Archive for July, 2008
I came across yet another mobile coupon service today called moQpon. The service allows consumers to text their zipcode to 41411 in exchange for a user-specified number of weekly coupons. Users can register for between 1 and 14 weekly coupons. An interesting aspect of the site is that there is also an onsite submission form so that users can submit the coupons and savings that they may come across in their community. While the website doesn’t clearly specify that it sends mobile coupons, and not just SMS messages of local savings and deals, it still is interesting in the sense that it keeps users cognizant of the savings in their local area. The benefit of having such an awareness of mobile coupons and savings is that moQpon can therefore build a type of user-generated social network based around mobile coupons, which is an idea we’ve seen before with services like Boulder’s Dizgo, UGotItFirst, and Coupons, Inc but is practiced a little differently by moQpon. The concept of user-submitted mobile coupons, if it is able to pick up steam, could be absolutely crucial in giving SMS coupons the breath and life that seems to be missing in the market.
MoQpon also just released an EPK, which is available here as a Google Document.
- JPK
July 30th, 2008
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What is the perimeter of Central Park?
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How tall is Ludacris?
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What is the gray dog’s name on the cartoon ‘Kipper the Dog’?
These are a few of the many curiosities and brain farts I’ve had the past couple of days. Impressively, these have all been answered almost instantly via my cell phone by a less flatulent brain, Cha Cha. Cha Cha is a personal, free, information service which invites us to text any question to be returned promptly by a human! For this reason I believe it trumps texting Google. Although Google might return an automated reply within seconds, it is limiting as to what I can ask. Plus, I find it annoyingly unnecessary to get three or four Google replies in my inbox providing contact information for the seven nearest Trader Joe’s when I only need one. Also, I can’t be pathetically entertained by seeking advice from Google whether I should grant my girlfriend’s wish to get a haircut or not.
On the other end of Cha Cha is someone like us. Since they don’t limit the content of our questions, they don’t limit their humor in providing answers. Texting them can be not only a convenience but a good laugh as well.
HOW DOES IT WORK? For ChaCha, you simply text your question to 242242 (the numeric equivalent to the words CHA-CHA)
Want to compare ChaCha and Google? You can text your question to Google at 466453
–cloud
July 29th, 2008
(originally found on Textually.org via WirelessMobileNews)
Hands On Mobile has released a new service that enables artists to publicize and promote their work in the mobile arena. With their mixtART service, Hands On allows users to convert their art into cell phone wallpaper. With mixtART, independant artists can undoubtedly capitalize on the growth and expansion of mobile technology and can use the technology to interact with traditional artwork. Wallpapers will cost $2 per download, and some of the works will be debuted at the upcoming San Diego ComicCon. Though the service does not launch until Fall 2008, mixtART allows curious users to download exclusive pre-launch wallpapers here.
- JPK
July 24th, 2008
We found this interesting IKEA offer this morning on Mobile Marketer. IKEA is working with bCode to create a mobile loyalty program. According to the article, the company is aiming to “start a dialogue with interested consumers.” After agreeing to join the program and texting IKEA1 TO 30364, members recieve weekly IKEA news, coupons, alerts, and games. Coupons can then be brought to IKEA and physically printed from a kiosk. Marketing specialist Casey Crook is optimistic of the offer.
“Your mobile phone is such a personal device – you carry it everywhere with you,” Ms. Crook said.
“Our IKEA Mobile program has allowed us to communicate one-to-one with our customers about store sales, events and activities, but it’s the bCode solution which has allowed us to drive customer traffic into the store,” she said.
Read the rest of the article here.
-JPK
July 22nd, 2008
With the opening of the Summer Olympics less than 3 weeks away, NBC has offered a generous assortment of mobile alerts for the Beijing Games. There are two ways to sign up:
Online: Services require free registration through www.nbcolympics.com under the mobile tab. There you can sign up for mobile alerts, but also video clips and mobile web. You are then able to customize your alerts (as described below) and format (email and/or SMS text messaging).
Mobile: You can also sign up for services directly from your phone. NBC offers the following alerts:
Daily Alerts
- Top Stories: Text “OLYNEWS” to 51515
- NBC Primetime Alerts: Text “OLYTV” to 51515
- NBCOlympics.com Livestreaming Alert: Text “OLYLIVE” to 51515
- Daily Medal Recap: Text “MEDALRECAP” to 51515
Real-time Alerts
- Breaking news: Text “OLYBREAK” to 51515
- Gold Medal alerts: Text “MEDAL” to 51515
- U.S. Medal alerts: Text “USMEDAL” to 51515
Media Alerts
- Video Highlights: Text “OLYVIDEO” to 51515
- Photo of the Day: Text “OLYPHOTO” to 51515
I will soon be reviewing NBC’s mobile alert services, but the full range of customizable alerts is promising. With the 12 hour difference, real-time alerts should satisfy the thirst for Olympic news for those who cannot wait for time-delayed Primetime coverage.
Upon registration, you will need to send a confirmatory text, ‘OK’. Text STOP to quit, and HELP for support. Again, alerts are free, but carrier charges may apply.
-BMS
July 21st, 2008
Solow claims to be “The Ultimate Prize Game for Your Mobile Phone.” If that doesn’t get your attention, Solow is sponsoring a $50,000 cash sweepstakes this summer, with drawings in July, August and September. To compete for the $50,000 Grand Prize, you have to sign up at www.solow.com and start playing. For every game you play between now and September 18, 2008, you will automatically receive one entry into the Sweepstakes. What’s the deal? Read on.
