SocialPoster, Where Social Meets Mobile

To ensure that your mobile marketing reaches the widest audience possible, it’s crucial to enable your fans to become brand advocates by giving them the opportunity to share your message.

Social media and mobile marketing simply go together. Now, users access their Facebook on their mobile phones more throughout the day than on desktop computers. This growing synergy of mobile and social is why we developed a way for your mobile subscribers to share MMS videos and content directly to Facebook or Twitter from within the text message.

SocialPoster is a feature in the Mogreet Campaign Manager that a marketer can use to easily add shortened hyperlinks within a MMS text message blast. It’s easy for your mobile audience to use too. The recipient just clicks on the link in the body of the MMS message that pulls up their Facebook or Twitter via mobile web with a pre-populated post or tweet.

With SocialPoster’s shortened links you can track clicks, CTR, and shares. Marketers can use SocialPoster to generate more buzz around TV shows, movies, products and services by facilitating viral impressions.

FOX has seen great success with their social and mobile efforts powered by Mogreet. FOX utilizes SocialPoster to generate more awareness for their shows and to build their mobile database by exposing the exclusive mobile content club members receive. After offering their audience SocialPoster links, they began to see more and more fans’ tweets and Facebook posts on a weekly basis for hit shows including Glee, House, Bones, New Girl, and Fringe.

SocialPoster is not only great for entertainment, but for retail as well. SocialPoster promotes branding, visibility, and makes shoppers advocates. Text message marketing doesnt need to be limited to communication within a mobile database – maximize impact with social amplification.

Example of how a retailer can use SocialPoster

Mogreet Joins MMA’s New Mobile Video Committee

As you may know, Mogreet’s CEO, James Citron sits on several Mobile Marketing Association (MMA) committees.  The MMA is the leading global trade association for the mobile marketing industry, setting the industry standards for fair and ethical marketing. James is one of many mobile leaders who help create these guidelines.

Earlier in 2012, the MMA approached Mogreet about participating in a new committee, one focused on creating a guidelines and best practices for the use of mobile video advertising within traditional and digital marketing campaigns.  Additionally “the group will research and review mobile video advertising practices currently in use across the various trade organizations, to identify and build on existing standards.”

The committee recently launched their first mobile video survey among MMA members, which will provide an overview of the video advertising landscape.  This will identify gaps in mobile standards as well as continue to promote mobile video, the most powerful digital marketing channel.

Marketers and video experts are integrating mobile video into campaigns to as a vehicle to deepen connections with customers.  And it is working!  Check out the below infographic to see how today’s consumers have embraced mobile video.

Mobile Video Changing Marketers and Mobile Industry

In late September, GigaOm PRO issued an insightful report, Mobile Industry 2012 Segment Analysis discussing the many changes rapidly facing the mobile industry, from shifting business models from today’s carriers to the importance of video in the consumer ecosystem.

First… Understanding the role of the Smartphone

Today, smartphones are like home appliances. Smartphones allow users to accomplish so many different things that the phones are actually changing consumers’ expectations for multimedia, function, and productivity. These expectations provide a big opportunity for the mobile industry. Marketers who understand the mobile industry understand that mobile marketing programs must focus on helping consumers meet and exceed their new expectations.

Several key smartphone statistics

• Smartphone adoption is expected to reach 67.4% by 2016
• Smartphone prices continues to decrease
• New low-priced phones have top line features and apps
• The increase in smartphone advanced functionality appeals to consumers
• Video consumption is driving more powerful smartphone processing (i.e. quad processors)
• Emerging apps are creating personalized experiences for businesses and consumers
• Carrier network speed and infrastructure is rapidly improving
• Carrier data-plan pricing is rationalizing

The Role of Video in the Consumer’s Life

As consumers find more and more ways to consume video content on mobile through outlets such as YouTube, Hulu, or Netflix, mobile phone and tablet designers are developing more video-friendly devices, to make them more attractive to purchasers.

Consumers love video so much, phone manufacturers and carriers are changing their offerings and business models to be able to offer it. And you certainly can’t ask for better validation for a video-based digital storytelling program than that! Marketers who understand and can create video story arcs are able to connect with their audiences faster, driving them through the consideration and purchse process faster than non-video based marketing.

Why marketers should be using video to engage customers:

Pew Internet Releases Mobile Trends Infographic: “Smartphone Research”

One of the most cutting edge research organizations, Pew Internet, published a very informative and detailed infographic discussing how smartphones and mobile usage has caused a shift in American’s purchase decisions and usage of different mobile technologies.

