WhoFi Publishes A Book About WiFi Analytics
WhoFi co-founder, John Kerber, recently published a book about WiFi analytics and how advanced technology can create stronger communities. The book, titled WiFi Analytics; Track, Improve, Grow, discusses how to help real-world spaces engage with visitors to create sustainable growth.
It’s written for everyone from library managers to IT professionals. WhoFi provides the insight you need to better serve your communities. By publishing this book, we hope to help more people understand the value of community spaces and how to use data to showcase this. In a time when every industry and individual rushes to go digital, clarity and connection happen in the real world.
“The value in WiFi analytics is to help real-world communities and spaces not become digital, but to retain and enhance their unique qualities. At the same time, to stay relevant our industry needs to help the physical spaces and communities stay top of mind when their members are spending time in the digital world.” –John Kerber, WhoFi co-founder, and author
The book covers topics such as which industries use WiFi analytics and what hardware, software or service you need to get started. The format is easy for even non-techy people to understand. The reader will learn more about the specific technologies that work together to improve public venues and communities, such as social WiFi, foot traffic, guest WiFi, WiFi marketing and presence analytics.
WhoFi is pioneering the technology used by public spaces and businesses to provide valuable insight into the community they serve. WhoFi offers companies and governments the opportunity to make better, data-influenced decisions while respecting the privacy of its’ WiFi users. All WhoFi reports and statistics provided respect citizen privacy, and are generated without requiring or storing their personally-identifying information.
WiFi Analytics; Track, Improve, Grow is currently available on Amazon Kindle.
How To Improve Community Spaces In 2020
Communities thrive on interaction. A pleasant and well-designed public space or gathering place has the power to bring people together, which builds stronger communities through connection. When people are connected-every individual, parent, child, and family feel supported. These thriving communities take intentional effort and thoughtful planning. Voters, city planners, businesses and managers of public spaces work together to bring the vision to life.
Many of these improvements require hands-on work, from the construction of the space to programming for the patrons. How can community leaders and public space managers monitor the effectiveness of this planning?
While bringing people together in real-life forms connections like no online interaction can, access to information via the internet is something your space sees as important. That’s why your space offers free WiFi and that investment in the community you serve demonstrates your commitment to its’ growth and prosperity. You want to improve their experience and community space. So how can you track large-scale trends of real-life visitors who use your space?
WiFi analytics is a simple solution to improving your community space in 2020.
Businesses with websites can easily see how website visitors are interacting with them, and tailor the customer experience to consumer habits and preferences, but this only works for the online world. Until recently there hasn’t been a way to get this level of information for real-world visitors. But now, WiFi analytics offers a solution to get in-depth data that’s easy to understand.
WiFi analytics provides answers to these common questions:
- Are you reaching the people you intend to reach?
- Is there an extra level of communication you can offer to increase attendance?
- Is there a particular group that is frequenting your space that would benefit from a program or information?
- What time of day are people visiting most?
- Should you adjust your programming calendar and timing?
- How can you attract more remote workers to your space?
Being able to see how your visitors are using your space, frequency of their visits, if their visit coordinates with a program, and if overall visitor numbers increasing will give you valuable insight into the performance of your space and programming. Big picture data can be gleaned from this technology while maintaining user privacy.
So What Is WiFi Analytics?
Put simply, WiFi analytics is like the Google analytics of the physical world. This technology enables you to use the information available through your existing wireless network to learn more about your visitors and how to best serve your community. With software downloaded to your existing hardware, you can:
- Monitor devices connected to your WiFi
- Track visitor count and dwell time
- Count recurring vs. new visits
- Learn more about visitor demographics
All of this valuable insight can be gained while maintaining visitor privacy by using a one-way encryption method. This allows your business to see large scale trends of visitor behavior and patterns without compromising trust or identities. The WhoFi analytics solution provides a detailed analysis of physical spaces so community spaces and businesses can make data-driven decisions while maintaining visitor anonymity.
If you want to improve your program’s reach, effectiveness, community outreach, create loyal customers, or enhance your space or business in general- WiFi analytics is your solution.
The great thing about WhoFi WiFi analytics solution is that you already have the hardware you need to run this program. Our WiFi analytics solution works with your existing hardware and can be installed by just about anyone-no IT background required. Adding WiFi analytics is the easiest solution to make community improvements in 2020. Check out our full list of WhoFi compatible routers and access points.
