Optism™

This week, we have lots of news from the mobile commerce front, but we thought we’d start off with a few stories that demonstrate how retailers can use SMS in their marketing programs.

Mobile Marketer investigated how New York & Co. built its database of 180,000 loyalists. According to Marielle Gelber, New York & Co.’s director of public relations, the retailer initiated its SMS alerts program “to broaden the way our customers can reach us to find out about new promotions and exclusive offers and events.” New York & Co. promotes the SMS program through a variety of channels including in-store displays, email, social media and direct mail. By using different keywords for each call-to-action, the company can determine which channels are netting them the highest number of opt-ins. The retailer has grown its mobile database to 180,000 opted-in customers, ready and waiting to hear from them. For Gelber, SMS “is the new way to share information with [their shoppers] whenever and wherever she may be.”

Mobile Commerce Daily writes about a major retailer’s use of SMS in “Gap offers personalized location-based deals via SMS program.” Gap Inc. is the parent company for a number of well-known brands including Gap, Banana Republic, Old Navy, Piperlime and Athleta. Customers can opt in to the company’s SMS service to receive “tailored discounts and promotions via SMS when qualifying transactions are made with enrolled Visa accounts.” The service is an expansion of Gap’s Mobile 4U program and relies on a partnership with Visa. According to Gap spokesperson, Liz Nunan, “Partnering with a credit card company like Visa provides us insight into our enrolled consumers that we have never had in the past.” The partnership with Visa also enables Gap to improve the targeting and timing of promotions, and to tailor offers to the customer’s preferred brand. Read the rest of this entry »

This week, MobileGroove features guest columnist Michelle Manafy, marketing expert and co-editor of the recently published book, Dancing With Digital Natives: Staying in Step With the Generation That’s Transforming the Way Business is Done. Michelle offers timely advice for marketers and brands who want to engage with digital natives – those born after 1980.

Digital natives have grown up “immersed in digital technologies” and their attitudes are shaped by this experience. Michelle notes, for example, that digital natives have a “natural inclination to live publicly.” They also have a different approach to knowledge – they’re knowledge sharers, not knowledge hoarders. This difference can bring them into conflict with employers who limit access to social media sites and other information-sharing channels. Most importantly, digital natives are focused on “interactions, not transactions.” Michelle advises marketers and brands that want to do business with digital natives to embrace an “interactive business model” that encourages people to participate in the definition and refinement of products and services. A great read and a compelling introduction to the topics explored by the book.

In India, we have seen the wireless industry revolutionized by a radical flood of subscribers. Unfortunately, at the same time a revolution in the bulk SMS trade has also occurred.

Throughout the last decade, we’ve seen considerable growth in the number of subscribers in our mobile market. From March 2004 to March 2009 the number of wireless subscribers in India grew from 33.69 million to 391.76 million. By January 2011, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) reported a 2.52% rise in the number of wireless users in a single month — for a total of 771.18 million users. In India the average user sends 29 SMS each month. Read the rest of this entry »