Once you register your mobile phone number at www.solow.com, you can play to win a variety of prizes by entering up to 20 numbers per game. If your entry turns out to be the lowest unique number for that game, you win! Recent prizes offered by Solow include $100 in cash, a $100 gift card for travel on Southwest Airlines, a $100 gas card, Virgin Music Festival concert tickets, and a $100 gift card for products at Sephora. These contests are all free to enter (except for the cost of text messaging if you are guessing from your mobile phone)—but beware of the games that say $.99 per guess; the prizes are bigger, but that extra charge will add up to a shockingly large phone bill if you max out your 20 guesses for each game.
Recent prizes offered by Solow include $100 in cash, a $100 gift card for travel on Southwest Airlines, a $100 gas card, Virgin Music Festival concert tickets, and a $100 gift card for products at Sephora.
The Solow text messaging option lets you check on how you are doing in a particular game or make a new guess based on in-game updates and hints. You can text your next guess to 23687 at any time during the game (games can last from a few days to a few weeks). Unless you opt for No Hints when you register, you will get text message updates from Solow on your standing in each game—for example, if your unique number is bumped by another player, you will find out via text message and have another chance to guess.
If you have ever tried to guess the lowest unique number for a www.Limbo.com contest, the Solow game play will seem very, very familiar. How does Solow make money from giving away cash prizes? One method is to offer hard core gaming fans a Solow Elite subscription. This will cost you $9.99 a month – in return, Elite status will let you enter all the premium games without paying the $.99 per guess fee.
Recently, Limbo has expanded its focus from just games to offer a mobile social community with new communication and location features for its millions of registered gamer members. It will be interesting to see if the members who joined Limbo for the simpler pleasures of guessing to win via text will migrate to Solow.
July 17th, 2008
Jeff Kohn, president of Dizgo (short for “discounts on the go”) proudly describes his company as the world’s first 100%, completely self-service mobile advertising platform. Kohn explains “it allows brick and mortars to create real time demand for products and services and instantly get customers into the door. For consumers, we are a service that is free and allows shoppers to find nearby discounts using their mobile phone.” Codespotter met with Jeff and asked him about his company, as well as it’s plans for the future.
Can you explain to me what Dizgo is?
There are multiple components to it. The first component is a web-based portal where an advertiser or retailer can log on and set up “actionable advertising”. We provide three different ways for them to distribute that offer. The first is called Deal Search, which allows consumers to use their mobile phone’s SMS to do the equivalent of a Google search. They can search specifically what they’re looking for. We have a patented ontology-based search engine that maps that key word back to a category that the retailer associates their offer with. We figure out all of the different keywords that someone might type into an SMS search and then map it back, so it’s very quick for someone to find an offer. The second component is called Deal Alert, where a consumer can opt in to receive alerts from their favorite retailers at specific times, and we have an interface for that called my.dizgo.com. They can log on to our site and they can see all of the different stores in a certain geography. Currently, we’re launched in Downtown Boulder, Pearl St Hall in Colorado; a collection of probably 500 different retailers in a walking area. They can opt in to receive offers from specific stores at specific times. There’s no spam, because we make sure that they select the exact times to receive alerts. The third distribution model is called Syndication. Here, we allow partner websites and partner mobile platforms to reach into our database of real time offers via a web service so that they can display localized actionable advertising around their content.
So you’re based out of Boulder now, but you have plans to expand?
In next month or so, we’re going to be rolling out our reseller and national brand platforms. The reseller platform allows traditional media companies or entrepeneurs in a different location. We would host the platform, while they’re in charge of the marketing. It allows us to expand much quicker than it would be if we built our own national sales force. We’re also in conversations with a lot of yellow page companies to augment their existing products, as opposed to selling paper or traditional media advertising. Our national brand platform is for national brands. For example, TGIFridays or Applebee’s could roll this out so that people could receive alerts regardless of their location. That will also give them the ability to do a business search, where they could text the word APPLEBEES and it would tell you all of the offers that Applebee’s is running then and there.
When you make this expansion, how are you going to expand Dizgo’s technology and ontology system that covers Boulder currently?
For food and beverage retailers, the ontology is essentially built, because the same key word someone types in Boulder would work in Madison, as far as searching for specific types of food and beverage. As far as expanding into new geographies, we are looking at ways to do a location based search, to identify the directory locations. We’re working on an iPhone application that taps into the iPhone’s API that gives geolocations, so that people don’t need to self identify where they are. We’re also working on an Android application for other brands of cellphones. It’s also a hosted service, so regardless of where someone is looking for deals, on the consumer side, it is all coming back to our datacenter, so we can scale there using our shortcode and our branding.
What do you feel the benefit is of using SMS coupons and mobile marketing?
I think what we have here is of course the cliché that it’s the one device that you have on you at all time and that you’re connecting at eye level with the customer. The reason we decided to go with SMS initially, though we do have plans to look at other mobile technologies, is that its part of the culture of our target demographic. A lot of forms of advertising don’t work with that 16-35 year old demographic. They’re on iPods and not listening to the radio, they Tivo past television commercials, and they don’t necessarily read print media. Here you have an opportunity to communicate with that consumer with something that is part of that culture.
How do you feel that Dizgo best utilizes that benefit?
People ignore advertising unless there is some sort of immediate benefit. The difference between this advertisement and any other form of advertisement is that this is an advertisement that the consumer is requesting. If you drive past a billboard or see a banner on a webscreen, you don’t want to see it. You want this advertising because it helps you; it helps you make a purchasing decision.
- JPK
July 16th, 2008
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