The MoPR Blog

Hold the presses: Email, not social networks, influence young buyers’ decisions. A new poll on internet marketing by ExactTarget has revealed that young adults (18-34) are more likely to shape their decisions based on information from direct and email marketing than they are via social networks.

Mike Bloxham, director of insight and research at Ball State University’s Center for Media Design, said that Internet marketing professionals should not assume that the media chosen by consumers to receive information is the best channel to transmit advertising.

“This is a dangerous assumption to make in a time when consumers are becoming increasingly aware of their level of control over their media experiences,” he continued.

Chalk one up for email marketers, we suppose.

Using Twitter for more than just boring personal updates. More and more organizations are using Twitter to push messaging, talk to customers and “join the conversation.” The latest to join in is Make magazine (a personal favorite here at MoPR). According to Folio magazine, Make is using Twitter for customer service, providing information about magazine events and even offering exclusive deals for Twitter followers. The Make Twitter feed gives readers a personal direct line to the senior editor – who answers each Tweet himself.

Says the Folio piece, the Make editor reads, “…everything from subscription requests to changes of address which number 30-40 a day. With Twitter, users expect a response right away.”

Mobile phone usage increases but users still want easier access to information. Azuki Systems, Inc., announced the results of its first annual U.S. mobile phone user survey to profile trends and emerging behavior. More than 54 percent of those surveyed said their mobile phone usage had increased by more than 25 percent over the last two years, and one in five respondents said it had increased by more than 50 percent. A significant catalyst behind this growth is smart phone adoption, with 62 percent of respondents indicating they either own or will own such a device in the next 12 months.

Despite increased adoption, almost 80 percent of those surveyed said they wished it were easier to access information from the Internet on their mobile phones, and an equal percentage stated they wished it were easier to access rich media on their mobile phones. (We’re working on it!)

Surprisingly, older users are accessing the Web via smartphones more often than their younger peers. The 35 to 44 year-old crowd is spending 60 percent of their mobile usage time each week surfing the Web. Perhaps fueling a significant portion of this growth was iPhone adoption, which according to the survey results appeared strongest among 23 to 44 year-olds.

The survey results also proved good news for mobile advertisers. Almost 70 percent of mobile users surveyed would prefer mobile ads in exchange for free access to mobile content. Additionally, if their mobile phones had location tracking capabilities that would present them with promotions for local businesses, more than 65 percent say they would take advantage of this opportunity.

Cool campaign of the week. File JetBlue under “they get it.” Last week their gorgeous new terminal opened at John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK). One way they promoted it was through a short-term WordPress blog called T508. Posts were all filed in one day, starting in the early morning, continuing through the afternoon and late into the night. Most posts were very short on copy and long on photos – photos of the lounge, restaurants, services, but most importantly of the people of JetBlue – and their customers. From a reader perspective it looked like one big, cool party. And if you were media and didn’t get the traditional press release [believe me, they promoted it through other outlets as well – we saw articles and news segments during the week] there’s a simple blurb and link that lets media get in touch.

Blogging doesn’t have to be a boring, corporate affair for organizations. It can be fun while being informative and supporting the brand. Kudos, JetBlue.

When viral goes…viral. We’re always fascinated by a great marketing campaign – and here’s a good one. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recently launched a viral campaign to help defeat a viral disease, the flu.

The CDC has launched a multifaceted public awareness campaign to encourage flu vaccination. A sampling of the agency’s methods include a YouTube film, web ads, eCards and “older” media such as posters, print ads and PSAs. The CDC also recently held a webinar with popular “mommy bloggers” (or as we like to call them, the mamarazzi) to enlist them to help spread the word on the importance of vaccinations. It’s working. We’ve definitely seen an uptick in flu shot messaging.

Metrics killed the video star. Imagine if you could gauge the exact moment viewers of your YouTube video lost interest and clicked away. Now you can. YouTube has unveiled YouTube Insight that lets marketers, filmmakers, and amateurs alike analyze viewer habits. The free tool lets anyone with a YouTube account view detailed statistics about the videos that they upload to the site. According to YouTube, uploaders can see how often their videos are viewed in different geographic regions, as well as how popular they are relative to all videos in that market over a given period of time. Users can also delve deeper into the lifecycle of their videos, like how long it takes for a video to become popular, and what happens to video views as popularity peaks.