The great data points from their research shed light on the growing adoption and preference consumers have for text messaging, in particular, photo-taking and multi-media usage.

See the full infographic for more statistics.

How Social Media Changed the Purchase Cycle and What it Means for Mobile Marketers

One thing you can say about social media – it certainly has opened a new door between brands and consumers.  Social media is the original cocktail party, with brands and customers practicing the fine art of communication as they walk down the ever-growing path to consideration before a purchase.

Every social media “how to” article discusses how to build customer relationships using compelling content, value based marketing and of course, extensive customer service.  Each social platform plays a different role in the brand/customer relationship. Twitter is a breaking news service with a constant stream of information, Facebook serves as a recommendation tool, and Pinterest allows users to express themselves with aspirations. All feature different types of news and content, all a piece of the brand/fan relationship building process to drive discovery and consideration.

And it works!  Dell was the first brand to attribute actual sales figures to Twitter and many brands soon followed.  But was this a good thing?

Before you say yes, think about this.  Before social media platforms existed, a potential fan only had to interact with your brand 5 times before they would consider buying a product.  Thanks to brands and companies constantly targeting customers on social media, and the myriad of emerging brand touch points, the average customer must now interact on average 12 times before considering purchase.

Are You Using Mobile Messaging in your Marketing Mix? Get Ready for the New Guidelines!

Mobile marketers, if you’re serious about staying on top of your compliance guidelines, go download the latest  version of CTIA-The Wireless Association’s CSC Monitoring and Compliance handbook here. The rules listed here are effective now, but will not be fully enforced until July 1, 2012.

Our friends at OpenMarket noted the following changes to this year’s handbook:

• Lighter touch is applied to auditing standard rate campaigns using social media
• Opt-in via non-mobile point-of-origin must include handset verification
• HELP and STOP requirements are relaxed for messages sent to mobile phones after non-mobile point-of-origin opt-in; however, the follow-up opt-in confirmation message must include HELP and STOP elements
• STOP requirements are relaxed for one-off standard rate messages
• Pending the FCC ruling on opt-out confirmation messaging related to TCPA, CTIA is suspending enforcement of this rule temporarily when violations are noted. In the interim, CTIA continues to view opt-out confirmation as the better consumer experience and completely legal under TCPA.

Use these guidelines in addition to those presented in the MMA’s best practices guide, found here, to ensure your mobile marketing program is compliant (and successful)!

We at Mogreet support these industry standards and best practices as they provide the best possible mobile marketing experience for consumers across all industries.

What do you think of these rules and changes?

How do you share web content straight to mobile? moShare

You want to share something you found on the interwebs with your friend, like a funny picture, but Facebook, Twitter, or email are so cluttered that you’re not sure if your selected friends will actually see it. Ideally, you would want that picture to get sent directly to your friend without the risk of it getting overlooked. When you want to tell someone something and know that they’ll read it, you’ll most likely text them, even studies have shown that text messages average a 98% open rate.

That’s where moShare can fit into your social sharing habits. And here’s how to use it!

With moShare you get mobile sharing. It lets you send web content to your friends’ mobile phones via MMS messaging. So your friend gets it to their phone just like they would get a text from you about dinner. It’s simple to share articles, pictures, videos and even music directly to your friend’s phone, no matter where they are online.  To send some moShares, just follow the next few steps and you’ll be on your way to newest way to share things with your friends.

Step 1: Get moShare! (it’s free)

Just like you would use a “Pinterest Bookmarklet” to pin things on the web, we have a moShare Bookmarklet and adding this button is easy and free. Simply drag or add the link to your browser’s bookmarks so you can easily moShare anything, at anytime!

 

 

 

Step 2: Find what to share!

When you see a piece of content that you want to share, click the moShare Bookmarklet on your browsers tool bar and a separate window will appear so you can provide the number(s) you want to send it to. Choose up to three people to send it to at a time!

 
 
 
 

Step 3: moShare it!

Click the “share” button, and you’re message is on its way. When received, they can view it directly on their phones without having to find a nearby computer.

 
 
 
 
 
 

moShare messages don’t cost you anything additional – it’s the same cost or fee as a regular text message, so if you and your friends have a text messaging plan, you’re good to go!

