Recently, the guys at Contagious, sent me a complimentary copy of their latest report dedicated to Mobile Applications in 2009. Having developed an iPhone application myself (see Nike Goal post) I'm extremely interested in the topic and I have to say this report offers good food for thought, both for beginners and more "mature" marketers. I like it because it features the right balance of numbers, tips for brands, consumer insights and ideas' review which, in my opinion, represent the ideal mix to inspire new projects.
As you might remember, BMW already played with 3D animation. Well, it seems that when the German automotive company gets into innovative projects, they never do things by halves.
In UK, they 've adapted their "Expression of Joy" campaign on many supports and technologies. One to notice is the Augmented Reality application :
I admit they are not the first brand to use AR, but in my point of view the all campaign remains consistent, especially regarding the positioning of the product, and shows a nice execution.
Note that the BMW group already used this technology in Germany for their Mini brand. They have also explored this field for some years now, in a very interesting industrial and service perspective.
Marta Kagan recently put online a useful presentation on branded applications for the iPhone, considered as the next generation of immersive mobile branding. Her slideshow gives me the opportunity to spend a couple of words on the huge contradictions I see on App Store if you take the digital marketer point of view.
We are talking so much about the digital world, where everything and everybody is connected, where you can discover and get to know great ideas and great people from all around the world, global meets local etc, etc, etc... But, but, but the Apple App Store is far from being a global store. If you are based in Italy for example, very often you can't buy nor even download for the applications developed in the US, and viceversa.
I'm extremely interested in branded mobile applications. As you might have read some weeks ago, with Nike Italy I have recently launched a football related app called Nike Goal, so my eyes are wide open to look for ideas and inspirations to further explore the iPhone (and now also the G1) world in order to deliver value and great consumer experiences through the device. This said, let's have a look at the ING Wegweijzer application, I've discovered today on Springwise. Launched by the Dutch bank ING, the application for the T-Mobile G1 (Google phone) helps users to find not only the closest ATM machine, but also tells them how to get there and, most of all, in which direction to move the first step to reach it.
The application uses the G1’s GPS and digital compass to provide you with directions to the nearest bank machine. It's a great example of augmented reality, since ING Wegweijzer is capable to overlay directions onto real-time views of the surrounding area.
The Epica Awards have been assigned recently. Among the others, you should have a look at the winner for the best mobile marketing campaign. The agency is one of my favourites, Forsman & Bodenfors very well know for a lot of cool things done on the Web for Ikea. This time they worked for AMF Pension with the aim to encourage people to start thinking about their pension while they were still relatively young.
Outdoor advertising invited passers-by to take a picture of themselves with their mobile phones and to MMS it to the pension-provider. A few minutes later AMF sent back a picture showing how the person might look when they are 70 years old.
Fanta (Coca-Cola Company) is about to launch a very innovative campaign on mobile across Europe at the end of January. Alongside the classic goodies (wallpapers, ringtones ...), and a game, the wap site will offer original applications too.
The most amazing one must be its virtual tennis. It is the world's first 3D augmented reality tennis game, in which two phones connect via bluetooth before playing a game of tennis, using a "court" printed from http://www.fanta.eu/. Players can then use their mobile devices as tennis racquets to hit a virtual ball whose movement is determined by the angle and position of the phone.
To promote its football broadcasting service on Orange TV and Orange mobile, the French Telco just launched a very nice micro site.
It is a full window flash video, where Sebastien Chabal, a French rugby player, kind of an icon here, is about to shoot a penalty. Only for that he's gonna need your help. So, you are asked to fill in a form, with your mobile number. (Unfortunately it won't work outside France ...)
You then instantly receive a call, with Chabal asking you personally, to give him a hint, on which direction he should shoot. You can press a button on your mobile that will determine his shoot on screen right after.
I've been fascinated by QR codes since the very beginning, a couple of years ago. And I've always asked myself the same questions: how many people have the QR reader software installed on his/her mobile phone? How many people really understand there is something they can do and access to through that barcode? Is it really worth and cost effective to launch an action with QR codes (outside of Japan, of course...)?
The disappointing thing is that I'm still looking for relevant answers to the questions above. I keep reading about QR actions but it's impossible to get any number on the spread of QR enabled phones nor on the results of QR campaigns. To give you an idea of the lack of information in the industry and among consumers, I think it's interesting to read an article Ralph Lauren has published on its online magazine. A fashion brand that explains its consumers a technology... let me say that this is a bit curious, unless you have realized nobody has interacted with your QR code...
From the UK, an curious case study about a Terminator campaign created by the guys at London 20:20. The action is a few months old now, but I'm sure you'll find it interesting anyway. Mobile played a key role in the project with an innovative GPS based mechanism that allowed users to precisely locate their friends around town.
There is a lot of buzz online about the new interactive video launched by the Arcade Fire. Surely a nice thing but, in my opinion, not as interactive and innovative as the Pet Shop Boys video inspired to Orwell's 1984 that embeds QR codes linking viewers directly to on-line content about issues of civil liberties. QR Codes are barcodes that contain digital information such as URLS that can be read by camera phones.
If you've done nothing wrong
You've got nothing to fear
If you've something to hide
You shouldn't even be here
You can learn more about the video on the official band's website.
On Textually, Emily has an interesting post on "missed call marketing", presumably a new form of mobile marketing spam.
"Missed call' marketing is the term that has been given to the practice of calling a mobile telephone for such a short period of time that the owner cannot answer the call. When the marketer disconnects the call, most mobile phones present a 'missed call' notification with the marketer's number. The marketer intends that the owner of the phone will think that they have missed a legitimate call and ring the number back, in which case they hear a recorded promotional message".
Spam is always very annoying especially if now it expands from your mailbox to your mobile phone. However, looking at the "Missed call marketing" practice, I'm impressed by the spammers' creativity in coming up with such a great idea which taps into the strongly emotional relationship people have with their mobile phone. How many people get excited/worried/surprised/curious by a missed call from an unknown number? I love these new spammers who studied the sociology of the mobile phone :-)
In The Netherlands, Asian food brand "Go-Tan" is running an interesting experiment of Bluetooth marketing in an Albert Heijn supermarket located in Den Bosch.
As explained on Emerce (in Dutch) custumers shopping in the supermarket (and anyone walking within a 100m distance) who has an open Bluetooth connection, are reached by a contact request from the Go-Tan device. The messages delivered through Bluetooth aim at making people aware of the discounted Go-Tan products available in the stores.
Brand Republic reports about "Business Colour", a branding campaign by Xerox to target BlackBerry users. Created in partnership with the Financial Times, the campaign delivers special ads to the users visiting the FT website for Blackberries.
Henrik Aagaard Bustrup, European advertising manager at Xerox commented: "The use of BlackBerries to extend the theme of our campaign with our key audience is an effective way of bringing colour to a business environment and not least be the first to use this medium demonstrating the innovative company Xerox is".
By: martina // Permalink // Comment(s): Category(s):Mobile marketing
In The Netherlands, Asian food brand "
