Mobile Web 2.0

Starter for Mobile Marketing Strategy Planning

2008-03-18T12:59:45-05:00:00

I have developed a strong strategy planning process to create a strategic and tactical plan for a brands mobile channel strategy.

The presentation can be found below:

Develop A Mobile Marketing Strategy

The guiding principle of the exercise is to create a better understanding of what is working today in the mobile channel and it relates with the organizations on going media channel plans and campaigns.

Let me know what you think.

Tom

Mobile Marketing 2007 Recap

2008-01-04T09:58:42-06:00:00

For 2007 it was quite a ride for our Mobile Marketing company. We started out very slow in the process of pure education on every single call and webinar. I break 2007 into three major phases:

Educational - answering the same questions over and over as the US begins to think about Mobile Marketing
Early Adopters - a few strong minded clients/new businesses are ready to give Mobile Marketing a shot
We'll Do it in 2008 - finally the last group those who have been waiting, studying, watching and are now planning for 2008 but these will be "Pilots". Q3/Q4 of '08 and 2009 will be the break out years imho.

Granted these three areas are still continuing the difference is we are seeing more falling out of the educational box and into the pilot phases. The following is a break down of the profile of each of the groups:

Educational
These people run the gambit from extremely interested and need to know everything to the executive who just wants to know enough to play buzzword bingo at the next strategy meeting. But here are the main questions asked and answered:

Does it cost the consumer for every text message they receive/send?
Is it considered spam to send messages to mobile subscribers?
Do you have a case study that of someone doing exactly the same thing we want to do and an ROI to prove its viable?
What the hell are you selling? Mobile Phones? (honestly I had that a few times AND they called me - go figure)
How much does it cost for a "basic" campaign? It always comes down to how much of course so that's a given.

I would say in my experience for every 1 hour webinar I gave in 2007 (about 60 - 5 a month over the course of 2007) the first 35 minutes at a minimum was spent on basic terms of the industry, how big the industry is and answering the questions above. In terms of content those slides in the deck could last all of 5 minutes for those in the "know" but for those educating themselves it was always at least 35 minutes of questions.

Let me say right now this is not a complaint this is just a demonstration that there is a STRONG interest in Mobile Marketing from a large number of companies but the amount of knowledge on the subject was/is very low. Therefore, a lot of smart people were asking a lot of basic questions to educate themselves on something they have a strong interest (in most cases).

Early Adopters
Thank God for the Early Adopters! These are the agencies, companies or individuals who see the power and opportunity that Mobile Marketing offers. I can say for my company in almost all cases the early adopter had a good idea in there head and was looking for some case studies, hard data to demonstrate it would work and be effective. But, we could not find that either in our book of business or through other resources. So, in all cases these early adopters forged ahead and gave it a shot. In some cases it just didn't work - wrong demographics, wrong message, too early ? Many different answers to why it failed but the client and myself consequently now have hard data. For those who took the risk I am so grateful because it allowed us to learn as we tried something new everyday. For those who gambled and it paid off it was beneficial for all - end consumer, client and my company. We found a nice mix that worked for everyone. But it all started with an early adopter mentality of let's give it a try what the hell!!

We'll Do it in 2008
I must say to me this is the catch phrase for me for 2007 - "We'll do it in 2008". I have had discussions with a great number of major corporations that spent a great deal of time and energy analyzing, educating themselves and planning for Mobile Marketing in 2007 and all ended up saying "We'll Do it in 2008". At first it was hard to hear but as it went from just one client to two to many I realized they were not all saying NO. They were not saying YES either they were saying Mobile Marketing is not ready and/or we are not ready. So, we'll resume this conversation in 2008.

2007 Final Analysis
For me 2007 was a long year of many, many conversations about the potential and opportunities that Mobile Marketing can bring to an organization and the end consumer. It was many discussions of the infinite number of programs/campaigns that could be deployed. But, finally it was a year of transition from discussing Mobile Marketing with a few enlightened participants to a much larger group of agencies, companies and individuals who will finally in 2008 (not 2007 as we saw) engage the mobile channel in some form. So, for that 2007 was a good year for Mobile Marketing not a great year but one that hopefully many seeds of knowledge were planted in fertile minds and 2008 will see them grow into a banner year for Mobile Marketing.

Tom Walls
Kona Interactive

Technorati Profile

Cell phones prove to be poor surfing platforms

2007-12-26T11:57:24-06:00:00

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/business/344882_mobileweb26.html

Some key quotes out of the article:

But at a recent conference, 3G was called "a failure" by Caroline Gabriel, an analyst at Rethink Research. She said data would make up only 12 percent of average revenue per user in 2007, far below the expected 50 percent. (The 12 percent figure does not include text messaging, but you don't need a 3G network to send a text message.)

