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Coca-Cola turns mobile phone into loyalty card

Coca-Cola breaks multifaceted mobile loyalty progrThe on-pack call-to-action from Coca-Cola and Rogers

The Coca-Cola Co. is ramping up its mobile loyalty initiatives in North America by partnering with a Canadian wireless carrier to drive participation in its “Twist TXT Save” program.

In conjunction with Toronto-based Rogers Wireless, the beverage giant issued mobile calls-to-action via email, its Web site, the carrier’s site and on-package. The partners are running an under-the-cap SMS promotion along with the “Summer’s Sweetest Moments” MMS sweepstakes.

“Coke has been doing this for years—you can go online to enter the codes or do so from your cell phone by texting them in,” said Julie Ask, vice president and principal analyst at Forrester Research, Boston. “You have to sign up online for the program—name, address and carrier.

“You opt-in to have promotions—mostly their sweepstakes—pushed out to you occasionally,” she said. “What is interesting to me here is Rogers’ involvement.”

The mobile medium is a key component of Coca-Cola’s loyalty and customer relationship management initiatives (see story).

Twist TXT Save, AirBonus
Coca-Cola has successfully turned its classic Coke bottle into a mini-retail environment to run direct-to-consumer affinity programs.

Coke prints a unique PIN under the bottle cap which acts as a proof of purchase.

Rogers subscribers who text the under-the-cap PIN number to the short code 42653 get $0.75 off their mobile phone bill or $1,000 iCoke points.

Coca-Cola single-serve bottles in stores across Canada carry the following mobile call-to-action:

“This bottle gets you $0.75 off your Rogers Wireless bill. Get PIN under cap & text to 42653 to redeem or get 1,000 iCoke Points @ iCoke.ca. Max 10 discounts/customer/week.”

Here is a screengrab of the call-to-action on the Web site:

Coca Cola has taken this in-store strategy to the next level in Britain (see story).

In Britain and Canada, Coke Points can be instantly redeemed on O2 and Rogers Wireless networks for an instant credit on wireless minutes.

It is only a matter of time before United States carriers take advantage of similar opportunities.

“Airbonus is an exciting opportunity for brands as it offers a new way of driving a sale without discounting the product,” said Gary Schwartz, CEO of mobile aggregator Impact Mobile, Toronto.

“Airbonus is an exciting opportunity for brands as it offers a new way of driving a sale without discounting the product,” he said. “Airbonus eliminates the need for clearing houses and offers a mobile CRM channel.”

Coke’s program works as an affinity channel in any store allowing the consumer to text message the PINs to collect Coke Points.

Promotional PINs are alphanumeric codes found on specially marked Coca-Cola products and on special promotion materials that can be redeemed on both via mobile and online.

These PIN codes give registered MyCokeRewards Members in the U.S. and iCoke in Canada of the chance to collect iCoke Points and instantly win prizes. Everyone who enters a PIN code receives the number of iCoke Points.

Consumers work to accumulate points to redeem against tickets and other valued swag.

“What I like about this new campaign is that it leverages immediacy,” Ms. Ask said. “People are more likely to redeem these points if they don’t need to carry them around in their pocket until they get in front of a computer.

“And, Coke gets to know when and where people are buying and consuming drinks,” she said. “It offers all the benefits of sweepstakes—lots of excitement and people buy more cokes, but it doesn’t deliver qualified leads.”

In addition to the service providing a revenue stream for the carriers that have increasingly become disenfranchised from the mobile marketing and advertising value chain, the service, called AirBonus, could revitalize a dying rebate business, as there is no need for clearing houses and the shopper does all the work.

Most importantly, there is an instant rebate: Cash in hand for the mobile consumer.

This provides a compelling value exchange for consumers: Redeem loyalty points on a handset and the brand will top up minutes on the same redemption device.

Coke is using the phone as retailers use a plastic loyalty card.

The value exchange can be moved seamless on and off the card, or in this case, the mobile phone.

