How Can You Use Mobile Marketing

I think the biggest hurdle most business owners have when it comes to mobile marketing is how it applies to their own business.  So, I’ve decided to do a post on how mobile marketing might apply to your specific business.  Keep in mind this is a very limited list but it may cause the light bulb to come on.

Restaurants
A restaurant owner gives out 4×4 cards that encourage customers to become part of their loyalty program by texting in a keyword (i.e. Earls) to 70734.  The incentive to “opt in” to the loyalty program is the customer gets a free appetizer or dessert the next time they come.  Now the owner now has the phone number and can easily communicate with the customer and send them coupons or specials thus boosting sales.
Or a busy restaurant owner wants to solve the problem of making their customers wait for long periods of time to get a table.  So they use the My Mobile Text Reminder System to alert customers when their table is ready.  The process is simple.  Instead of the customer hanging around for 45 minutes they simply give the hostess their cell phone number, the hostess quickly enters it into the MMTRS and as soon as the table is ready the hostess clicks a button which sends a pre-written text message to the customer letting them know the table is ready.  The customer can then text back in REAL TIME and say something like, “be there in 5″.  Obviously, the owner is also building a list of numbers which he can communicate to in the future.

Video Rental Store
A video rental store advertises the text message campaign Text “video” to 70734 and as reward for joining customers get the next rental free of charge by showing the confirmation message they have received. The store sends out information about new releases to customers once or twice a week at 4 pm to remind them to pick up the videos on the way home from work.

Dental Clinic
A dental clinic wanted to decrease “no shows” and increase the number of people who get their teeth cleaned or checked during the year.  The clinic easily implemented MMTRS and taught their administrators to use it.  Now all appointments were booked using the text to reminder system and the administrator could communicate in real time to the customer to remind them of their appointment.  Plus, the system automatically sent out text alerts 6 months later reminding them to book an appointment to get their teeth cleaned.  The dental clinic’s revenue soared up 25% from the previous year!

Massage Therapy Clinic
A massage studio wanted to solve the problem of people canceling the last minute or people who just never bother to show up.  Since the massage therapist it is a huge expense to the business.  So, the massage studio decided to start a loyalty program where they offered a 20% discount if the customer texted “massage” to 70734.  The customers were delighted to get a discount and be part of the loyalty program but the really powerful part is the business owner now could instantly text their customers when there was a no show or cancellation and say something like, “40% off massage if you come in 20 minutes”.  The result is it increased profits and made a lot of customers very happy.

Car Dealership
A car dealership wanted to make it easier for customers who were passing by to browse through their inventory.  So, they advertised to text the word “car” to 70734.  The dealership had it set up so that the potential customer would receive an immediate text back with some info and a link to their mobile website where they could browse the inventory.  The bonus is the dealership now had a growing list of people interested in buying cars and could now easily communicate with them by sending offers, deals, promotions, etc.

Retail Store
A retail store offers customers 10% off at the counter (point of sale) for customers who join their loyalty program by texting “shirt” to 70734.  The text call to action is also advertised on store receipts.  The store sends text marketing messages to customers just before lunch time.  This results in a significant sales increase. The store informs customers about special events and extra discounts for members of their loyalty program.

Hotel Chain
A hotel chain wants to increase customer loyalty.  Everyone knows that people forget their hotel loyalty cards (or they don’t apply for them) so what’s the solution?  You simply ask the customer if they want to join your “cardless” loyalty program and by doing so will be sent discounts and promotions.  Also, you can now make the stay more personal by sending a “thank you” text upon leaving.

Coffee Shops
A favorite coffee shop had a booming business Monday-Friday with customers coming in for their morning coffee and pastries, as well as a strong lunch crowd. They were looking for a way to boost their Saturday morning sales, as they were very low due to the loss of their morning “work crowd”. They created a campaign offering $1 off a large gourmet coffee by asking customers to text “CAFENOW” to a shortcode. They advertised the offer in their newspaper ad, a coupon magazine, on their website and in their shop. After 5 weeks, they had 300 customers in their database and sent out an offer to receive a free small gourmet coffee with the purchase of a pastry on Saturday morning only. The first week, they had a 16% response rate and the second week they had an incredible 26% response rate. They continued different offers for Saturdays and ended up increasing their Saturday sales by and average of 60%.

Radio Stations
An Irish radio station wanted to interact with its audience with an opinion poll. At every news bulletin 98FM broadcast, a shortcode number was promoted to which listeners could send, via text message, their opinion about a nominated news topic.
Participants merely sent a “yes/no” response and then received a response inviting people to send further comments. Radio station staff then had access to live statistics via a special web page.

Corporate Competition
A financial brokerage company wanted to run an in-house competition for its brokers. Each week every broker was sent a personalized Text Message detailing where they were on a leader board for financial product sales. This appealed to the competitive spirit of the brokers who were in the running for weekly prizes and a grand prize.

Product Packaging
Starburst’s “More Juice More Burst” campaign looks to engage teens by using their cell phones to text a unique promotional short code found under specially marked packs of Starburst Fruit Chews.
Using the code J-U-I-C-Y (58429) across any cell phone carrier, and online at starburst.com, users can find out instantly via a return message if they.ve won juiced-up technology prizes like a 42-inch flat-screen TV, i-Pod Photo and more. The campaign ran through Sept. 30, 2005.
With more than 60 million on-pack impressions, the Starburst Brand More Juice for More Burst contest was the largest short-code, cross-carrier campaign for a consumer product goods company in U.S. history. Using packaging to drive the promotion, the company reports that online daily visits had nearly doubled since its April debut. Text messaging has accounted for 40 percent more traffic than anticipated.