Social Networking Is All About Mobile, So Why Aren’t You All About Mobile?

September 20, 2010 By Leave a Comment

 

Over the last few posts it has become obvious that customers are using mobile phones for a variety of reasons and one of the biggest is social networking. 

When you look at the various social networks almost all of them require a smart mobile phone. If you check in on Foursquare.com, Gowalla.com, Where, Facebook Places or Yelp.com you have to use a mobile phone. Each site uses mobile phone location services to tell if you are close to where you want to check in and you typically can't check in if you aren't close to the location.

 

The point is

Social Networking is all about Mobile, So Why Aren't You All About Mobile?

Aren't you already mobile? You most likely own a smart phone like an Android or iPhone. You are probably like most smart phone users, you use the phone to play games, send or answer text messages, look for stores and restaurants, check the weather and you probably have downloaded the PayPal app and you shop on your phone. (Somebody is shopping, Paypal expects to close 2010 with $500 million in mobile payments).

So the question is, Why haven't you started a mobile strategy for your business? If your spending thousand of dollars and hours of time on social networks, social networking marketing.

If you've hired a social network guru, why havn't you include mobile marketing in you business marketing plan. 

It's time to start NOW

 

Want  help developing a mobile marketing plan.

Schedule a FREE STRATEGY SESSION  click here.

Filed Under: Marketing, Mobile ECommerce, Mobile Phones Tagged With: , , , ,

The Big Boy Mobile Marketing Series – Macy’s Prepares for Holidays By Ramping Up Mobile

September 16, 2010 By Leave a Comment

Mobile ShopperSuccess leaves clues and if you are a small business owner that is looking to have a great holiday season it may be time to take your cue from the big boys.

Macy's has ramped up its mobile strategy according to Mobile Commerce Daily, Macy's has revamped it's mobile website to ensure that pictures are sharp and bigger and has optimized it's websites to recognize the various types of mobile devices .

Both Macy's and Bloomingdale's sites have been upgraded, the company has also upgraded and relaunched it's iPhone app.  The new iPhone app lets  consumers  browse merchandise, place and track orders, explore gift guides, read product reviews, find stores and get information on special events and campaigns.

The company also has a promotion on Foursquare.com, when a customers checks in at a store on Foursquare before September 30, they are entered in a contest to win a trip to New York City.

How an you use mobile to boost your business's holiday season?

Copy some of the things Macy's has done. I

  • Check to see how your business site performs on mobile phones. If necessary create promotions with custom designed mobile landing pages instead of a complete mobile website.
  • Initiate an SMS campaign, so you can send offers to customers on their phones
  • Make sure your business is on all of the social media sites and design campaigns for those sites.
  • Claim all of your online business real estate
  • Partner with FourSquare.com, Gowalla..com, Where.com nd reward customers that check in.
  • Encourage customers to follow you on Twitter, Facebook and other sites
  • Reward customers for allowing you to communicate with them on their mobile devices.

By initiating these strategies you can take advantage of your customers most intimate comunication device and enjoy a profitable holiday season.

Want  help developing a mobile marketing plan. Schedule a FREE STRATEGY SESSION by clicking here.

Filed Under: Marketing, Mobile ECommerce Tagged With: , , , ,

Neilson App Report Reveals Secrets To How People Are Using Their Mobile Phones

September 15, 2010 By Leave a Comment

Neilson App ReportOn Monday, Nielson released a Mobile App Report revealing how people use their mobile phones. Nielson surveyed 4,000 people. One of the most eye opening findings was "most Americans can't imagine leaving home without their mobile phones" and that one in four respondents own a smartphone that is "more powerful then the computers used to send a man to the moon".

Here is what people are doing with their smartphones;

  • Download apps – 59% of respondents downloaded a mobile phone app per month
  • Play games – 61% of respondents bought and play a game per month
  • Check the weather – 55% use their phones to check the weather
  • Respondents use phones to get directions as well

Respondent also use mobile phones to checkin on social sites, like Facebook, FourSquare, Gowalla and more. 

Read more about how people use mobile phones here. 

Filed Under: Marketing Tagged With: , , ,

Your Business Uses Mobile or Your Business is Bust

September 2, 2010 By Leave a Comment

I know, bold statement but the facts are the facts. Here are some reasons why from an Adage

Mobile is now even bigger than desktop use, and data/video usage exceeds voice calls.

  • 80% of the U.S. population will have a mobile phone by 2010.

  • 35% of American adults are using their mobile devices for wireless Internet access.
  • The average iPhone user only spends 45% of his on-device time making voice calls – the rest is spent browsing the web or using applications.
  • Video accounts for 69% of mobile data traffic.

Access to the web and applications via mobile is growing and will soon be universal.

  • Smartphone usage of both browser and applications has increased more than 110% in the last year.

  • By 2011, 99% of mobile phones will be data-capable devices – at minimum they can do basics like sending and receiving SMS text messages.

Consumer use of mobile devices is growing exponentially – much faster than PC or Internet use grew – but U.S. businesses have been slow to take advantage of endless opportunities to optimize stakeholders’ mobile interactions with the brand.

Possibilities for interacting with consumers via mobile go beyond delivering content and enabling transactions. Location-based targeting, real-time comparison shopping and QR codes allow businesses to interact with customers in novel ways.

