Digital sales literature for o2 shops in Germany

Digital brochures replace tons of paper at the point of sale

Three million leaflets and 75 tonnes of paper - up to now, this large amount of sales literature, i.e. leaflets, brochures and other information material, has been produced and sent out annually for around 2,000 Telefónica sales locations. Thanks to the new Webmag cooperation, this is about to change. Starting from now, customers in shops and partner shops as well as at all indirect sales partners of the o2 brand will be provided with digital offers, product information and promotions by using a QR code at relevant product areas. In this way, the telecommunications group is taking the next major step towards sustainability and digitalisation.

Digital flyers to create a seamless customer journey

In order to present a wide variety of paper flyers in a mobile world, a concept that combines all of them in a single digital publication on the Webmag platform has been developed in cooperation with Telefónica. With this approach, there are no different versions of the same flyer circulating. Instead, all information is bundled in a single application.

Using special features developed in-house, such as a special filter function, customers can select in the flyer which content interests them. This means that only the information relevant to them is displayed. This creates an interactive tool that promotes regular customer contact and focuses on the needs of users.

The entire flyer application was created by using the Webmag editor. All future content can now be edited and updated either by Telefónica employees or their partners.

Interlocking the online and offline world

As the digital flyer is optimised to be viewed on smartphones, shop visitors can now easily open the flyer via QR code, take it with them and easily share it with others. This meets people's usage patterns as QR codes have become more popular in retail and gastronomy since the pandemic. As a result, the popularity of combining store-based retail with digital technologies has grown steadily. According to Telefónica, an increasing amount of people are using their smartphone as a shopping assistant and value options like self-scanning or collecting additional product information.

Thanks to call-to-action buttons, selected products on o2online.de can be accessed straight away via the flyer. This interlocking of the online and offline worlds allows the customer journey to remain seamless, even between physical shops at the point of sale and central online offers. Integrated analytics provide exact evaluation of which content within the flyer is being used - with the goal of continuously improving the customer experience.

Digital flyer – benefiting our environment

The production and printing of paper leaflets is highly energy-intensive and largely responsible for the carbon footprint of handouts. o2 Telefónica has been dedicated to sustainability for many years and keeps on adapting their processes and offers. In this context, digitalisation is playing a key role - thanks to the new digital flyer, for example, 87 tonnes of CO2 will be saved (source). For the moment, it is available in hybrid form: both as a paper brochure and in the new digital version. This transition phase is intended to allow customers some time to get used to the digital flyer. The circulation of paper brochures will be reduced successively and eventually completely stopped.