What to put next to the till
The counter QR code is the whole acquisition funnel for a shop loyalty program. Most of them fail for reasons that take a minute to fix.
On this page
For a physical shop, the sign next to the till is the signup flow. There is no landing page, no ad, no funnel — there is a person holding a card machine and about four seconds of attention.
Most counter QR codes waste those four seconds.
The three failures
It does not say what happens. “Scan me” is not an offer. The customer has no idea whether they are joining a mailing list, downloading an app, or getting something. Say the reward: “Nine coffees, tenth free. Scan to start.”
It is in the wrong place. Next to the card reader, at the height a phone is already being held. Not on the wall behind the barista, not on the door, not flat on a counter where it is under someone’s bag by ten past nine.
Nobody mentions it. A sign converts a fraction of what a sign plus one sentence from staff converts. The sentence does not need to be a script — “want a stamp for that?” is enough, and it works because it is asked while the card is already out.
The thing to measure
Not scans. Scans include the curious, the accidental and the person who bailed at the first form field.
Measure cards added per hundred transactions, and watch it by shift. It will vary more between staff than between locations, and that tells you the sign was never the bottleneck.