The PHYGITAL Project is an innovative initiative aimed at revitalising and digitalising shopping tourism in Benidorm's shopping areas. This project uses proximity technology to send messages via WhatsApp to registered users, informing them about promotions and events in real time when they are near the establishments. The implementation of this system allows local businesses to carry out digital marketing campaigns at no additional cost, simply by installing signs with QR codes that users can scan to register.

Our nodes are able to send messages to registered users when they are within range. This proximity marketing strategy allows businesses to attract the attention of potential customers at the right time, avoiding message saturation and respecting users' preferences and behaviours.

Project phases

In the Initial Phase, incentives for registration include exclusive discounts offered by local establishments to registered users, cultural and sporting incentives such as free tickets to events in Benidorm, prize draws and competitions organised by local businesses with prizes for registered users and free parking or discounts in car parks to encourage registration.

In the Advanced Phase, offers, promotions and relevant information will be communicated to all those businesses that wish to participate, always respecting the restrictions mentioned above. Exclusive promotions may include discounts and special offers, information on local events and activities, news and product or service launches, and details of opening hours and services available.

We have carried out several raffles to encourage user participation. With the help of ABRECA, we have raffled dinners for two people valued at €50 at the Pinocchio restaurant and at Taberna Andaluza. Soon, with the support of AICO, we will raffle two electric bicycles, thus expanding the opportunities for more users to benefit from our project and actively participate in the platform.

This project has the support of Benidorm's main trade and service associations: AICO (Independent Association of Traders), ABRECA (Association of Bars, Restaurants and Cafeterias), AVIBE (Association of Benidorm Travel Agencies) and Visit Benidorm. These associations play a crucial role in the implementation and dissemination of the project, ensuring that the benefits of proximity marketing are extended to all sectors of local commerce and services.

Discover the areas of action on the map below:

https://www.google.com/maps/d/u/0/edit?mid=1Xesc-zZExL8yomXYvs6vg1CxjZ-cGyY&ll=38.5420090238987%2C-0.14081629006601926&z=14

This project promises to be a breakthrough in the digitisation of shopping tourism in Benidorm, benefiting both local businesses and visitors to the town.

If you're in Benidorm, register and don't miss anything!

https://comerciobenidorm.es/register/

In the second half of 2023, Seeketing implemented its Phigital technology in the Matarraña Region, Teruel, with the aim of establishing a DTI tool that would allow two clear objectives to be met:

• Establish a common Tourist Information Signposting System in the whole region integrated with a tourist web/app as a smart tourist destination in the Matarraña/Matarranya Region where all the available information is available. 

• Establish an observatory of tourism data obtained through the Seeketing Nodes, which allows the analysis and study of the real flows of residents, tourists and excursionists in the 18 municipalities of the Matarraña region. 

This system aims to encourage flows of tourists and residents in the territory, increase overnight stays, promote the protection of the heritage and tourism potential of the region, as well as improve competitiveness through data analysis under the umbrella of Big Data.

In order to implement the Intelligent Tourist Signage System, a multimedia content creation campaign was carried out, which involved taking high quality photographs of 198 points of tourist interest divided between the 18 municipalities that make up the Matarraña Region. In addition, 19 videos were made to present the municipalities and the region, as well as 3D tours of the most emblematic monuments and 360º visits of the 18 municipalities.

The design, printing and installation of 216 signage elements was also carried out, within which we can differentiate between 18 totems presenting the municipalities and 198 signage signs for the different points of interest. All of them have beacons that connect to the APP and QR codes that connect to the tourist information website.

This multi-language web/APP provides presentation information on the whole Matarraña region and the 198 points of interest. In this web/app, in addition to all the available information, we will find the multimedia content developed for the project, as well as interactive maps where we will find geolocated the different points of interest, and direct links to get to them through Google Maps.