Similarly, surveys by Yankee Group, a Boston research firm, show that only 13 percent of cell phone users in North America use their phones to surf the Web more than once a month, while 70 percent of computer users view Web sites every day.

"The user experience has been a disaster," said Tony Davis, managing partner of Brightspark, a Toronto venture capital firm that has invested in two mobile Web companies.

What does this mean to those of us who are pushing for more mobile web? Well, if you dive deeper most believe that products and newly designed mobile browser applications coming around in the next 5 years will solve the problem. But, in the short term is does prove that the mobile web is not yet ready for prime time. Stay tuned.

Pay using Text Messages

2007-12-26T11:50:15-06:00:00

http://news.enquirer.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071224/NEWS01/312240025

This is a great example of leveraging the useability of text messaging to integrate with an existing commerce platform.

Be very eager to hear more on the success of the initial launch.

Mobile Marketers Talk About Children

2007-07-18T09:38:21-05:00:00

NEW YORK -- Protecting children under the age of 13 was one of the biggest issues addressed by the latest Mobile Marketing Association Consumer Best Practices Guidelines released on July 17.

As pre-teens have become the fastest growing segment of new phone purchasers, protecting them became paramount, per Laura Marriot, president of the MMA, Denver. “[Committee members from] Disney and MTV suggested we make more of an emphasis on protecting all of the folks in the ecosystem particularly those under 13.”

The new guidelines range from broad suggestions like complying with COPPA standards, to more targeted recommendations like avoiding exhortative language such as “only” and “just” when it comes to offers. For the complete guidelines go to: www.mmaglobal.com/bestpractices.pdf.

The other significant change to guidelines was adding mandatory double opt-ins when using interactive voice response or the mobile Web. For example, is you are purchasing a $1.99 Fall Out Boy ring tone, you have to confirm the purchase. “We didn’t address the mobile Web or voice in the past,” said Marriott. “This makes the services more foolproof. The worst thing that could happen is to have a consumer have a negative experience [in the mobile marketplace] and never come back.”

Source: BrandWeek

Mobile Marketing: Back in Business

2007-07-17T14:47:10-05:00:00

New unlimited text plans have revived the Mobile Marketing industry in the U.S., according to the New York Times. (In the past, marketeers had held back from the mobile route because unsolicited text messages were seen as annoying spam by those who were paying for the privilege of receiving them.)

Online retailers, some of the most obvious and earliest users of online advertising, don’t get the award for innovation here, says the NYT. The biggest trend-setters in the Mobile Marketing space have been the “offline” retailers like Coca Cola and American Express. This is because most Mobile Marketing has been about trying to give more “stickiness” to single brands, rather than actually getting people to use their phones to buy products. Mobile commerce, in fact, still has some way to go before it is ubiquitous. Of the 230 million people who use mobile phones in the U.S., half have sent or received text messages, but only 32 million have used their handsets to surf the Web. (Luckily for PayPal, which recently launched a new payment service for the mobile Internet, it will be targeting users in other countries as well.) Ingrid Lunden, mocoNews

The other major trend in Mobile Marketing has been the increasing involvement of big media firms, by way of M&A. AOL purchasing Third Screen Media, and Aegis buying Marvellous Mobile—among other acquisitions—have helped bridge the connection between big media buying clients, technology, and dealing with mobile operators.

Source: Ingrid Lunden, mocoNews

Reaching More Customers With a Simple Text Message

2007-07-16T11:08:35-05:00:00

ONLINE retailers were, for all the obvious reasons, the pioneers of Web advertising. When it comes to advertising on the mobile Web, though, they are treading carefully.

On the one hand, executives and analysts said, online retailers are right to be cautious. After all, few consumers are buying items through their mobile devices. But at least some online retailers say they have found enticing success from early marketing efforts, as long as those initiatives are aimed at simply keeping themselves on the radar of customers as opposed to trying to prompt an immediate purchase or a visit to the company’s Web site.

Take Moosejaw Mountaineering, for example, an outdoor goods retailer based in Madison Heights, Mich. Earlier this year, Moosejaw began sending out text messages to more than 1,000 of its customers who had signed up to receive them. The campaign caught on quickly, with recipients often sending messages back to the retailer and receiving loyalty program points as a reward.

A recent message sent to customers, for instance, conveyed the news that someone had told Robert Wolfe, one of Moosejaw’s founders, that he looked like Ben Stiller. It then asked customers whether that was a good thing and promised points in the company’s rewards program for those who answered “correctly” (meaning yes). Sixty-six percent of the customers who received the message voted.

Mr. Wolfe said he tested a text messaging campaign two years ago with his customers (largely college students and recent graduates), but messages were too costly to send and receive, so he abandoned the idea. Now, with cellphone service carriers offering unlimited texting plans, he thinks the time is right to try again.

“With our customer base, we have to be first to market with this type of stuff,” he said.