YouTube says using these metrics can help people posting videos to increase a video’s view counts and improve popularity on the site by finding their audience then concentrating on creating compelling new content that appeals to their target audiences, and finally posting these videos to YouTube on days they know these viewers are on the site.

Does this mean Obama is a Mac? Remember when the Obama campaign turned to text messaging to announce the vice president? Now they’re delving deeper into tech waters by unveiling an iPhone application. Developed by a team in Portland, Ore. (gotta have some hometown pride!) the official application from the campaign will give users the following:

• Call Friends: A great volunteering tool that lets users talk to people they already know – with contacts prioritized by key battleground states. Users can make calls and organize results all in one place.
• Call Stats: Users can see nationwide Obama ‘08 Call Friends totals and find out how their call totals compare to leading callers.
• Receive Updates: Receive the latest news and announcements via text messages or email.
• Local Events: Find local events, share by email and get maps and directions.

If you’re in the Portland area, be sure to stop by the Mission Theater and Pub next Tuesday to celebrate the launch of the official Obama ‘08 iPhone application. Drink some beer, watch the debate and download the app.

And speaking of presidential campaigns and uncharted use of technology…mobile will play a key part. As both presidential campaigns aim to get out the vote using multi-channel marketing like never before, Nielsen Mobile has unveiled some context on how mobile phones may play a role in this election season.

In addition to the text message campaign and iPhone apps, the Obama campaign has a full mobile website containing news, videos and ringtone and wallpaper downloads. Meanwhile, says Nielsen, the McCain campaign “has not been as active in mobile media, but that may make sense.”
Perhaps the McCain campaign “knows that, in 2008, mobile is a more effective channel for reaching Democrats than Republicans.”

Nielsen Mobile reports that, as of Q2 2008, mobile media was slightly more popular with Democrats than Republicans. Here are the stats:

• Overall, 62% of Democrats are mobile data users who use one or more data service on their mobile phone (compared to 55% of Republicans)
• Democrats are more likely than Republicans to use text messaging (53 percent compared to 46 percent)
• Democrats are more likely to use picture messaging and MMS (27 percent compared to 21 percent)
• Democrats are more likely to use mobile Internet, as well (17 percent compared to 13 percent)

These variations, however small, indicate that advertising across mobile channels tends to be more efficient at reaching Democrats than Republicans.

That’s not to say that conservative voters are without a place in mobile media. According to Nielsen, The Drudge Report, a “news site many consider to be conservative-leaning, attracted a mobile Internet audience of 567,000 unique users per month, as of July 2008.”

How important is social media to businesses? Very, say customers. If you thought that social media was some trendy, hip teen trend, you’re wrong. New research from Cone claims that an overwhelming majority (93%) of online Americans say companies should have a social-media presence, and 85% believe these companies also should be interacting with consumers through social media.

Asked about specific types of interactions, respondents said:

• Companies should use social networks to solve their problems (43%).
• Companies should solicit feedback on their products and services (41%) via social media.
• Companies should develop new ways for consumers to interact with their brand (37%) through social media.
• Companies should market to consumers (25%) using social media.
• One-third of younger, hard-to-reach consumers (age 18-34) believe that companies should actively market to them via social networks.

Interesting to us is that the wealthiest households (household income of $75K+) believe that companies should seek to reach them via social media.

We have [yet another] winner! Remember that scene in It’s a Wonderful Life when it’s explained that every time a bell rings an angel earns their wings? Well, at MoPR, every time one of our clients wins an award, we update our email signatures. And lately, we’ve been doing a lot of updating!

Congratulations are in order for Mobility PR client Hovr, the first place winner for “Mobile Infotainment & Community” at the Mobile Content 2008 awards. And three of our Canadian clients, Cascada Mobile, Talkster and Viigo all won Red Herring’s Top 50 award that celebrates the most innovative and promising private technology companies in Canada. Congratulations to our wonderful clients.

You can add Under the Radar | Mobility to the list of industry conferences we really love at MoPR. This past week both Melissa and I had the opportunity to attend this conference together with our clients Talkster and Hovr, who were both presenting companies.

At Microsoft’s Silicon Valley campus, 32 early-stage startups, together with 10 “Grad Circle” companies further along in their development, presented to an audience of VCs, reporters, bloggers and other industry watchers. The premise of the conference is telegraphed by the conference name. All of these companies are young businesses that have not yet become household names in their respective markets – they are “under the radar.” But the name of the conference producer really implies the purpose – Dealmaker Media.

