The below article was published in Qatar Today magazine, September 2011 issue. The article highlights innovative mobile marketing technique adopted by brands. Click on the below pics to continue reading.
"Text Version"
Emergence of Mocial Marketing
Mobile marketing has come way beyond sending the 160 character text. With the growing popularity of smart phones the scope of reaching your customer via the mobile channel has grown.
Mobile and social media are merging and this integration of social networking and mobile will change the way we reach out to our customers.
According to Silverpop, an email marketing firm, a survey revealed the following results –
More than 75 percent of the marketers polled stated that their campaigns are only somewhat “mocially” integrated or not at all integrated.
Twitter and Facebook dominate the social scene, while only four percent of respondents are currently using location-based services, such as Foursquare and Gowalla, in their marketing efforts.
QR (Quick Response) is one of the popular tools that has been successfully adopted by Online marketers for mocial marketing. QR codes, a decades-old technology that was first used in the supply chain and now has become a way of mobile marketing.
A QR code is a matrix or two-dimensional bar code readable by dedicated smart phone (camera enabled).
How do you use QR code: when you see the code on a billboard, magazine page, on the metro, etc, scan it with a smart phone that has the necessary code-reading software. The code can contain a text, image or can a redirect the person to a mobile website.
How can marketers use it – Share your campaign information that can include anything from special promotion and competitions to images. Use it on your print media to share additional info or some other message.
Benefit – You can always change the URL code in the QR to show different content. Unlike in print media, if there is a mistake in your marketing campaign you don’t need to reprint the content. When you hand out brochures, collection of data is almost close to impossible unless you conduct a survey later on. QR marketing is able to collect details of each access of the QR Code instantly.
QR Codes Fact Sheet (via Queaar a social communication platform): -
Q2-2011, QR scanning traffic was rising at an astonishing rate of 9840% vs Q2 2010
QR codes are scanned more by women (64%) than men (36%)
35-44 year old users have scanned the most
87% of users expect a coupon or deal when they scan a code
68% of scans are done via iPhone
New York is the leading city in the US for QR code scanning
The most QR codes scanned globally are in Japan
Who is using QR Codes?
Starbucks wanted to allow their customers to pay for their latte’s via mobile media. They thought it would be an old fashioned way giving them prepaid cards and then swiping them on POS machines. So they decided to develop an app for iPhone to help customer pay and top up their ‘e-card’ using their own mobile phones.
It works like this –
- punch in your Starbucks card info
- verify some details, and the iPhone app becomes the gift/e-card.
- A secure QR code is generated for the store to scan when you pay the bill.
This payment mode is now enabled over 1000 Starbucks stores in USA.
Nissan Motor Company has begun fixing QR codes on vehicle window of their 2012 Altima. The QR codes link users directly to a mobile optimized page that includes videos, features, vehicle inventory levels and more. The customer can give feedback and know more about the car they have bought.
Try creating your QR codes on : -
http://www.mobile-barcodes.com/
http://www.createqrcode.appspot.com/
The study of human behavior shows that incentives offered for completing a task, tend to be addictive.
An outright example for this is location based website – Foursquare. The mobile app encourages people to share their location wherever they are. The users try to check-in to locations several times to receive one of the several badges offered by the site.
The entire experience of achieving the “Mayor” status of a particular location gives users immense pleasure. The commercial side of this is that many retailers give their customers discounts/freebies upon achieving “Mayor” badge (or any other badge prescribed by the retailer). E.g. Dominos pizza in UK offers exclusive discount to anybody who checks into their outlet frequently and becomes the Mayor of that particular outlet.
As per a report published by ICT Qatar in 2011, on average, each household in Qatar owns 3.9 mobile phones and the country has a mobile penetration rate of 99%. About 57% of the individuals who own a mobile phone access internet via mobile. With access to high speed networks combined with usage of smart phones, makes a clear case of experimenting with Mocial Marketing in the country.
The emergence of this new marketing technique gives marketers a new channel to reach out their customers and build relationships. Customer engagement via mobile would be taken to the next level once brands are able to customize the experience.
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