A new feature for Scan, a QR code scanner app that has seen quite a bit of popularity during the last year, is making it easier for its users to quickly find and follow users on the popular photo-sharing app Instagram.

The feature is called Scan-to-Gram, as TechCrunch reports, and it allows users to scan QR codes and instantly make changes to their Instagram profiles, allowing them to follow other users or businesses. The idea is that users and brands can make following them extremely easy, and also tap into the huge number of downloads that Scan has garnered – more than 12 million in the iTunes App Store.

In addition to taking advantage of Scan’s user base, brands are also able to leverage the increasing popularity of Instagram, which was just acquired by Facebook for more than $1 billion. Instagram recently hopped form the iOS App Store to Google Play, the app market for Android, and with that move, it gathered a few million more users for its already sizeable base of 50 million.

Scan’s business is to help businesses increase their mobile presence and to make that presence more dynamic, and Scan-to-Gram helps do that using the popularity of Instagram. Already, the Instagram development team has created a Scan-to-Gram page (even though the feature just went live today), which you can check out here. The pages are quick and easy to set up – I just made one in less than five minutes – and they make it equally easy for users to take advantage of them.

Scan-to-Instagram is just the latest QR code extension that Scan has created: It also offers similar capabilities for Facebook and Twitter, and for products that can be purchased. In general, QR codes are somewhere between ubiquitous and unknown, but as companies such as Scan continue to find cool ways to implement them, it seems possible they can become a useful way for businesses and brands to reach out to new customers. Scan’s focus on content and ease of use can definitely help.

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