Take action today and schedule a demo to see how WhoFi WiFi analytics can help you improve your community space.
Businesses Must Adapt To Consumer Rights To Privacy With New CCPA Law
In recent years, businesses have faced increased pressure to comply with customer privacy regulations as consumers demand ownership over their valuable personal online data. California became the first state to set statewide privacy regulations with The California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) that is set to be implemented on January 1, 2020. If your company hosts data from any California citizens — which likely applies to most U.S.-based companies — then you will have to comply.
California is likely the first state of many to implement these regulations, which comes on the heels of the GDPR, the European Union data privacy laws. The great debate of our time is how Big Data can provide useful services to you as a customer while maintaining the privacy of the individual.
Consumers are aware that online data can be transformed into a precious commodity, and that it’s used without their consent. According to estimates in the Standardized Regulatory Impact Assessment for the CCPA regulations, the CCPA will protect more than $12 billion worth of personal information that’s used for advertising purposes in California each year. This law empowers citizens — so they can decide how much, what and when to share their information or their children’s information.
WhoFi Privacy
WhoFi offers companies and governments the opportunity to make better, data-influenced decisions while respecting the privacy of its’ WiFi users. All WhoFi reports and statistics provided respect citizen privacy, and are generated without requiring or storing their personally-identifying information. Since our software was originally developed to anonymize user information, our company —and customers by extension — are already in compliance with CCPA. We give you the answers you need to improve customer service experience and community engagement without compromising the integrity of the relationships you’ve built. Our fundamental belief in consumer privacy rights is why we support this law.
Here’s what you need to know about CCPA.
What is the CCPA?
The California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) was created to protect the privacy and data of consumers. The CCPA initiative requires businesses to tell consumers what data is being collected and for what purpose. And, most importantly, it gives consumers the right to opt-out and to sue companies if their personal data is breached.
The CCPA grants California consumers new data privacy rights that, we feel, should’ve been the standard originally.
- The right to know what personal information is collected about them.
- The right to know how this personal information is used, shared or sold and to whom.
- The right to delete personal information held by businesses and by extension, a business’s service provider.
- The right to opt-out of the sale of personal information.
- The right to equal price or service even when a consumer exercises their new privacy rights granted under CCPA.
- Children under the age of 16 must have a parent or guardian consent.
To Whom Does CCPA Apply?
When it goes into effect in January 2020, businesses that meet one or more of the following thresholds must comply with the CCPA:
- Annual gross revenues of $25 million or more.
- Buys, receives or sells the personal information of 50,000 or more consumers, households or devices.
- Derives 50 percent or more of its annual revenues from selling consumers’ personal information.
- Most companies in the United States have customers in California and will likely be required to comply if they want to continue to receive information from their California customers.
What Do Companies Need To Do To Comply With CCPA?
If your business meets one or more of the thresholds above, you must prepare to be in compliance with this law. Even if your business doesn’t meet those, it would be wise to take steps to be in compliance to gain consumer confidence.
- Review and understand what personal information is collected by your business.
- Understand how personal information is collected, used, or sold; to whom and for what purpose.
- Review internal policies and procedures regarding the collection of personal information and update internal and online privacy policies to comply.
- Prepare policies and procedures to implement when a customer requests access to, deletion of or information related to the sale or disclosure of their personal information.
- Implement technological solutions that process requests by the customer to opt-out.
- Review contracts with all service providers to ensure they protect the personal information provided by your business.
How Can Big Data And Privacy Coexist?
WhoFi believes that with full encryption for all consumer data collected, both the company and the consumer benefit. Looking at data on a massive scale is what gives companies the best insight into consumer behaviors and patterns, not consumer identities. By one-way encrypting the data from the first consumer interaction all the way to analysis, the company can’t easily tie back the data to an individual but can gain large scale trend insights they need.
WhoFi is pioneering the big data privacy movement with our anonymous location analytics technology that allows companies to see trends while maintaining consumer trust and privacy. Our analytics solution provides a detailed analysis of physical spaces and foot traffic, allowing businesses to make data-driven decisions while maintaining customer anonymity.
Would you like to know more about how the WhoFi solution can benefit your company or government organization? Schedule a demo to see what our technology can do for you.