There were awards given to the companies that were considered best by a panel of judges and another by the audience in each of the respective mobility categories: Publishing Platform, Messaging/Sharing, Search and Discovery, Voice Services, Advertising, Media Platforms, Infrastructure and Social Network. Having worked with Dealmaker Media to place companies into the conference, we can tell you that all of the 42 companies that made presentations are in fact winners as there was an extensive vetting process, as one might imagine, to whittle down the field of mobility startups to just 42. As a result, the conference was a fascinating portent of how mobility is going to be changing consumer and business services in the near future.

Hovr walked away with the Category Winner prize in Advertising for their ad-supported mobile gaming and social network service. As CEO Vipul Sawhney began his presentation, a group of VCs sitting behind me casually dismissed Hovr as being the same as their competitor, Greystripe – a company that was earlier in the market with ad-supported mobile games, but does not include any of the ad targeting or social networking capabilities of Hovr. But as Vipul explained MobileSpace, the social networking component to Hovr’s service – which enhances the social engagement aspect of mobile gaming that encourages repeated play of the same game by a group of friends thus driving more ads to be served and more revenue for Hovr and game producers – these same VC’s had their “a ha moment” and understood the big gulf between Hovr and Greystripe. In the end, judges Erik de Kroon of Vodafone Group, Daniel Rosen of AKQA Mobile and Eric Ver Ploeg of VantagePoint unanimously picked Hovr as the best in the Advertising category.

But as I said, each of the 42 companies were winners just by being selected to present, and the purpose of the event was not to win prizes but to make deals. In between sessions and during the breaks both our clients were engaged in several meetings with VCs and potential business partners. Each exec that attended from both Talkster and Hovr left the event with a pocket full of important business cards and, more important, a schedule of follow-on meetings.

We saw a lot of interesting companies at the event. Certainly, and quite objectively, our favorites were Talkster and Hovr.  Talkster had great momentum having won Best Overall Service at CTIA in October, and the buzz from their newly announced platform to ad-enable any voice or text communication carried over into the conference. It must be very gratifying after all the hard work of building and launching a service to have VCs approach you, as happened on a couple of occasions for COO James Wanless and president Jim Fergusen.

But besides our clients, people in the industry should pay attention to each of the 42 companies. Among our favorites were Vollee, a company that can stream processor-intensive applications to 3G phones (and other IP devices such as IPTV set top boxes) in the form of video. Their application allows for the best of console and PC games to be played on a mobile handset. They solved the problem of portability for Second Life, and that alone should make them hugely successful. TileFile was another interesting Media Platform company which allows the easy sharing and publishing of video optimized for the mobile platform.

Socialight was our favorite by far in the Social Networking category. The company has built a platform for content producers to create communities based on location. Another company in Advertising that was interesting is Zoove, which is looking to replace the five-digit SMS short code with a telephonic process. Zoove’s CEO Tim Jemison showed how their technology can replace a six step text messaging based call-to-action with a one step process that works like placing a phone call. In the Search and Discovery category, Dial Direct was category winner by both audience and judges for their very simple service – dial into your phone the word d-i-r-e-c-t-i-o-n-s (347-328-4667) and speak your location and the place you want to find and this service will not only find it for you but will send you step-by-step driving or walking directions. We actually met their co-founder Amit Desai earlier in the week at FierceMarket’s Wireless Voice conference in San Francisco and used the service several times even before seeing it presented at Under the Radar.

Another favorite aspect of this event is the event producers themselves. I met a lot of people at this conference, but among my favorites was Dealmaker Media CEO Debbie Landa. She has one of the coolest jobs in high tech. Through her events and blog, she gets to see the entire landscape of emerging technologies and watch the progress of the very best young companies. I’m jealous. Most people in her position would be harried and frazzled as she had to manage all the moving parts to ensure everything went off smoothly. But Debbie was omnipresent, always with a smile on her face and happy to talk to anyone who came up to her. On her staff, Shay Nowick was extremely helpful to us throughout the entire process of submitting our clients and getting them to the stage. But the entire Dealmaker Media staff gets our vote for a great conference very well produced.

If you’re at a young start-up looking for funding and exposure, we highly recommend participating at Under the Radar. Oh, and if you’re a young mobility start-up hoping to emerge from being under-the-radar, contact Mobility Public Relations!