This is going to save a lot of time for creative mobile marketers.
There’s a creative, free QR Code generator at www.rasoftwarefactory.com/qr-generator (not a mobile link). It offers a range of designs for different background colors and textures, rotation, rounded corners and more.
The simple, intuitive interface allows users to select either a URL (website), SMS text message, or vCard. When finished, simply save the image to your computer. The standard size is 349 x 349 pixels.
Hopefully the people scanning the QR codes will get the idea to turn their camera phones sideways to get an accurate scan.
The QR code above leads to the mobile version of the mobiEnthusiast Facebook page. Try it out, click “like” when you get there and let me know how the code worked for you.
Like most marketers, I’ve been watching the mobile industry for the past few years, waiting for it to gain traction as a marketing discipline. This week my patience led me to Mobile University 101 in Chicago; a one-day dive into the basics of mobile and its potential for marketing. The question on the minds of the well-dressed crowd of marketers attending was: “Is this finally the year of mobile?” The answer is both yes, and no. Here’s what I think has been holding mobile back from being adopted as a wide-spread marketing tactic: perspective.
Note: For additional insights, take some time to read the tweet stream from Mobile University.
What Mobile is Not
If you hang around advertising agency and corporate types (not that there’s anything wrong with that) it won’t be long before you hear the word ‘silo.’ In the real world, a silo is where you store stuff, like grain. In the marketing world, silo is a metaphor for separating things into self-contained units. In silos, things don’t get mixed up. They stand alone and separate. There are company silos, likes sales, marketing and manufacturing all operating independently from each other. There are marketing silos, like online and offline, broadcast and print, TV and Cable. And here’s where mobile doesn’t belong; in a silo.
It’s very tempting to separate mobile from the other marketing storehouses into its own silo, because it mostly all takes place on a mobile device. But mobile marketing is not a silo like television or newspaper. Think of mobile more like a landscape, with several mobile floras combining into a diverse marketing panorama.
How can you possibly stick all these things into the same silo?
And Now, for the Good News
First, let me break the bad news: the mobile picture will not get any clearer for a while. The landscape is evolving. The floras are still maturing. New species are being developed. The picture remains blurry. And really, that’s good for you.
Because where there is obscurity and confusion, there is hesitancy. That’s what’s happening right now. A wait-and-see attitude proliferate the general business population because things are difficult to understand. “Let’s just wait until this picture clears up.” “Let’s wait until we understand this better.” But that’s just like saying, “Let’s just wait until we have no tactical advantage.”
The Time for Mobile is Now
The joke in marketing for the past 4-5 years is that we keep waiting for “The Year of Mobile.” What we’re really looking for is permission to move forward into this mysterious new country. “Is it safe yet?” We’re looking for safety in numbers so that our mistakes aren’t so clearly evident. Let someone else be Lewis and Clark, we’ll take the wagon train later.
But Andrew Koven gave us the right perspective on the final panel of the day at Mobile University 101. Koven is the President of E-Commerce and Customer Experience at Steve Madden Shoes. He said that “There is no year of mobile. But it’s time for mobile.”
And it is time. Time for you to jump in. The barriers to entry are minimal, and the cost can be surprisingly low. There are some small business applications available for as little as $20 a month. Don’t just admire the landscape, be the landscaper.
Are you ready to try mobile? What’s your perspective?
About the Author
Jay Ehret is Chief Officer of Awesomeness at The Marketing Spot, a marketing consulting firm in Waco, Texas. He turns entrepreneurs into marketers and transforms businesses in to brands. He blogs at The Marketing Spot Blog.
Guest post from Mark Jaffe www.mobilemandala.com
Back when I was dating, the cardinal rule was to never phone after the first date until at least three days had passed. The phone was too personal for such a quick contact and you could be seen as too aggressive or worse, too desperate.
Times have changed. Now it is OK to use your phone for contact immediately after the first date, provided you don’t speak into it. Texting something pithy or witty that night, or the following day, can often be viewed as a positive addition to the dating experience.
Now let’s move to the end of the relationship. Breaking up over the phone is not as good as breaking up in person, but not nearly as bad as – OMG! – breaking up via text. Same phone. Same message. Completely different level of cultural acceptability.
We respond to text messages faster than emails, and BBMs faster than texts. Same Phone. Same message. Same textual appearance. Different accepted practice.
It is OK to whip out the phone (among some dining parties) at a restaurant to perform certain tasks – like looking up a sticking point in the conversation – but not others, like answering an email or playing a game. Same phone. Same amount of time “away” from the conversation. Different effect on your friends.
The list goes on and on. What is it about the mobile phone that generates this long list of rules and practices that is not present on our other media?