Ideally, the mobile program would eliminate the need for a rebate or coupon clearing houses, cutting out time delays or intermediaries between the brand and the shopper.

Summer’s Sweetest Moments via MMS
Coca-Cola is also running a mobile sweepstakes in partnership with Rogers called Summer’s Sweetest Moments, which has the tagline “Celebrating Canada’s Freshest Summer Pics!”

The call-to-action appears on the iCoke.ca Web portal:

“Want to win a BlackBerry Pearl 9100 smartphone plus a $100 Rogers Gift Card? Enter the Summer’s Sweetest Moments Contest! Click here!”

Consumers are asked to text in pictures from their Rogers mobile phone to the short code 42653 to win a BlackBerry Pearl 9100 smartphone plus a $100 Rogers gift card.

“The photo contest is fun—it’s social,” Ms. Ask said. “Obviously, it is a lot more fun if my friends or people I know are a participating and posting—most will post on Facebook.

“The ability to post more than one place at once would be cool, both to their promotion and your own accounts on Facebook [and other social networks],” she said. “Participation here will be driven more by size of prizes than engagement with social media aspects.”

Final Take
Dan Butcher, associate editor, Mobile Marketer

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Uncategorized

(Via comScore) The iPhone Reality in Europe: Low Overall Penetration, Enormous Impact

comScore, Inc. (NASDAQ: SCOR), a leader in measuring the digital world, today outlined the impact the first three generations of Apple’s iPhone have had on the European mobile market, in light of record pre-sales and extraordinary consumer demand for the iPhone 4, which launches tomorrow.

The iPhone currently represents just 4 percent of the EU5 (U.K., France, Germany, Spain, Italy) mobile market, but 18 percent of the overall EU5 smartphone market. However, the iPhone has facilitated fundamental change in mobile user behaviour and ignited fierce competition among device and operating system (OS) providers.

iPhone owners are the most voracious consumers of mobile media: 94 percent use mobile media, 87 percent use applications and 85 percent browse the mobile internet. With just 4 percent share of the European market, iPhone users represent 12 percent of all mobile media users.

Mobile Media Usage Among European Smartphone Owners by OS Vendor
3 Month Average Ending April 2010
Total EU5 (UK, DE, FR, ES and IT), Age 13+
Source: comScore MobiLens
Share of Smartphone Owners Engaging in Activity
Total Smartphone Symbian Apple Microsoft RIM Google
Smartphone Marketshare 100% 58% 18% 13% 8% 3%
Mobile Media Usage
Mobile Media (Browsing, Apps, Downloading) 65% 52% 94% 68% 81% 89%
Web Browsing 53% 39% 85% 56% 66% 83%
App Usage 53% 38% 87% 55% 72% 78%

“The iPhone 4 is set to have a huge impact globally with pre-order handsets selling out and retailing websites buckling under the pressure,” said Jeremy Copp, Vice President Mobile Europe, comScore. “To date the iPhone has had a disproportionate impact on the European mobile market considering its relatively modest installed base of around 10 million. It has catalysed the consumption of mobile media and opened the eyes of brands to mobile as an engaging marketing medium. However, it has also prompted other device manufacturers and OS vendors to elevate their game so the poster-child of the smartphone generation now faces serious competition.”

The European smartphone market is growing 38 percent year-on-year, but the most recent year has seen some significant developments. In the last 12 months, although the dominant OS, Symbian, gained device owners, market momentum has now moved to the North American operating systems of RIM, Apple and Google, each of which has grown by substantial percentage over the past year.

