QUESTION : WHAT does one in four diners do when sitting down to eat at a TGI Friday’s restaurant? Answer: They use their mobile phones to browse the internet, with a good proportion of them checking their Facebook and Bebo accounts.

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It’s certainly good news for Kevin O’Connor, founder of BlueZone, which specialises in Bluetooth proximity marketing and which has just signed a deal to supply free internet access in all four TGI Friday’s restaurants in Dublin and Belfast. “So much of people’s lives are now led online,” says O’Connor. “Being able to browse the net on the go is almost as important as being able to make phone calls on the go. We’ve even had people checking their CAO offers online in TGI Friday’s.”

Wi-Fi hotspots, which allow customers to go online with their laptops, are nothing new, of course. BlueZone’s Bluetooth networks though go one step further, allowing customers with Bluetooth-enabled mobile phones to download a customised browser and surf the web for free.

The benefit for companies such as TGI Friday’s is that they get to market special offers not only to their mobile-toting customers but to anyone with a Bluetooth-enabled phone within an 80-metre radius.
O’Connor, a database analyst with a degree in physics, set up BlueZone in May 2008. Among his first clients were the Subway restaurants in Blanchardstown, Wexford and Enniscorthy. “I generally look for customers I can see are already spending money on advertising and marketing, because they’re the ones who’ll be looking for new ways to make an impact.”

O’Connor says people tend to think of Bluetooth messages as “something like text messages”, but he argues that they are much more sophisticated than that.

“Each message can include the company’s logo and the success of simple promotions such as ‘show this message when you pay and get 10 per cent off’ can easily be judged against till receipts,” he says. “The ability to surf the web using BlueZone adds a whole new dimension in terms of marketing the business to customers who want to be able to go online through their mobiles.”

O’Connor is optimistic that a successful rollout at TGI Friday’s will be followed by other restaurants in the EE Group, including Dante Pizza and the Hard Rock Cafe, bringing turnover to more than €150,000 in 2010 and forming the basis for future growth.
He expects this expansion to be boosted by two other aspects of BlueZone’s business: BlueZone OnBoard and BlueZone Weddings.

“BlueZone OnBoard is a Bluetooth system for buses that allows passengers to access the internet on their mobiles in the same way as restaurant customers can,” he says. “Whereas with ordinary Wi-Fi a 50-seater bus tends to have only, perhaps, five people going online with their laptops, with Bluetooth that increases to around 30 going online with their phones.”
The BlueZone OnBoard service recently won O’Connor the prize for innovation at Fleet magazine’s 2010 Bus and Coach Awards.

BlueZone Weddings, meanwhile, involves setting up a Bluetooth network at a wedding venue “so that guests with Bluetooth-enabled mobile phones can be sent messages saying, for instance, ‘Welcome to Jack and Jill’s wedding’, or perhaps a little package including pictures of the bride and groom”.

What, ultimately, is O’Connor’s goal? “In a few years’ time I want people to know instinctively when they see a BlueZone logo that they’re in a “blue zone” – a shop or restaurant with Bluetooth internet and special offers,” he says. “For me, that will mean success.”