QR Codes: What are they and 6 places to generate them for free

Other than being your soon-to-be best friend, a QR code is a little barcode that you can hold up your smartphone’s camera to and be brought right to the intended website page. Over the past year and a half we’ve really seen QR codes make a comeback because they are contactless.

With all great comebacks, come great ideas. QR codes are a great way for your Nonprofit to bring someone right to a page on your website. They’re quick, easy to use, and super creative! Not to mention, an amazing way to get people onto your website who may not have found it otherwise.

Many organizations have started to use QR codes on their paper mailings or printed flyers. Whether it’s your big donation solicitation mailing or an event flyer hanging up at a local coffee shop, people see a QR code and they know to scan it. How much better is simply scanning something versus having to type in a long URL?! 

The best part, if someone doesn’t know how to use a QR code, it’s simple enough to put a little “scan me” with an arrow to help people get there. And, how awesome would it be if the first time they scanned something was associated with your organization? They’d likely be excited by this new technology and tell all their friends that this great organization had a flyer hanging and you scanned the code to sign up for their event! 

Here are 6 free places to generate a QR code (and don’t worry, we’ve tested all of them and put in our notes):

• QR Code Generator: This process was quick, easy, and  (free and they request you review them — help a fellow marketer out!) our top choice easy, simple, and done! 
• Go QR: Not as quick as the others, but it works! 
• Flow Code: They will make you create an account to download your code, but it’s a simple process — and still free!
• Unitag: You will receive a zip file and at the end it asks you to enter your email, but you do not need to do so to download your zip. The cool part here is that it also gives you a code to embed in your email, website, etc. 
• QR Stuff: This is a SUPER quick download! Again, at the end it will ask you to subscribe and show their monthly plan if you would like to sign up, but it is certainly not required.
• Beaconstac: This is quick and as long as you don’t mind a few promotional pop-ups then this can be your go-to!

Although we have our notes, we encourage you to test each of these and see which you like best. Within most of these, you can also choose color, shapes, and sizes making it easy to brand it if you would like. Keep us posted on all your QR code success!