Discover for yourself the content of the Web-app of the Intelligent Tourist Information Signposting System in the Matarraña Region by clicking on the following link:  https://app.matarranyaturismo.es/ 

In order to carry out the tourism data observatory, Seeketing nodes have been installed in each of the 18 municipalities that make up the Matarraña region, these being:

• Arens de Lledó / Arenys de Lledó
• Beceite / Beseit
• Calaceite / Calaceit
• Cretas /  Queretes
• Fórnoles / Fórnols
• Fuentespalda  / Fondespatla
• Lledó
• La Portellada
• La Fresneda / La Freixneda
• Mazaleón / Massalió
• Monroyo / Mont-roig
• Peñarroya de Tastavins / Pena-roja de Tastavins
• Ráfales / Ràfels
• Torre de Arcas / Torredarques
• Torre del Compte / La Torre del Compte
• Valderrobres
• Valjunquera / Valljunquera
• Valdeltormo / La Vall del Tormo

A Dashboard has been created in which the analysed tourism data is presented, allowing us to know the number and behaviour of people visiting the main points of reception of visitors.

It provides data on:

• How many people have travelled through the different municipalities.
• Influences by days and hours. Peak and off-peak hours.
• Flows between points of tourist interest.
• How many people have downloaded and used the APP and the website.
• How many people who have registered at a point of interest have also used the web and the APP(tourist to tourist phygital analysis).

This installation in the Matarraña Region is a first prototype for the implementation of the tool, which promises to be extended in the coming years by installing a greater number of nodes, so as to increase the data study areas.

Ikea (Ingka) is increasingly embracing the Phygital concept. This concept will be present in its new worldwide test lab located in Alcorcón, just a few kilometers from Seeketing's headquarters.

Although many retailers still don't know what Phygital is and think that where there is something physical and something digital, it's already Phygital. We invite them to review this concept: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phygital

Understanding Phygital as a mixture of physical and digital actions is a mistake caused by the use of technical terms in common language.

A similar example is ChatGPT. Many people mistakenly talk about ChatGPT or GPT3, GPT4 as artificial intelligence. The concept of ONE artificial intelligence is much deeper, richer, and broader than ChatGPT, which is actually nothing more than a natural language processor based on artificial intelligence techniques, like many tools nowadays (including Seeketing).

These techniques have been used for decades, although in ChatGPT, there are more innovations on how trained it is. If you are still not convinced, ask ChatGPT if it is an artificial intelligence, and you will see what it responds (in the response, it is evident that it processes human language very advanced, even better than humans, but it only processes language and does not have intelligence itself).

Phygital implies knowing that behind physical and digital actions, there is the same entity (person or potential customer). To avoid confusion, we review what is not Phygital (things from the 20th century that are still done in not innovative stores):

• Sending an email with offers to consume in the physical store.
• Placing a tablet, an interactive screen in the store.
• Drawing on the same dashboard the number of steps measured by the door's camera, with the number of unique visitors to the website or e-commerce that day.

In all these situations, there is a DISCONNECTION of the information that the Retailer has about the individual behind physical and digital actions. The retailer does not know if the person reading the email is at home or in line at checkout 3. The customer who uses the screen in the store does not know if they are the same person who regularly buys a certain garment on the web or e-commerce. The steps information from the camera is counting the same person who visits the store weekly four times, but says four customers (which is not true), and there is no relationship with the four unique users that same day.

Certain actions have come closer to the Phygital concept:

• Putting a QR with offers for the customer to scan each time they visit the store.
  Leaving the customer responsible for scanning a QR to find out about the store's offers would be the same as if the customer enters the website, but we know they are in the store. This last action could be Phygital and effective if we let the customer scan once for their consent and automatically communicate with them, sending them a WhatsApp the next time they enter or pass near the store.
• Putting Bluetooth beacons to detect the customer who installs an APP.
  The problem here is not the technology, which is Phygital, it's performance. The percentage of total customers who enter the store and that we can detect will be less than 1%. It's probably not very profitable to dedicate a lot of effort to this.

What is pure Phygital and, of course, must be massive (not only applicable to 1%):

• Automatically knowing that the person who enters the store at that moment was browsing a product on our website or e-commerce platform yesterday.
• Identifying which person who received our email with frozen food promotions this week is currently in the frozen food section of the physical store.
• Recognizing that the same person who passes by the shop window every day but only enters the store on Friday afternoons, and sends them a WhatsApp message when they pass by on a different day than Fridays.

All of this and much more implies having an identifier that links the physical behavior with the digital behavior of each customer as a single entity.

We are always happy to share with you other examples of extensive use of Phygital.