Growth in European Smartphone Owners by OS Vendor
3 Month Avg. Ending April 2010 vs. 3 Month Avg. Ending April 2009
Total EU5 (UK, DE, FR, ES and IT), Age 13+
Source: comScore MobiLens
Smartphone Owners (000)
April-2009 April-2010 % Change
Smartphone 41,224 56,974 38%
Symbian 28,014 33,146 18%
Apple 3,846 10,019 161%
Microsoft 6,719 7,268 8%
RIM 2,456 4,594 87%
Google 71 1,804 2429%

“Google’s Android is most certainly the one to watch,” added Jeremy Copp. “It has gained about 1.7 million users in a very short period of time and now accounts for 3 percent of the European smartphone market. Crucially, Android user mobile media consumption is very high – slightly behind but comparable to that of Apple. 89 percent use mobile media, 78 percent applications and 83 percent browse the mobile internet. The Droids are coming and current demand for the iPhone 4 implies a titanic battle between Apple and Google is imminent.”

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Infographic Mobile Useful

Mobile Social Network Usage by Age and Gender

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Apple iPhone Mobile Trends

Millions of websites use Flash: Get used to the blue legos.

The best web experience ever? Doesn’t look like it..

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Apple Infographic

Who is getting rich off the iPhone?

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Cool Goodies Mobile Out&About

Interesting Foursquare presentation by Chris Tuff

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Out&About

I don’t envy this cyclist today..

Sent from miPhone

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Cool Mobile Tech Trends

Daizi Zheng’s Sugar-Powered Mobile Phone

Daizi Zheng's Sugar-Powered Mobile Phone-1

Daizi Zheng's Sugar-Powered Mobile Phone-2

Treehugger reports on an intriguing cell phone concept design that’s powered by sugar. Daizi Zheng’s mobile phone runs on a battery that can generate power using soda, or any other kind of sugary liquid. It’s unique idea, and a potential solution to the environmental problems that come with disposing traditional batteries.

Zheng explains:

Through my research, I found that phone battery as a power source, it is expensive, consuming valuable resources on manufacturing, presenting a disposal problem and harmful to the environment. The concept is using bio battery to replace the traditional battery to create a pollution free environment. Bio battery is an ecologically friendly energy generates electricity from carbohydrates (currently sugar) and utilizes enzymes as the catalyst. By using bio battery as the power source of the phone, it only needs a pack of sugary drink and it generates water and oxygen while the battery dies out. Bio battery has the potential to operate three to four times longer on a single charge than conventional lithium batteries and it could be fully biodegradable.

via psfk.com

via Treehugger

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Cool Digital Goodies Mobile Social Media Tech Trends

TrendsSpotting 2010 Social Media Trend Predictions

I’ve omitted the word ‘influencers’ from the original headline because it still bugs me a bit but nonetheless this is a brilliant compilation of so many varying predictions on 2010 in the one place from some of the biggest movers and shakers. I’m merely there to fill up the numbers obviously and being next to Seth Godin has provided many with much amusement. But I’m all for a bit of self-deprecation every now and then. Hat tip to @tim_whirledge for the original heads up.

Everyone that is featured in the presentation is listed below with their @names, making it easy for you to follow as many as you wish.

Major trends that came to the fore out of all the predictions were:

Mobile, Location, Transparency, Measurement, ROI and Privacy.

Not much new there then for 2010. Mobile, Location and Privacy would be my three to watch in 2010. Transparency shouldn’t even be there because it should happen without a second thought. But in 2009 we have seen and still in 2010 we’ll continue to see ideas, campaigns and executions which will pretend to be something they’re not / mislead consumers in some way or fake its roots and originality. Sometimes it is purely for the sake of controversy and to get people talking about it but other times you wonder who initially thought it would be a good idea and then how it ever made it in to the public spheres.

It was concluded that 2009 did not meet expectations. What should we expect in 2010?

