corporate incubator BIG (Business Innovation Garage), we really started after LeWeb09 where Marc Gemeto envisioned the potential of a contactless card as an easy way to connect online. We started experimenting early concepts of securely sharing content with a card, pitching it to people in Silicon Valley. They loved how the mobile/card interaction was enlivened but felt the “pain we were trying to solve” lacked consistency. It was this sharing of ideas that led us to realise what people really were looking for: improving their real life experience when connecting with one another.

We’ve all been there: an important appointment missed because we’re tucked up safely in bed. The only good thing about sleeping in is that everyone has done it – and missed something important – at least once before. Does this excuse it? Of course not.

Always keen to hear about new innovation and technology that enhances my life, I recently came across this article on the Trendblog by Daniel Bulygin, about an NFC alarm clock that can help you get out of bed in the morning. Intrigued, I read on and learned that Daniel was referring to an Android app called Puzzle Alarm that allows you to set alarms on your smartphone that challenge you to wake up.

Like the innovative use of technology in POPWings business cards, the alarm clock app uses Near Field Communication that allows you to interact with the digital world around you.

By setting the alarm to activate only when coupled with an NFC tag, you can ensure that you have to get out of bed in order to cancel the alarm. As Daniel says, “I have placed an NFC tag in my bathroom. So if I want to turn off my alarm I have to stand up, go to the bathroom and scan the tag.” The potential for NFC is huge, so by embracing the technology, you can start finding innovative ways to enhance your own lifestyle.

No matter what working role you have, it always pays to make connections. You never know who you might bump into that could spark that next big idea or an exciting new relationship. I was intrigued to read Nicholas Provenzano’s blog, The Nerdy Teacher, recently, where he explored digital tools and making connections.

Nicholas shares some great tips on how to reach out and engage with others, such as establishing a social media presence and connecting at a conference. It’s important to do this whether you’re a teacher, a sales manager, a scientist or anything in between. The world and our life experiences are all about the connections we make, some that break and some that grow.

The rise of social media has brought about the advent of constantly-connected workers and social groups, with many people having multiple profiles on different networks, as well as more than one email and phone contact. It’s our hope that NFC-enabled business cards will help people to manage their connections and prompt greater sharing of ideas and innovations.

Picture President Obama’s business card. Or Steve Jobs’ at Apple. What do you think they look like? Well, Flavorwire has collated the business cards of 20 famous people, ranging from Andy Warhol to Fidel Castro. Take a look here:

http://flavorwire.com/364847/the-fascinating-business-cards-of-20-famous-people/9  

Whether these are all true or not remains to be seen, but it’s curious to see that many relied on the traditional format.

So, let’s take a look at some other types, including supposedly ‘invincible networking cards’, courtesy of Trend Hunter. There are ones that can survive being stamped on by an elephant or that are waterproof and tear proof. But just how often do you find yourself in environments that are dangerous to your business cards?

I believe it’s more important to make connectionsthan it is to have a talk-worthy business card. The business card (and details) should be the handshake that accompanies an interesting or useful connection; this is why tapping with your mobile device is so convenient. Here’s a video from Mobile World Congress to show you how:

Business-Actor’s Valérie Demyttenaere speaks to Marc Géméto this week about a career in technology and the new NFC business cards launched by POPWings.

Marc explains how he created the Business Innovation Garage (BIG) to promote and share new ideas, which could then be turned into a dynamic new business. From this incubator, POPWings was born.

After playing around with NFC and a set of playing cards, Marc recognised the magic of being able to instantly capture and share useful information via a mobile device.  Applied to something more practical, like business cards, NFC offers a fun, simple way to instantly share your contact details and social profiles with the people you meet each day.

As NFC becomes integrated in more smart devices, which can be used for mobile payment, travel and building access (among others), it’s a logical step that traditional business cards modernise and integrate with our digital lives.

Marc also explains to Valérie that users can completely personalise their NFC business card and the personal information they want to share.

The 2013 edition of the Microsoft TechDays took place last week in Paris and proved to be a huge success. There couldn’t be a better place for POPWings to be and officially release the Windows Phone 8 version of its app last February 14th.

As a Microsoft partner, POPWings buzzed around handing out every speaker their personalized POPCard and spurred as well the download of the on-the-store-newly available app. POPWings also delivered Microsoft dozens of NFC tags visitors could use to rate the sessions they were attending, demonstrating one of the many possible use-cases this new technology fosters.