11/20/09 by David Wachs | Blog, Marketing Blog | No Comments »
I just returned back from a trip to New York, where I had the opportunity to attend a benefit dinner for one of our clients, the Ad Council. Ad Council is celebrating its 56th year of delivering public service announcements; now many of which are coupled with web sites and integrated marketing campaigns. So far, we’ve been lucky enough to work on:
If you haven’t seen any of these campaigns (or others created by Ad Council), they’re worth a look; some of the best names in advertising–BBDO, DraftFCB, ArnoldNYC–have donated their time to create exceptional pieces, and we’re thrilled to be involved, if only slightly, in these causes.
In 2010, we hope to get more involved with this esteemed organization. While meeting with the Ad Council this week, we pledged our support to offer mobile marketing keywords to every single campaign, (and every single traditional media piece) developed by the organization, for no charge, indefinitely. We hope this allows the organization to continue to increase awareness of their campaigns. Even the simplest “save this information to my phone”, will help those standing at bus shelters, watching television commercials, or hearing radio ads remember to visit the Ad Council’s web sites when they get in front of their computer.
Congratulations to the Ad Council on another terrific year. And thank you to all the members of the advertising community that pledge their time, money, and ad inventory to make these campaigns successful, impactful, and (many times) a part of Americana.
11/19/09 by Cellit Staff | Blog, Marketing Blog | No Comments »
Mobile doesn’t work in a vacuum. As we talked about in the 3rd C – Commitment, without the aid of outside media, your mobile club will fall flat. It’s important to integrate mobile into your entire media plan, from broadcast television and radio spots, to print, billboard, email, newsletter and in-store. The more it just fits in, the more successful the club. So that begs the question: what is the right media message for mobile. Let me break it down into four points:
Have a clear call to action: Make it easy for the end user to understand what they need to do. Keep it simple and to the point. A short “TEXT BRIAN to 30364” will work wonders (and, if you actually do it, get you more information about me).Describe the benefit or reason for joining: The end user will want a reason to join the mobile club, and to understand the content they will receive upon joining. “… to receive coupons and alerts”, or “… to enter the contest”, or “… to get special offers via your phone” are all great examples of brief, succinct reasons to join.Visual and oral: Every medium has its own capabilities and restrictions – however, whenever possible, using both visual and oral will increase the impact. Broadcast television is the best for this, as it allows you to put text on the screen while the announcer provides audio reinforcement.Urgency: While not always applicable, urgency is great. Give the end user a reason to act now. Contests are great examples, while other clients have used the upcoming holiday deals or other timely season events to drive membership immediately.A good media message can be short and to the point, including all four of the points above. “Text BRIAN to 30364 before 2010 for killer ideas on how mobile can change your business!”
11/13/09 by Cellit Staff | Blog, Marketing Blog | No Comments »
As email has evolved from text only to graphic-heavy, branded communications – the technology behind them has grown increasingly complex. Marketers have included tracking links, served ads and complex tables to better organize the massive amounts of data we cram into emails. To further complicate this, consumers are managing how and where they read their emails – providing marketers with a host of limitations to this influx of technology.
The consumer is ultimately in control – especially when it comes to email. These individuals can choose whether to read their email via an online interface, through Outlook or Entourage, or have that same email forwarded to a smart phone. And there’s very little one can do to track or change those habits, as many (including myself) do all of the above at some point throughout the day. The simple solution is to allow consumers the option of an HTML or text only version … however, that presumes I want the same experience for every medium. So what is a marketer to do?
Mobile Marketer recently had a great article on this subject, and I decided to add Cellit’s perspective – as we’ve done some consulting work on behalf of our clients in this area. Here are some high level thoughts on how you can optimize email for the mobile device:
Quickly get the end user to an alternative format: we’ve all seen the saying “can’t read this email, click here”. The problem is that oftentimes the verbiage is included after a header graphic, or includes a tracking link. It literally should be the very first bit of code put into an HTML email, which will ensure that it’s the first thing a user reads.Make the link short: there’s no reason to collect user data on the link to an alternative version. The inconvenience and degradation of the user experience far outweighs the incremental value. By creating a human readable link, you more quickly get the end user to the content – which is the real value.Create an optimized Mobile version: the alternative version doesn’t have to be just text .. in fact, it can be just as awesome as the original version. Just because a phone doesn’t render email in HTML doesn’t mean it can’t do so on the web. That being said, each phone has a different screen size and capabilities – so you’ll want to work with a vendor to use mobile user agent detection so that you can appropriately scale and format the content to meet these changing requirements.Email doesn’t have to be hard when viewed via mobile device. With a little bit of thought, you can avoid many of the mistakes and create a good user experience that covers the gamut of places users check their email.