The mobile phone is not “the third screen.” It is a very personal, interactive, communication ecosystem of which the screen is just one visual component. The mobile phone has developed, and is continually developing, behavioral mores and cultural norms that have very serious implications for marketers. Violate one of those norms, and the consequences can be severe.
Marketers who continue to treat the mobile phone as yet another screen to “repurpose content” or as a quick campaign add-on to “target a hard to reach audience”, do so at their peril. It will be the brands that actively leverage the behavioral use patterns of the mobile phone and their attendant cultural norms that will succeed.
Marshall McLuhan said “The medium is the message” and he couldn’t be more right as it pertains to the mobile phone. The emerging customs, lifestyle behaviors and prevailing standards associated with the use of the mobile phone are unique, real and significant.
When mobile-specific behavior and culture is taken into account, the mobile phone shines as a brilliant addition to a well crafted overall brand marketing strategy – witness AT&T and American Idol.
When ignored, it can have the potential to undo the hard earned trust of the very same brand. AT&T found that out when it violated customer privacy expectations by using the American Idol list. And worst of all, most of the customers who chose to break up with the AT&T brand as a result, didn’t even bother to inform them by sending a text.
This post is one of the ten reasons why mobile advertising has not reached its potential. You can access the other nine at www.mobilemandala.com
DUBLIN and WASHINGTON – Oct.13, 2009 – dotMobi, the company behind the .mobi top-level Internet domain, today announced the availability of its one-of-a-kind mobile keyword and .mobi domain bundle for Chinese brands and businesses, offered in partnership with China-based mobile keyword vendor Huarui.
Currently, more than 50% of China’s 1.3 billion citizens are estimated to be mobile subscribers – a figure that will quickly grow with the advent of 3G networks, which are just now arriving in China. And as with other countries, 3G mobile network speeds will drive the growth of mobile Web use. dotMobi’s unique mobile keyword and .mobi domain bundle is designed to meet the needs of businesses in that burgeoning mobile Web environment.
Trey Harvin, CEO of dotMobi, said, “The packaging of mobile keywords and .mobi domains is a global first. This gives Chinese site owners the flexibility of using the .mobi domain to help ensure successful discovery by search engines, while using both the .mobi domain and matching keyword in advertising efforts.”
Keywords – memorable words that a user can type into a mobile phone instead of a number – are very popular in China. And specific to the Chinese market, dotMobi will offer Web addresses in Chinese characters. These addresses in non-standard language characters are known as Internationalized Domain Names (IDNs). The use of Chinese-character IDNs will allow Chinese-language mobile Web sites to be found more easily by search engines. According to Analysys International, more than 270 million Web searches were performed on mobile phones in China in the second quarter of 2009 – double the figure from a year earlier, which highlights the importance of search for the Chinese mobile Web.
“Huarai is pleased to work closely with dotMobi in bringing a unique solution to market for local businesses as well as global brands doing business in China. With 700 million Chinese mobile subscribers, a rising number are using the Web on their phones as carriers in China roll out 3G services. Being able to find content that works on mobile phones is extremely important, given the ongoing rise in mobile Web users, and that is why Huarui is happy to be collaborating with dotMobi,” said Mr. Ma Yanli, CEO of Huarui.
Availability
The dotMobi / Huarui bundle of keywords and Chinese-language .mobi domains will be available in a special sunrise period beginning at 4 a.m. UTC on October 29, 2009, and will finish at 4 a.m. UTC on November 28, 2009. Immediately after on November 28, 2009, general registration will commence, and the keyword / Chinese-language .mobi domain bundle will be available at standard prices.
More information for registrars is available by sending an email to IDNCHINA@dotmobi.mobi.
About dotMobi
Headquartered in Dublin, dotMobi is a worldwide leader in enabling the development & discovery of quality mobile content through innovative services, helping businesses and individuals reach the world’s billions of mobile phone users. dotMobi spurs mobile industry innovation by giving content providers the tools they need to ensure the Web will work on mobile phones with speed, accuracy and relevant content.
dotMobi is backed by leading mobile operators, network & device manufacturers, and Internet content providers, including Ericsson, GSM Association, Hutchison 3, Microsoft, Nokia, Orascom Telecom, Samsung Electronics, Syniverse, T-Mobile, Telefónica Móviles, Telecom Italia Mobile (TIM), Visa and Vodafone.
For information on .mobi domains and all dotMobi services, visit http://mobiDomain.com, and on mobile devices, visit http://mobiDomain.mobi.
