Photo from IPMAP America

Last week, I found it interesting last week when I read through many articles written in the late 90’s and early 2000’s that were highly concerned with privacy. What makes this interesting is that in reading through recent writings, there actually are significantly fewer articles that express the same level of angst. Most seem to almost take the status quo regarding privacy as a given part of the fabric of our mobile world. Have we become complacent/accepting/resigned…or numb to the risks?

One 2011 article I did find expressed concern over a specific component of mobile privacy: locational data achieved by tracking a user through their phone (Daily Mail Reporter, 2011). This article is particularly concerned that Google (through the Android OS) and Apple capture data from users of their technology for the purposes of building data bases in order to tap into the rapidly growing market for location-based services.

Both companies claim that while they collect data from individuals, that it is aggregated and then scrubbed, since the purpose is more focused on activity around Wi-Fi hot spots than the actual phone owner themselves. Even if this is in fact true (and anyone who has watch Google eerily hone in on your search activity would have reason to question this), the fact that both companies have the technology to collect the data makes you realize it wouldn’t be a big leap forward to be able to continue to store it on a personalized, rather than a blended basis.

On a locational concern of a different dimension is the whole issue of cookies. While Google and Apple are tracking by capturing live transmission from phones back to their databases, cookies for the purpose of tracking browsing history on your mobile device present another danger. While they are great for speeding access to sites and providing a more seamless experience (Krum, 2010), the fact that they work by bypassing users names and passwords, can make theft of information that much simpler if a device is lost or stolen.

What do you think? To me it sounds like picking your poison when it comes to mobile convenience vs. privacy…

References:

How wide does this go? Now Google devices ‘found to transmit user locations back to the company’ (2011, April 22). The Daily Mail Reporter. Retrieved November 15,2011 from: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1379597/Privacy-Googles-Android-HTC-mobile-phone-transmits-user-locations-company.html

Krum, C. (2010). Mobile marketing: Finding your customers no matter where they are. (pp. 99-100). Indianapolis, Indiana: Pearson Education, Inc.

Numerous experts indicate that the most important issue to consider when developing a mobile marketing plan is in knowing where the plan might fail and how to account for that failure. While this is certainly important, as it is one of the natural progressions in building the plan, failure planning is not likely to be effective without a clear view of the customer/prospect and the overall marketing objective being pursued.

So those 2 factors (knowledge of the customer and your objectives) are likely the most critical to making for a successful effort, as all the other important factors stem from them.

From a very practical point of view, mobile (at least today) is direct response; the better we identify the audience for the messaging, the greater the desired response. And like with email, advertising to mobile clients who have not opted in to receiving your message is likely to be met with a scathing response and very negative brand image. Opt-in is important.

However, defining the appropriate audience has to go beyond collecting those who naturally opt in. Finding additional customers becomes a reiterative process where we look at who our ideal customers for the program are, how to best tailor our offering to fill the needs of those customers/prospects and what approach to them will motivate them to grant permission.

This process requires determining what our customers and potential customers want: not just product, but interaction method, timing, information level desired, how they use mobile, etc.  I am not marginalizing the rest of mobile marketing components; they are all important.  However, the audience and their need will determine the message. The message will often determine the media, both in terms of platform and browser, message style and content, frequency, escalation, interplay with other legs of our marketing, etc.

“More companies are discovering that an über-connected workplace is not just about implementing a new set of tools — it is also about embracing a cultural shift to create an open environment where employees are encouraged to share, innovate and collaborate virtually.” – Karie Willyerd & Jeanne C. Meister, HarvardBusiness.org

As reported in the news today, the economic consensus seems
to be a good news/bad news scenario: The good news being that a double dip
recession is believed to be unlikely. The bad news is that the consensus among
economists is this stagnant economy is now expected to persist for years,
possibly even through the next decade.

But this is not intended to be a pessimistic post, and I would
like to point out a possible silver lining. For as Keynes once pointed out, “In
the long run, we are all dead”.  Why act
all gloomy now while we are still here.

One positive is that now may be a great time to invest,
while prices are depressed. This thinking applies to individuals, but is even
more true for companies. In recessions of the past, companies that invested
more heavily in branding and recognition than their competitors achieved great
benefit more quickly and to a higher degree when the economic tide once again
turned.