07/30/09 by Cellit Staff | Blog, Marketing Blog | 1 Comment »
Having created successful mobile campaigns, and become believers in the power of mobile marketing – many of our clients have been starting to think outside of the SMS box. As they begin exploring the wide open frontier that is WAP sites and Mobile Applications, they have looked to Cellit for guidance and advice. More often than not – I get the question: what’s the difference? And do I need both?
I recently wrote a post with some thoughtful advice on whether a business needs a mobile application. Once an owner has determined if stepping beyond SMS is the right next step, there are many options and they can quickly become expensive. Let’s start by defining the two main options: applications and a WAP site.
Created for smart phones, mobile applications are downloadable programs that run on your phone. Smart phones include the Apple iPhone, the Google Android Phone, the Palm models (including the new PRE), Blackberry models and all Windows phones. The applications offer the ability to provide a slightly more customized experience, in addition to added features and functionality. And because they are designed for a specific platform (ie – an iPhone), can be built in such a way as to maximize the unique features of that platform – including compass, camera, and motion sensors.
WAP sites are html websites that have been optimized for viewing on a phone. Unlike traditional websites, the user is often restricted by a limited screen size and ability to navigate. As such, they tend to be very streamlined and simplified, with only a subset of the data and options available on the traditional .com website.
Both options accomplish much of the same thing; however, there are some notable differences. I have mentioned the mobile applications ability to have additional features and functionality, in addition to the fact that you can design the application specifically for the platform, taking advantage of the phone features.
Most importantly, access is the main differentiator. Smart phones represent about 40% of the US market. While this is growing at a substantial rate, it is still less than half of the population. Within that percentage, each individual Smart phone category represents some subset of the population. For example, if an iPhone application is created – with no other applications – it will have the potential to reach only 2-3% of the entire population. Thus, to aggressively pursue a mobile application strategy – a company will need to either plan to develop applications across all the major platforms (Android, Apple, Windows, Blackberry and Palm OS) or specifically analyze their target market and the particular phone type they are most prone to use. For example, a business-to-business company may target the Blackberry for application development, as it is popular amongst business users – while a company targeting early adopters and a younger demographic may develop an iPhone application.
There has been some discussion about the growing popularity of the iPhone application store. To be more specific, does an application developed on another platform (say, Blackberry for discussion purposes) provide a better ROI because there is a larger chance that it will be found by casual browsers than for an iPhone application, which will be lost in the thousands of applications currently available. While there is some truth to this, much of the success of an application will rest on the ability of the organization to promote it through other advertising and communication mediums to their target audience.
In contrast to applications, the WAP site is available on more phones, both smart and traditional mobile handsets. While some subscribers may not subscribe to a data plan, two-thirds of all users have access to the web, and most new phone models offer some type of mobile browser. WAP sites, when done correctly, resize all graphics to display best on the screen size of the phone – thus ensuring the best possible experience for each individual user. It is a least common denominator, ensuring access across platforms, mobile company providers and phone models.
One strategy that I found particularly compelling that blends the best of both worlds comes from CNN (who is not a client). They have created a downloadable icon, which is available in the various stores (in my case, Blackberry). This icon simply links me directly to the CNN.mobi WAP site. It offers the convenience of an on-screen icon for smart phone users, ensuring top of mind awareness, but also takes advantage of an existing WAP site. In my mind, this is an example of getting the best of both worlds – and maximizing development dollars.
It’s our belief that starting off and reaching the broadest audience provides the best ROI in this marketing climate. As such, companies will want to start with text, then to WAP sites, and finally onto the application development front through targeted platform development. Applications provide great benefits and exposure when developed on the right platform for the right target audience.