Have questions or need help? Shoot the moShare crew a note at contact@moShare.com

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Are you a content publisher wanting to implement a moShare button for your site? Not a problem! A variety of different moShare buttons are available here.

2012 is the Year of Mobile, and KPCB’s 2012 Internet Trend Report Proves It

Earlier this week at the D10 conference, Mary Meeker and Liang Wu from Kliener Perkins Caufield Byers (KPCB) released their 2012 Internet Trends report.

If you haven’t seen it, heard about it or read a review, you have surely been offline or really busy with work while the rest of the mobile industry was celebrating!  While the report covered many elements surrounding today’s Internet growth, it also provided an in-depth look at incredible growth and impact of mobile in the United States and across the globe.

Global Internet Usage

In 2011, global Internet users increased 8% to a total of 2.3B with 1.1B (18%) of those users accessing a 3G network.  U.S. usage is startling.  More than 79% of Americans are now connected to the Internet with 64% connected via 3G.  What is even more exciting is looking at the amount of Internet traffic coming in directly from mobile phones.

In 2009, 1% of the world accessed the Internet via mobile phones.  Today more than 10% of global Internet traffic is via the phone.

Android vs. iPhone

At the end of 2011, there were 6.1B mobile phone subscribers, 953MM subscribed to smartphones.  So who wins the Apple iOS vs. Android war?  Android, who enjoys a much wider global mobile penetration trounced Apple with global cumulative unit sales 4x higher than the iPhone.

The Power of Tablets

The overall mobile market grew by 37% thanks to strong tablet sales by Apple’s iPad (3x the sales of iPod and iPhones).  U.S. Tablet and eReaders sales increased from 2% in 2009, to a startling 29% of Americans owning one in 2012.

How to Upgrade Your Existing SMS Marketing Program in 5 Easy Steps

In today’s overly congested branding space, it is crucial for a company to retain their brand identity.  This is the crux of the SMS marketing problem facing today’s brand owners.

Payless Shoes SMS Marketing

In recent years, more and more marketers turned to mobile messaging as a tool to engage customers and to drive marketing goals. Marketers dipped their toes into mobile by launching simple SMS campaigns, being as creative as possible to engage fans within the limitation of 160-text only characters.

But what do customers really think of receiving those basic text messages from brands?   Not much.  (In fact, some of our clients received as much as 10x increase in customer response rates when they switched from SMS to MMS.)

Why?  As customers adapt to mobile phones becoming a first screen interactive platform, the expectations for the mobile experience has grown dramatically.  Facing consumer backlash to SMS marketing, marketers are now realizing how limiting SMS’s 160 characters can be.  Shorthanded text simply does not provide the best customer experience that a brand can and wants to provide for their fans.

Where do you start?  Stop using SMS

Yes.  Stop using SMS.  Stop trying to describe your brand, product, or services in shorthand. Teenagers text with broken and abbreviated words, companies shouldn’t. SMS marketing is the same as sending your email database a plain text email with no images or colors.  SMS is a great delivery platform to short textual news, but it’s never going to be the tool to drive excitement in a new shoe line or TV show.

Steve Madden Shoes MMS message marketing

And what is MMS again?

MMS is a fully branded marketing platform. MMS delivers completely branded video, audio, photos, look books and text to fans.  It includes options to link back to your website.  Mogreet’s MMS allows your recipients to share your messages across social platforms with a direct integration with Facebook, Twitter or Google +.  So with MMS, you can send your mobile subscribers a flipbook with those new shoes with information about the nearest store and even a unique coupon code and then the shopper can also share that flipbook directly to Facebook, Twitter, or Google+. Mogreet’s MMS brings your brand to life and offers a better customer experience.

How to switch to Mogreet’s MMS service in 5 easy steps:

 1. Choose to use a shared short code or vanity short code. A shared short code is simply a shared short code that other companies are using as well. A vanity short code is a short code that is aesthetically pleasing such as a pattern or an acronym (i.e. 51515 or “STYLE” (78953)).

There are huge benefits to owning your own branded short code for instance, no conflicting keywords with other companies on the short code. To purchase your own vanity short code, work with your new provider to determine the code you want, based on availability and to begin the paperwork necessary to purchase the code.  Your mobile marketing provider will work with you through the process, just remember, it does take time to finalize, approximately 4-6 months.

2. The next step is to transfer of your existing mobile database from one provider to the new one. If you use a shared code, this part is easy!  Ask your existing mobile marketing provider to export your list in a .CSV or .XLS file and you can email the list to your new provider.