The content of the messages was, Mr. Wolfe said, in keeping with the company’s mission to “have as much fun as possible with our customers.” The next contest will ask customers which Kelly they prefer, the one from “Beverly Hills 90210” or the one from “Saved by the Bell.”

“We try to be as dumb as you can possibly be,” he said.

Mr. Wolfe said the campaign is helping sales, although he declined to say how much. In future versions of the texting campaign, he said, the company would take a page from past marketing initiatives and include coupon codes for those who reply. The logic of that approach, he said, may be lost on more mainstream e-commerce executives.

“We sent out a mailer once that said text us back for a coupon code to get a free Moosejaw T-shirt with any order,” Mr. Wolfe said. “A real Internet business person would say it’s a mistake to do that, because the customer has to receive the e-mail, get on the phone and text us, then wait for the reply to get the code, then go back to the computer to put in their order.

“We could’ve just sent out a coupon code in an e-mail,” Mr. Wolfe continued. “But texting is cool enough that we were willing to risk some friction, knowing the upside was that people would talk about it in their dorm rooms.”

Mr. Wolfe said he would consider buying graphical advertisements for mobile Internet devices, but with the exception of iPhones, he said, screens are not sufficient to render ads effectively.

Of the roughly 230 million Americans with cellphones, about half have used them to send or receive text messages, while only about 32 million use them to browse the Web, according to Greg Sterling, an analyst with the Internet consultancy Sterling Market Intelligence.

“Thirty two million is still a significant number,” he said, “but text is where most of the volume is.”

While e-commerce companies take their time exploring mobile advertising, some of the biggest offline marketers, like Visa, American Express and Coca-Cola, have been more aggressive. That is partly because online merchants typically pursue different goals with their marketing dollars than, say, consumer goods manufacturers, who chiefly want people to remember their brands when they shop at the supermarket. Online merchants, by contrast, try to generate purchases or Web site visits with their ads.

“It’s been the opposite of the early days of the Internet,” he said. “Only now, when we’re two and a half years into the real buying, are we seeing e-commerce companies come and say, “This can drive traffic to our sites.’ ”

Online retailers with less technologically aware customers than those of , say, Moosejaw have ignored even text messaging as a marketing tool. William Strauss, chief executive of Provide Commerce, the parent company of, among others, the online flower seller ProFlowers, said he might consider a texting campaign like that used by Moosejaw if customers opted to receive the messages.

“But I’d rather advertise in a more traditional place, where people drive by billboards or see it on the Internet,” Mr. Strauss said. “On a mobile phone, it’s on my ear, not in front of my eyes.”

Mr. Strauss said the iPhone could change that because of how well the device’s screen displays Internet pages. “All bets are off in terms of what behaviors the iPhone might create,” he said. “It’s something we’ll watch very closely.”

Whether it is from e-commerce companies or traditional marketers, consumers should expect more ads on their cellphones in the coming year, industry executives said.

Membership in the Mobile Marketing Association, an industry trade group, has nearly doubled in the past year, to about 500 companies.

“This is going to ramp up much faster than the Internet did,” said Mr. Sterling, of Sterling Market Intelligence. “It took 10 years and the proliferation of broadband for marketers to do things online that were predicted early on. This will take half the time or less.”

Source: Bob Tedeschi, New York Times

3 Things to Revolutionize Mobile Marketing

2007-07-09T14:40:03-05:00:00

1. Time Based Opt In - The way most opt-in's work is that an individual company seeks my permission to market to me, and once they have it they can send me messages at any time based on their own schedule. We all know this comes with wastage as many of the messages will likely reach me at a time when I am not interested in them. For email, this is not as much of a problem as I can just save it for later. Mobile Marketing is about immediacy - and therefore less suited to this model of opt-ins. What we need is a time based opt-in where I can indicate my status and openness to marketing messages as easily as I change my status on an instant messenger window. This works for consumers and for marketers - ensuring the messages arrive at a point when consumers are most likely to act on them.

2. My Marketing Profile - Unfortunately, delivering messages at the right time doesn't necessarily mean they will be relevant. Right now, users can create profiles on social networking sites, indicate news preferences to get the most relevant news, and otherwise create profiles on thousands of sites to save their preferences. What people can't usually set is their marketing preferences. Of course, you can opt in to messages from individual marketers, but what about opting into messages from every company in a mall that you frequent, or all middle eastern restaurants in Brooklyn? Setting these parameters into my profile lets me opt into messages that have the most relevance. The difficulty is the level of coordination (sometimes between competitors) that would be required to make this work.

3. Synchronization of Mobile And Retail - As anyone who has ever downloaded a marketing offer to their mobile phone knows, the entire process falls apart if you go into a retail location to redeem the offer and the staff are unaware of the promotion or how to honor it. This is a large stumbling block and one that will continue to hinder the adoption of mobile as a channel to receive marketing messages. Consumers need to feel that what they get via mobile is integrated into a real life experience (where appropriate), or Mobile Marketing will always need to fight the same credibility battle.