For more information, please contact:
Vance Hedderel
dotMobi
+1-703-485-5563
vhedderel@dotmobi.mobi
Gareth Davies
Edelman for dotMobi (Europe)
+44-20-7344-1216
gareth.davies@edelman.com
Danielle Siemon
Edelman for dotMobi (US)
+1-650-762-2947
danielle.siemon@edelman.com
Note from mobiEnthusiast: Thank you to Mobility.mobi forum member ChineseDomain, who offers this additional clarification:
From the above link, you will know who is CATR, China Academy of Telecommunication Research (CATR) of the Ministry of Information Industry (MII).
HuaRui (北京华瑞网研科技有限公司), its English name is “Beijing RITT – Net Technology Development Co., Ltd”. There are few materials about it and only have Chinese Websites http://www.rntd.cn.
From the Chinese Introduction of HuaRui, it is an Join-venture company under CATR. The 12114 Chinese wireless keywords operation is under HuaRui. HuaRui manage the whole 12114 wireless keywords database. The China IDN.mobi and Wireless keywords bundle API/management is developed by HuaRui.
Note: there are several wireless keywords in China, 12114 is the one controlled by HuaRui. HuaRui and CATR are only company, not MII.
It is just like the “Name” of a domain, but it has no extension. It has to be used with SMS service number, i.e. 12114 here.
Wireless keyword is an addressing technology established on the quick access in wireless Internet by mobility equipment. This technology is the simplest method for acquiring wireless website address. Wireless keyword establishes the bridge of wireless information communication between the Internet and mobile terminals so as to fundamentally solve the basic problems of the development of mobile informatization. The extensive application of this technology will enable mobile terminal users to acquire rich information from the wireless Internet with Chinese input method.
For Chinese IDN and Wireless keywords bundling, it means the 12114 wireless keywords, not others
How it works?
Send the “Keywords” with “Operations” to 12114 by SMS, then you will get what you you want by SMS. For example:
1. get the WAP url: send keywords “当当” to 12114, you will get the WAP URL of “当当网”(dangdang.com) by SMS in your mobile
2. vote: send “some keywords” with “your prefer name”, then you vote it by SMS.
3. Get the bus route: send “some keywords” with “start station” and “end station”, you will get the route from “start” to “end” by SMS.
4. Any more you want? It can. Donate Money, buy books, buy tickets…
It require backend application to support complex wireless keyword features.
This blog post is part of Carnival of the Mobilists (Computer Link), the weekly roundup of the top mobile bloggers’ stories on the internet.
Budweiser and Bud Light beer for years have hosted their own “big game” in the big-ticket arena of superbowl ads. Dubbed “bud bowl,” the advertisments show a football game where Budweiser bottles dressed in tiny football uniforms compete against Bud Light bottles over a series of commercials spread out over the course of the superbowl. For international mobiEnthusiast.mobi readers, the superbowl is the game that decides the American football champion. Now, Anheuser-Busch mobile marketing is taking that message directly to consumers’ phones via a combination mobile website and SMS text messaging campaign. budbowl.mobi.
Budweiser SMS Opt In
The Budweiser mobile opt-in process is not actually mobile. It’s not possible to opt in directly from a mobile phone, which could mean potentially lost subscribers. In order to receive the Budweiser promo code to view the “secret spot,” mobile phone users need to go back to their computers to register at the deskop site, budbowl.com (computer link). There is an intial gateway page that requires visitors to enter their birthdate to ensure they are over 21 to enter the site. Unfortunately, due to this gateway page, we were unable to transcode the budbowl.com site for use on mobile phones.
Read more »
Here’s something exciting for iPhone users: Free WiFi at participating Starbucks with AT&T hotspots. According to Kevin Shawver at the Starbucks Blog (computer link) (transcoded mobile link), here’s how to get started:
- Activate Wi-Fi from the settings icon on your iPhone
- Select “attwifi” from the list of available networks
- Enter your 10-digit mobile number and check the box to agree to the Acceptable Use Policy. Tap ‘continue’
- You will receive a text message from AT&T with a secure link to the AT&T Wi-Fi hotspot. You will not be charged for the text message.
- The SMS link will be valid for 24 hours at the location it was requested. Another request must be submitted when using another hotspot location.
- Open the text message and tap on the link for 24-hour access to the AT&T Wi-Fi hotspot
This does have some critics wondering why Starbucks is going this route, especially since iPhone users on the AT&T network can access the internet on their unlimited data plans via their mobile phone network. No mention was made of whether this service would apply to the iPod touch or other brands of mobile phones.
Now you can send a birthday card to your friend’s phone right from the mobile internet. It’s only in beta testing, but the developer of BirthdayCard.mobi has an idea that’s sure to catch on. The service allows users to send an SMS birthday card to a US-based friend’s mobile number. At the moment, there are four designs with more on the way. The service is free, but recipients will be billed any mobile picture service fees from their phone carrier.