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In this report,  the 2010 Social Media trends are foretasted by:

@petecashmore PETE CASHMORE Founder, CEO Mashable
@armano DAVID ARMANO Senior Partner, Dachis Group Author, Logic and Emotion
@chrisbrogan CHRIS BROGAN President, New Marketing Labs
@peterkim PETER KIM Managing Director, N.America Dachis Group
@seth SETH GODIN, Bestselling Author, Entrepreneur & Agent of change
@litmanlive MICHAEL LITMAN Social Media Strategist Consolidated PR
@tamar TAMAR WEINBERG, Community & Marketing Manager, Mashable
@johnbattelle JOHN BATTELLE Founder & Chairman Federated Media
@mariansalzman MARIAN SALZMAN President, N.America Euro PR, Trend Spotter & Author
@mzkagan MARTA KAGAN Managing Director, US Espresso- Brand Infiltration
@danzarrella DAN ZARRELLA Social & Viral Marketing Scientist HubSpot
@emarketer eMARKETER Digital Intelligence
@drewmclellan DREW McLELLAN Founder and Author The Marketing Minute
@idc CAROLINE DANGSON Digital Marketplace Research Analyst IDC
@jasonfalls JASON FALLS Social Media Strategist Social Media Explorer
@charleneli CHARLENE LI Founder Altimeter Group
@gauravonomics GAURAV MISHRA CEO 2020 Social Online
@marc_meyer MARC MEYER Principal Digital Marketing Response Group
@emarketer JEFFREY GARU Senior Analyst eMarketer 2010
@jimmy_wales  JIMMY WALES Founder Wikipedia
@alecjross ALEC ROSS Sr Advisor -Innovation State Department
@CraigNewmark CRAIG NEWMARK Founder of Craiglist
@scobleizer ROBERT SCOBLE Technical Evangelist Rackspace
@dmscott DAVID MEERMAN SCOTT Marketing Strategist & Author World Wide Rave
@roncallari RON CALLARI Social Media
@ravit_ustrategy RAVIT LICHTENBERG Founder & Chief Strategist Ustrategy.com
@equalman ERIK QUALMAN Author Socialnomics
@pgillin PAUL GILLIN Writer, Author & Social Media Consultant Principal
@adambroitman ADAM BROITMAN Partner & Ringleader Circ.us
@cbensen CONNIE BENSEN Director of Social Media & Community Strategy Alterian
@mikearauz MIKE ARAUZ Strategist Undercurrent
@nenshad Nenshad Badoliwalla Co-author Driven to Performance
@adamcohen ADAM COHEN Partner Rosetta
@danielwaisberg DANIEL WAISBERG Head of Web Analytics Easynet
@communitygirl ANGELA CONNOR Journalist & Community Strategist
@trendsspotting TALY WEISS CEO and Head of Research TrendsSpotting.com

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Mobile Tech

BBC iPlayer is mobile’s most wanted

According to recent research by analyst house CCS Insight, the BBC’s iPlayer came out on top in a poll of what the most desired mobile service is with users saying that they want to get access to the TV and radio programmes on their phone.

BBC iPlayerThere are a handful of handsets out there which currently have the ability to play programmes from the iPlayer through 3G and Wifi, for example, a whole host of Nokia’s like the N85, N96 and N97 phone, Samsung’s, Sony-Ericsson’s and the iPhone. The iPhone can however, only stream over Wifi. Considering the amount of storage available on the iPhone, I’d love to to be able to download a programme in an evening and watch it while travelling in to work in the morning. I’d like to think over time, it will be possible!

Consumers’ mobile internet usage is on the increase due to phones like the iPhone coming with ‘all you can eat’ data packages. I use my phone more for web browsing and emailing than I do for actual phone calls. That’s something the telco’s will have noticed as a growing trend and it represents an opportunity for mobile operators to revitalise their ARPU (average revenue per user) and create new data-oriented business models as voice revenues continue to decline.

iPlayeriPhone

In the poll as mentioned above, navigation/maps and unlimited music are the next most desired mobile services after iPlayer, according to the analyst’s report, with around 20% of the votes on each. Maps have been ever present on the more top end of phones for the last few years, I was using an N95 and it’s ‘Maps’ programme about 2 years ago now but it’s becoming more commonplace and a standard feature.