3. After you have ported the database to your new provider, the Mobile Marketing Association (MMA) requires that you notify your existing mobile database of the transition to your new short code.

This is easy to do!  Send a message to your current subscriber database informing them that you plan to switch short codes.  Ask them to save the new number in their contact database to drive compliance.

4. Then send a message to your existing database utilizing the new short code.  To show off your new MMS capabilities, we highly recommend adding a branded video or other rich media to provide a great customer experience right from the first interaction.

5. As always, be sure to always include the legally required guidelines on how to opt out from the overall mobile marketing program in all messages you send.

Of course, now that you have switched providers, you will want to continue to build your mobile subscriber database.  Need help? Check out our recent article on building mobile databases here

Have questions?  Let us know!

Report: Apple iPhone and Samsung Smartphone Users View MMS More Than Other U.S. Mobile Consumers

Mogreet Semi-Annual Mobile Marketing Analytics Report Shows Strong Increase in Mobile Video Views by Samsung Users

LOS ANGELES (May 23, 2012) – The Apple iPhone continues to lead mobile video messaging usage, increasing from 7.4 percent to 23.6 percent since August 2011 however the use of Samsung devices is quickly gaining ground, increasing from 2.9 percent to 21.9 percent over the same period. These numbers are according to the semi-annual 2012 Mobile Marketing Analytics Report released by Mogreet, the premier multimedia-based mobile marketing provider.

Currently, over two-thirds of all multimedia messaging delivered by businesses to consumers in the United States is done via the Mogreet platform. This saturation of the mobile market provides the company deep insights into what messaging consumers view on their phones, giving unique types of useful knowledge for mobile marketers looking to improve and strengthen their messages according to carrier, handset type and geography. 

In addition, the semi-annual report includes the following key statistics:

Percent of mobile multimedia messaging (MMS) delivered by mobile carrier:

• Verizon Wireless – 45.4 percent
• AT&T – 42.9 percent
• Sprint – 8.2 percent
• Cricket (Leap Wireless) – 2.4 percent
• T-Mobile – 0.7 percent

Percent of MMS delivered by handset type:

• Apple iPhone – 23.6 percent
• Samsung – 21.9 percent
• LG – 17.8 percent
• Blackberry – 5.1 percent
• Motorola – 5 percent

Top 5 U.S. regions using MMS:

• Atlanta
• South Carolina
• Phoenix
• Texas – Houston
• Las Vegas Area

“As the installed base of smartphones surpasses 50 percent in the United States, MMS provides a unique opportunity for marketers to reach all of their consumers with high-quality, engaging mobile video,” said James Citron, CEO of Mogreet.  “With the continuing increase in the quality of cameras, video cameras and photography apps on mobile devices, consumers are naturally taking and sharing more pictures and videos than every before from their mobile device. Mogreet’s MMS platform allows digital marketers to reach the mobile consumer looking to consume video, pictures and audio on their devices to increase consumer loyalty, engagement and responsiveness.”

The company’s platform metrics are used by clients to improve their marketing effectiveness and reach. These metrics include data such as regional hotspots (brands can tailor offers to users in a specific geographic area), app development priorities (if a critical mass of their customers are using Android phones over iPhones, they may choose to develop Android apps first), and many other valuable drivers.

Mogreet’s messaging platform enables the seamless delivery of video, text, picture and audio messages to all mobile phones in North America. It is a cross-carrier solution that can deliver mobile video to more than 290 million mobile subscribers in the U.S. and more than 2 billion consumers globally across more than 175 countries.

Download the Full Report PDF here:

Mogreet Semi-Annual 2012 Mobile Marketing Analytics Report

About Mogreet

Founded in 2006, Mogreet is the leading mobile messaging platform for the delivery of rich media to mobile devices. The company works with leading marketers in media, retail, political marketing, consumer products, health care and real estate. Currently supported in over 175 countries, Mogreet’s platform can reach 2 billion consumers globally. The company has raised $14.1 million in venture capital from Ascend Venture Group, Black Diamond Ventures, Bryant Park Ventures and DFJ Frontier. Mogreet is headquartered in Venice, California. http://www.mogreet.com

Media Contact:
Serena Ehrlich
Serena.ehrlich@mogreet.com
310-566-0713

Joshua Heath
joshua@methodcommunications.com
801-461-9794