Filed Under: Advertising, Marketing, Mobile ECommerce Tagged With: , , , ,

Viking Cooking School Uses Text Messaging & Text Coupons to Grow Enrollment

September 1, 2010 By Leave a Comment

Viking Range Corp manufactures high end stoves and other appliances and has a cooking school.

The school has 16 locations around the US. Recently Viking used text messaging to boost school attendance. The school sent out an email to it's existing customer database with an offer to signup using a web based custom widget.

Then Viking asked students to text "Viking" to shortcode 313131 (the school now had a mobile text customer list).

Once they built the list, Viking looked at the schools cooking schedule to see what classes need filling. They then sent a text message to the list. Here's an example;

Girls Night Out in Vegas! Cook shrimp to perfection, make herbed melt in your mouth biscuits and grilling meat to perfection Sun 4/18 5PM-8PM call 898-8345

One recent text filled eight class spots, valued at $79.00 each — a single text message that cost less the school $15 dollars to send resulted in an additional $632 dollars in revenue. Viking Cooking School has since brought two other locations on board, with plans for more in the near future.

How can you use text messaging to grow your business. Call us today to discover how 267-940-7504

Filed Under: Advertising, Marketing Tagged With: , , ,

3 Uses for SMS Messaging in Your Business

August 30, 2010 By Leave a Comment

There are many ways to use SMS or Text Messaging in your business.  Here is a list of the different  ways SMS can be used in your business to either grow sales or reduce costs.

In every case, the first step is to make a compelling offer to customers (online or offline offer) asking them to text a keyword to a shortcode. (for example to get more information from me you  text "autolead" to 69302. Once the customer has opted in to your mobile system, you have permission to send them

  • Mobile Coupons. This is a great way to sell products and services. You create offers with a coupon number or word and send the offer to your mobile list. Many businesses have had tremendous success with mobile coupons by asking customers to join a VIP list and then sending the VIP's special offers. You can really get people excited by then advertising your VIP offers to non VIP members and ask them to join the VIP list.
  • Mobile Customer Service. A great way to reduce customer service costs and increase customer satisfaction, mobile customer service allows you to 
    • Provide service locations
    • Provide status of repair
    • Send service instructions
  • Mobile Reminder Service. Remind your customer about appointments an reduce the aggravation and costs of rescheduling and lost time. Mobile Reminder Service is great for service appointments like HVAC service as well as remind patients of upcoming doctor appointments.

There are many more uses for mobile marketing but the point is to start now. How can mobile marketing, text marketing to help grow your business. 

Filed Under: Marketing, Mobile ECommerce Tagged With: , , ,

Consumer use of mobile payments is growing according to recent survey

August 26, 2010 By Leave a Comment

A recent survey by AT&T's Sterling Commerce and ecommerce service provider DemandWare Inc found that consumers are increasingly using mobile phones to make payments. The study found that 15% of consumers have used mobile phones to make purchases but the same consumers are concerned about security and ease of use. As expected, 25-34 year olds use mobile phones for purchases the most at 21%. Read more here

Filed Under: Marketing, Mobile ECommerce Tagged With: , ,

Big Food Franchises are Winning the Mobile Monopoly Game

August 18, 2010 By Leave a Comment

McDonalds, Subway, Starbucks, Burger King and more are winning the mobile monopoly game called Mytown by Booyah.com. Mytown is the new mobile monoply game according to the New York Time and other popular tech sites.

Mytown by Booyah is described as an location-based mobile entertainment app. Mytown is similar to the very popular Foursquare in that users checkin when they are at a location the difference between Foursquare and MyTown is that MyTown offer points for checking in, MyTown users check in to get virtual goods or rewards to advance through a Monopoly-like game.

According to Advertising Age "Quick-service chains Subway, McDonald's, Starbucks and Burger King have the most unique check-ins on MyTown, a location-based game with more than 3 million users that provided the data. Subway has seen nearly 6.4 million check-ins from more than 500,000 users since the app launched in December".

So here is the question for you, small business owner. When are you going to take your place in an organized fashio around these location based apps? When are you going to take advantage of having your customers tell their friends that they are at your store, restaurant or whatever.

Don't let the big boys dominate the space, Create your own plan and get started in mobile today.

 

Filed Under: Marketing Tagged With: , , , ,

Mobile Phones Can Do Damn Near Anything

August 9, 2010 By Leave a Comment

OK, I get it mobile phones can do anything

Filed Under: Marketing Tagged With: , ,

Amazon may dominate mobile marketing if other retailers aren’t careful

July 26, 2010 By Leave a Comment

If you have ever doubted that mobile retailing isn't real, Amazon just posted 1 billion (thats right folks) n sales in their mobile channel. “We’re seeing rapid growth in Kindle, Amazon Web Services, third-party sales and retail,” Mr. Bezos said in the statement. “We’re also encouraged by what we see in mobile. “In the last twelve months, customers around the world have ordered more than $1 billion of products from Amazon using a mobile device,” he said. Read more in Mobile Commerce Daily

After you read the article, it's time to start thinking about how you can join Amazon in this mobile tsunami

Filed Under: Marketing Tagged With: , ,
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