Source: Rohit Bhargava, Internet Financial News

Read article here

Half the World Population will have a phone by end of July

2007-06-27T11:08:50-05:00:00

http://news.com.com/Global+mobile+phone+use+to+pass+record+3+billion/2100-1039_3-6193559.html?tag=nefd.top

By the end of July, global mobile phone use will for the first time pass the 3 billion mark--equivalent to half the world's population--as cell phone demand booms in China, India and Africa, a survey said on Wednesday.

The Real Thing in Mobile Marketing

2007-06-20T09:20:47-05:00:00

Coca-Cola announced in 2006 that it was working towards allocating over 50% of its marketing budget to Mobile Marketing. On Friday, 22 June 2007, we will see the launch in the US of its first mobile digital community linked to the Sprite brand, called Sprite Yard. What is the marketing model and is it relevant to the South African market?

The launch of Sprite Yard is aimed at being a real time “on the go” community. It will allow its members to network with each other and to download various types of content 24/7. In order to register to join Yard, users simply SMS the keyword “Yard” to a short code. They will then be linked to the Yard portal and will be able to download a browser application on their mobile phones.

The Yard user is registered with a tag name and password, has the ability to select various preferences relating to content and can invite friends to join their community. In short, the Yard is a classic mobile digital community with the significant difference that it is consumer-brand driven.

Changing dynamics

Up to now we have seen web-based digital communities such as Myspace, Facebook and mobile digital communities such as Mxit in SA. They have dominated the market based on first entry. I foresee that vertical social network services offered by consumer brands will drastically change the dynamics in digital communities. There is a new game coming to town.

What, from a technical point of view, is Sprite Yard offering its consumers in its mobile digital community?

A tag name and password for access giving a form of security
The ability to create your own community by inviting others to join
Photo sharing
A message board for sending messages to individuals or groups
Showcasing a snapshot of your activities
Digital downloads of content for free
Exclusive content such as visitones (music with ringtones) and mobisodes (animated shorts) linked to PIN activation under a Sprite bottle cap.

Linking mobile content to product sales will become the new marketing dynamite of the next five years.

The Mobile Marketing perspective

Taken from a Mobile Marketing perspective, Sprite Yard is an example of a brand combining with technology to communicate with its consumers in the most personal way via their mobile phones. As I have mentioned before, the mobile is personal, portable and pedestrian. It is also offers the most complete way in which to communicate a message to someone since Eve offered the apple of temptation to Adam.

“We know that when it comes to reaching teens, mobile is the medium. This program will enable us to connect with teens by putting Sprite both in their hand and in their phone,” says Denis Sison, Sprite global brand director.

The mobile imperative for teens

Looking at recent global research by Mobilitec (www.mobilitec.com/) on Mobile Marketing and Teens, the principal points are confirmed once again. These are that

teens are highly responsive to Mobile Marketing techniques and mobile branding
this group anticipates receiving advertising and special offers on their mobile phones telling them about new products and good deals.

This is hardly surprising when you think about it. This group is probably the most connected to the world wide web where they are constantly exposed to similar offers.

A similar research project, conducted by Q Research, amongst the 11 – 20 age group in the UK, has come up with results that rank their preferences when receiving Mobile Marketing communications as follows:

32% – willing to receive “general” ads to mobile
71% – willing to receive ads only on things I am interested in
76% – willing to receive ads in exchange for discounts/ special offers
82% – willing to receive ads in exchange for top-up credit

The research further showed that young people preferred picture advertising messages to video and text/sms ads. This is probably due to the current cost of downloading video in the UK. As SA presently has amongst the cheapest rates in the world it would not surprise me to find that SA teens would be quite prepared to download video ads on their mobiles.

Mind the gap

But what of the generation gap and the old timers in SA? Anything from 35 years and up could be considered “old” in the mobile digital age. Will they use their mobile phones to join communities and to access information? What of the digital divide in this country?

One has to spend only 30 minutes in the company of Brian Richardson of Wizzit Bank to realize that when one offers a valued service on a mobile phone, no matter what the age, gender or ethnic group, the user will learn to use and adopt that service. In the case of Wizzit, this is a banking product that has been enthusiastically adopted by the previously unbanked population sector of SA.

Bite the apple

There are two things that you can do about this opportunity that is being offered to you:

You can relax, soak up the sun and have it pass you by. At least, make it a conscious decision to ignore the proferred ‘apple' without testing the fruit.
You can decide to investigate it and determine whether or not a mobile digital community suits your brand strategy. At least then you will test the fruit and decide whether or not to take a bite of the apple.

And by the way, do it in 2007, because in 2008 you will be banished from the Garden of Eden.

Source: Biz Community

Read article here