Skype and eBay: Cautionary Tale for Communications-Enabled Business Processes

As useful as communications-enabled business apps might be, eBay's inability to wring any significant advantages out of voice-enabling eBay. Perhaps messaging of other sorts is valuable, but voice integration does not seem to have added much of anything to the eBay shopping experience.

All of which raises the question of where and when voice communications, perhaps as opposed to text-based communications, adds value to another application, or adds enough value that people even care very much.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aCWYwCYVyHx4&refer=home

Social Media Campaign Generates 28% Sales Lift

Packaged-goods firms are cautious about social media, as the return on investment is tough to measure. But MySpace recently hosted a $1 million campaign for a personal care product that achieved exposure to 76.9 million people, about 40 percent of the U.S. Internet user base, creating 1.1 billion impressions and generating $1.28 million in incremental sales, Advertising Age says.

Of 76.9 million people exposed to the campaign in four months, 765,000, or fewer than one percent, visited an advertiser page on MySpace.

But the campaign produced $1.28 million in offline sales, as measured by loyalty program provider Dunnhumby, which compared purchases among shoppers not exposed to the campaign with purchases among those who were.

That amounted to a 28 percent return on investment, not counting returns from repeat sales among consumers the brand won via the campaign. About 17 percent of the sales were of products advertised in the campaign; the rest of the sales lift went to the parent brand, in a "halo effect."

One question: whether that level of return will hold up for larger campaigns.

http://adage.com/digital/article?article_id=135940

Kraft Foods Tweets

Kraft Foods is using Twitter to spread word about where its Oscar Mayer Wienermobile drivers will be next. Kraft also launched the "DiGiorno Crispy Flatbread Pizza" by delivering pizza to "tweet-ups," or in-person, social-media gatherings.

AT&T Seeks to Extend iPhone Exclusive

AT&T is now in discussions with Apple Inc. to get an extension of AT&T's exclusive on the iPhone until 2011, the Wall Street Journal reports. AT&T also is seeking to overhaul AT&T's marketing to make wireless the priority. Ultimately, that likely will mean that customers can qualify for AT&T discounts on IPTV or broadband access if they are a wireless customer, where tradtionally AT&T has tied discounts to being a wireline voice customer.

AT&T has 77 million wireless customers and 30 million consumer voice lines.

The intensified focus on wireless shows just how much is changing in the world of former wired telephone companies. Where once most telcos were very similar in terms of services offered, customer base and strategy, firms are becoming quite differentiated. Verizon and AT&T have options, footprints and business segments quite distinct from those of virtually all other U.S. carriers.

The big challenge is what wired network providers without the scale and wireless assets of those two firms will fashion their business strategies.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123973238611017715.html

Mobile Broadband: 2nd or 3rd Mass Market Mobile Data App

By the end of 2014 more than two billion users globally will be accessing the Internet using a mobile broadband connection, analysts at Ovum now project. By that point, mobile broadband will have proven to be the first mass market data application since text messaging (short message service). Some of us might argue that mobile email was the second mass market data application, but a success on this level would be quite noteworthy, in any event. 

Total mobile broadband users will grow by 1024 percent by 2014, while total mobile broadband revenues grow at a 33-percent cumulative average growth rate over the forecast period.

Total mobile broadband revenues will not only stem the decline in text messaging revenue Ovum expects will happen, but also will grow operator overall revenues. Though handset access to mobile broadband services will exceed laptop access in terms of number of users, laptop ARPU is six times greater than handset ARPU.

Bluetooth at Fiesta Fiesta: Proximity Marketing in Action

Attendees at the “Fiesta Fiesta” event in Alamo Plaza on April 16 might see a pop-up message might appear on their Bluetooth-equipped mobile phones offering a 15 percent off coupon for a Fiesta pin.

The message comes from Blue Zone Mobile Media, which employs Bluetooth technology to send coupons, images, ring tones and video clips to cell phones within a 300-foot radius of its broadcasting device.

The San Antonio-based advertising company partnered with the Fiesta San Antonio Commission for the event. Blue Zone also is working with Pocket Communications Inc., Toyota Motor Co. and Anheuser-Busch InBev to send out Bluetooth ads to cell phones during Fiesta.

Levi's, Bacardi and Pepsi all have dabbled with Bluetooth ad campaigns on mobile phones, offering incentives at festivals, train stations, bus stops and shopping malls. Last month, the Bluetooth Special Interest Group used Bluetooth wireless technology to send songs and wallpaper from various artists to the mobile phones of people attending the South by Southwest Festival in Austin.

When the consumer comes within range of Blue Zone's hardware, they receive a message from one of its advertisers, McWright said. From there, the user can accept or decline the invitation, he said. If they accept, Blue Zone can transmit a video clip, ring tone or coupon to them.

“We make sure our campaigns are 100 percent opt-in,'' said Vincent Hearn Jr., Blue Zone's founder.

http://www.mysanantonio.com/business/Bluetooth_messages_to_pop_up_for_Fiesta.html

Social Marketing Generates Qualified Sales Leads, Business Owners Say

Some small business users of social networking for marketing purposes are relying heavily on tools such as Twitter, blogs, LinkedIn and Facebook, a survey of some 700 early adopters finds.

About half the respondents to the survey were sole proprietor operations, typically in service businesses. The study was conducted by Michael A. Stelzner, indicates that users gain not only by increased awareness, as you might expect, but also served as a lead generation tool.

About 48 percent of respondents say social marketing created qualified sales leads.