I believe this stance could be even more relevant today.
People are more invested than ever before in communicating. Sociologically,
there are a number of reasons for this. One that is important here is that
social media represents an escape for consumers, and is a relatively
inexpensive pursuit.

From a company perspective, investment in social media
presence is also a less expensive investment than other media choices and many
promotions. Many digital media options can be tested on a highly defined and tightly
limited basis. While your product may not have a favorably elastic demand, and therefore
may not fly off the shelves today, a brand building opportunity at bargain
basement prices may be present for those who can sustain themselves through
this current storm.

So test; have a little fun. It will take your mind off of
unmet sales projections

…although I think this may be more about investment banking than marketing…:)

However, back then, and until quite recently, the drawbacks of price and ease of use hampered wide spread distribution and usage.  But now the game is different. Jeff Hastings, writing in itbusinessnet.com points to the following 6 success factors in the new breed of digital signage:

- Content and screen layout design
- Interactivity
- Synchronization
- Networking
- Open platform
- Portability

These now available factors are the key reasons integrators report that retailers are not only installing more new digital signage solutions, but are also upgrading existing  installations with new, easier to use technology. While all of these factors are important to the exploding usage of these devices for communication, I believe the keys are open platform (“I don’t want to make a mistake”) and interactivity. No longer are these signs just attention grabbing electronic billboards… the capacity now exists (and at a reasonable price) to interact with consumers and gain valuable information using touch tone screens or their phones.

Touch, gesture, geo-location and image recognition have taken us beyond a one-way digital connection to new ways of effectively engaging the customer.  For example, a recent InfoTrends study reported that digital signage displays:
* Provide  47.7 percent effectiveness increase on brand awareness
* Actually increase the average purchase amount by 29.5 percent
* Generate a 32.8 percent growth in repeat buyers
* Generate not only a 32.8 percent more in-store traffic but customers spend 30 percent more time in the store

This interactivity is the key to taking these signs from promoting items of specific importance to the retailer to being able to communicate and promote items of interest to that specific consumer. Interactivity also enhances the ability to sell luxury, high ticket items through this signage, as opposed to acting simply as a reminder for often purchased or impulse buys.

In this era of mass customization, this one-on-one communication is not only powerful stuff, but almost necessary in many industries to stay in the game.

Deena Amato-McCoy notes in Drawing Attention (Stores.org) that information is captured when smart phones engage with these signs, whether the proposed transaction is accepted or declined. To many my age and older, it would seem that we are opting voluntarily into the age foreseen by George Orwell in 1984. But the truth is today that the majority of the consuming population finds this ability to be recognized and catered to by marketers a necessary convenience and almost seductive on some levels.

Isn’t the internet great!? Amazing access to information, news, pictures, and thoughts is a capability that should not be taken for granted….

In the past several years, digital giants have grown up in the in the land of group buying services.

The precedent for these efforts existed in buying clubs, groups, co-ops, etc, but the advent of current technology brought forth the ability to leverage this concept to the highest possible level.  While it is the current economic climate with its propensity to promotionalism has acted as a stimulus to growth, there is no doubt that group buying is a concept whose time has come. Groupon and SocialLiving today own 90% of this market as currently configured, but as their success in a very brief period of time has shown is that there is no telling directionally where this phenomena is headed.

The fact that Google recently offered $6 BILLION to buy Groupon, and that they were turned down is a testament to where industry heavyweights believe this market is headed (I think they jury is still out on whether Groupon specifically made a mistake on estimating their future is a subject for another time…). The fact that Facebook and Google are now entering this market on their own, along with platforms involving banks or bank partners, will make this a very lively space over the next several years. The banking approaches (typically with partners) are particularly interesting because of the localized consumer spending data that they have available to them

Consumers love this approach; the real issue is making this a win for participating merchants. The question of brand building comes into play: most merchants using these services are small and many do not have the sophistication to capture and use the possible data available. Most are looking at these group offers for a short term fix to a revenue shortfall. But is this a long term win? Likely not.

In response, software for creating a buying group off of their own web site traffic (especially ShopIgniter, a cloud based application) is becoming more readily accessible to these small businesses. And while these apps provide the engine, they can also provide information through partnering with an analytics provider that enable these smaller merchant customers with the data necessary to capitalize on these promotional events  and create longer term, full margin business.