Voda 2005Multiplayer games and other mobile TV were desired by four per cent of the vote apiece, with video calling being requested by just three per cent. Video calling was once a key feature for some top end phones on Vodafone a few years back in 2005. It was expensive, you were prohibited by others needing a front facing camera and well, it never did catch on did it. Picture to the left is Vodafone’s Christmas 2005 handsets which were heavily pushing the 3G technology, increased download speeds and mobile TV.

Interestingly, the respondents of the survey showed that gender informs hardware choice, with Samsung mobiles being twice as popular with women than men – but the reverse being true for the iPhone and BlackBerry. 90% of the users questioned had visited Facebook on their mobile with only 14% having visited Twitter. This for me would be a clear indication of the age of the large majority of users polled, where it was said that 18-35 year olds were polled. I’d think they were mostly of the younger age bracket as it’s well known that Twitter is more widely used by 35+.

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Goodies Social Media

Is social media a fad? Nope.

It’s a fundamental shift in the way we communicate.

Great video full of interesting facts and well worth sharing.

A few tidbits:

  • It took radio 38 years to reach 50 million users while Facebook achieved the same number within 9 months
  • 80% of companies are using LinkedIn as their primary tool to find employees
  • The fastest growing segment on Facebook is 55-65 year old women
  • Gen Y consider email passe. In 2009, Boston College stopped distributing email addresses to new starters
  • YouTube is the 2nd largest search engine in the world
  • 78% of internet users trust peer recommendations while only 14% trust advertisements
  • 1 in 4 Americans in the past month have watched a short video… on their phone
  • More than 1.5m pieces of content are shared on Facebook, daily
  • Listen first, sell second

The most amusing I thought was: “What happens in Vegas now stays in Facebook, Twitter, Bebo, Orkut, Digg, MySpace and YouTube”

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iPhone Mobile Tech

The evolution of mobile

Kyle Bean - MobilesKudos to Kyle Bean for this.

Pretty interesting really, seeing the evolution and the miniaturisation from 1985 to the present day and how the rapid innovation, technology has allowed for size to no longer be a prohibitive issue when it comes to ‘real’ portability. Size is no longer the major challenge, nor is it about packing the phone with more hardware features, such as bigger and better cameras, or music, or screens. It’s more now about how the features are being used. I’ve noticed a shift over the last year or two where it’s now all about the software and the tight, seamless application of it as proved by Apple and the App Store, Google and Android. If it was a hardware race, no one would be buying the iPhone. 2MP these days is unbelievably poor (yes I don’t have a 3GS because I’m still locked in with my ‘old’ iPhone 3G for the duration of the contract.) My even older Nokia N95 had a better camera than that at 5MP. Clearly, my purchasing decision wasn’t based on the power of the camera. I was mesmerised by the potential of the App Store. The software then.

A present day example of this for me is the Nokia N97. Hardware wise, I think it’s actually highly impressive. The fold out keyboard really feels good to use on a regular and prolonged basis which is one thing that annoys and frustrates me about the iPhone. It’s quicker for me to write something down that it is to load up the ‘Notes’ application and hammer out the letters on the on screen keyboard. What lets down the N97 is the software. It’s simply nowhere near as intuitive, logical or easy to use than what has to be the benchmark for everyone now, the iPhone. The amount of times i’ve seen new handsets come out and the term ‘iPhone Killer’ being banded about is amazing.

Talking of iPhone Killers, the HTC Hero is one to watch which I’m keeping a keen eye on..

The models which Kyle selected to highlight above are:
1985 – motorola dynaTAC
1988 – nokia mobira cityman 1320
1991 – AEG teleport
1993 – ericsson GH198
1996 – motorola micro TAC 650
1998 – siemens C10
2001 – nokia 3210
2005 – motorola razr V3
2009 – samsung tocco

Borrowing a quote from the legendary Nigel Powers in the film Goldmember, perhaps better known as Michael Caine when he said:

“It’s not the size mate, it’s how you use it.”

You could say the same for the current state of mobile.