By Julia Deets, VP Sales & Marketing
After having a couple of months off from
conferences and trade shows, we had a double dose of them in August and one in October. One of the
conferences we attended was the NPMA (National Property Management Association)
NES (National Educational Seminar) and in addition to having a booth at the
trade show we did a presentation on Specialty RFID Tagging. The presentation
was very well attended and I thought the questions that were asked were
probably the best ones I have witnessed while presenting; however, I noticed a common
theme on how I started answering the majority (if not all) the questions that
were asked. I started my answers with the phrase “that depends.”
To some people answering questions with “that depends” may sound like the
person answering the question doesn’t know the answer, but in actuality what we
are saying is that it depends on how you as the user answer the following
questions.
How much do the tags cost? This is a question that is not just exclusive
to RFID tags; prospective customers ask this question about bar code tags or
any of our products. Everyone wants an idea of cost, but we want to get them
interested in the best product for their application regardless of cost so it
can be a tricky situation. Nevertheless it depends on a number of factors like
quantity, size, number of colors, etc. Whenever I have someone come into the
booth one of the samples they always like to point out is the Coca-Cola
“AUTOGRAPHS” sample because it is so recognizable (which is why we include it).
When they ask me how much something like that costs I just try to get them to
talk about their application more because more often than not that particular
product is not the right one for their application; it’s just a good
conversation starter.
What read range will they get? This is primarily an RFID question and the
fact is that it does depend. It depends on what the tag is going on, what
reader is being used, what inlay is being used if they are just pointing to a
specific construction, i.e. our smaller hang tag that can use a number of
different inlays and more. Again, I use this question as an opening to get them
talking about their application and what it is that they are actually trying to
accomplish. What they think they want/need may not be it at all. It all
depends.
Will they survive (whatever application conditions apply)? This question
is great because the customer appears to understand that not all labels are
created equal and if they understand that they may be more likely to place
additional value on a label that will survive a particularly demanding
application. However, even knowing what kind of conditions in general the tag
will be exposed to still deserves the answer “that depends.” Additional
questions must be asked. For example, how long will the tag be exposed to these
conditions? How long does the tag need to last? Is the tag directly exposed
(i.e. sunlight)?
How long will they last? This question is directly related to the
preceding one. How long a label will last DEPENDS on the environmental
conditions the tags will be exposed to. This question just begs for additional
qualification. We get asked this question a lot – not just for RFID, but this
was a specific question that was asked during my presentation and I’m afraid I
didn’t handle it very well. Rather than qualifying my answer with “it depends”
I gave her the information I knew about the anticipated lifetime of the chip.
Obviously, it does depend on a number of factors including how often the tag is
read. For example, a passive RFID tag that is read on a daily basis is not
going to last as long as a tag that is read only once a year.
Is RFID right for me? Answering this too quickly can have huge potential
consequences for the customer. We actually have an entire presentation devoted
to qualifying whether the customer is ready for RFID and it DEPENDS in a large
part what their defined objective is – what do they hope to accomplish? After
determining the objective it also DEPENDS on what kind of environment the tags
are going to be exposed to and whether the application is something that is
truly realistic.
The key to all of these questions (and more) is qualification and this
definitely lends itself to our “How” statement which is “our mission is to
understand customer ID applications even better than they do in order to
provide a superior customer experience.” Our ability to accomplish this DEPENDS
on how well we qualify the application – it’s as simple as that.