Good Games and Good Campaigns

Two things we love – Good games and good campaigns (not to mention good consumer engagement).

We also love to point out people and companies that are doing cool things in mobile and social media – and of course it’s even better when one of those innovative companies is a Waterfall Mobile client.

Video game publisher and developer Ubisoft came up with an innovative digital campaign around Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell Conviction.  It’s one of the first interactive campaigns to use mobile as a means of giving away free in-game content to players.  Since that exclusive content is just a text away, this is a great way to engage with consumers and build a mobile subscriber list.

When gamers text WEAPON to 44144*, they receive a text back with a code to unlock a secret weapon in the game.  We won’t tell you what it is – you have to text in to get it – but you won’t want to miss it.

Ubisoft let its gamer community know about the game code by pushing out messaging to its email list, mobile subscribers, Facebook, and Twitter.

On the first day of the program, the company nearly doubled its mobile subscriber list.   Within the next few days the list more than tripled in subscriber numbers. The campaign was so successful that Ubisoft has decided to allow more people than originally planned to get codes to unlock the content.

This is another testament to what compelling messaging and offerings can do in terms of user engagement. Ubisoft gave gamers what they wanted, and the gamers responded.

Way to engage your community!

The result thus far have been amazing – so amazing that the company is already planning content that can be unlocked via text for future games. Next up: Prince of Persia.

You can read more about the campaign on Mashable.

* Note: Message and data rates may apply.

SMS To The Rescue

Mobile Marketer recently posted an article on how SMS is the only reliable channel during significant events.  The article takes a look at the spikes in traffic around significant events, such as the Chile earthquake and events like football games, elections or big holidays.

The findings are not shocking – but they are extremely interesting.  After looking at the SMS traffic patterns, the results are: SMS surges after and during big events (something Waterfall Mobile experienced with “The Cove” after the call-to-action for that very successful campaign was flashed onscreen during the Oscars).

So, why the surge?  Simply put, SMS is the best way to communicate in high-traffic times.  Many of those texters probably tried to place a call and couldn’t get through and then realized they could get in touch with loved ones via text.

As the writer, William Dudley of Sybase 365 explains:

Traffic channels have significantly more bandwidth than do the control channels, but control channels are not held up as long as traffic channels.

So when multiple calls are in progress, as when there is some event, the traffic channels are allocated. However, there is almost always control channel room for SMS traffic.

Even if there is no network capacity to deliver the message immediately, SMS messages are stored by the carrier’s SMSC, so when the network capacity is available, the message is then delivered.

The Mobile Marketer article noted when the earthquake hit Chile on February 27^th, SMS surged as much as ten times the normal rate for the first 24 hours.  Since that earthquake the SMS levels have remained double the normal rate and have surged even further around any aftershocks.

You can read the full article here.

I know in times where I’ve experienced earthquakes, placing a call immediately after was impossible – but SMS messages to family worked perfectly.   Have you had any similar experiences?

(Jason Saroyan is the AlertU business lead at Waterfall Mobile. For questions or inquiries regarding the AlertU emergency notification platform, please email him.)

I Couldn’t Have Said It Better Myself

As the hype surrounding the iPad becomes deafening, it’s helpful to get some additional perspective from people who know the mobile space.

Over at AdWeek, Simon Vella makes some excellent points in his op-ed “Forget Apps, Text Still Reigns in Mobile.”

He notes:

Nearly every cellphone in the U.S. is capable of text messaging and because it’s used for regular personal communication, it’s always top of mind in terms of general daily use. By comparison, only 18 percent of all phones in the U.S. are smartphones. Further, Juniper Research forecasts that smartphones worldwide will account for just 23 percent of all new handsets sold per annum by 2013, hardly representing the mass market for general consumer goods and services.

And furthermore,

An October 2009 report from Strategy Analytics] showed only four to six mobile apps are used on a consistent basis. Brands need to be aware that there’s intense competition for share of the mobile phone desktop…This doesn’t leave a lot of room for grabbing consumer attention for those without big budgets or unique functionality. The reality is that most mobile apps are downloaded and discarded to the bin unless they’re compelling and have an ongoing mobile usefulness to them.

Elsewhere, Mobile Marketing Watch has used the AdWeek essay as a jumping off point to discuss the power and utility of SMS in the face of lots of noise.

Justin Montgomery notes in “Mobile Apps May be Reaching a Saturation Point, SMS Still Reigns Supreme”:

Mobile apps are dominated by the iPhone, with most development going toward its platform, which only represents 4% of the entire mobile market.  With such a frenzy for mobile apps, competition is rampant with very few avenues to distribute, apart from Apple’s App Store which has the most competition of all.  Because of it, the mobile app market is beginning to be saturated.  SMS, on the other hand, has none of these limiting attributes.

I couldn’t have said it better myself.  Marketers don’t want hype; they want to reach consumers with meaningful brand messages.  SMS, and targeted digital messaging, are powerful tools that can achieve exactly that.  While apps are fun to play around with, they’re expensive to make, offer questionable ROI, and the bulls eye is extremely small.

Pound for pound, SMS is the more effective and proven marketing channel.

We Are All Abuzz…

Some very exciting news.

Waterfall Mobile, along with Participant Media, is being honored with an Adweek “Buzz Award” for the mobile activism campaign Waterfall and Participant created for the Oscar-winning documentary “The Cove.”

The Buzz Awards honor the best in brand/media integration for innovative campaigns that catch fire and invade pop culture.

Waterfall will be included in the May 3, 2010 Buzz Awards special section that will run in print in that week’s issues of Adweek, Brandweek and Mediaweek.  The coverage will also appear online at www.adweek.com.

As you may already be aware, Waterfall Mobile powers the mobile activism campaign for “The Cove,” a hard-hitting film from Participant Media, the company behind “An Inconvenient Truth,” “Syriana,” and “Charlie Wilson’s War.”

This already successful campaign went truly viral on Oscar night, after one of the filmmakers held up a sign emblazoned with the mobile call-to-action during the telecast.  After an initial spike in text-ins to the “Cove” list, new subscriptions grew substantially during the hours after the telecast – due to an impromptu grassroots digital activism campaign that took place on Twitter and other social media platforms.

In the days that followed, “Text DOLPHIN to 44144” received tens of thousands of tweets, retweets, Facebook mentions, blog posts and mainstream media stories.  The list is now well over 90,000 members strong.

You can see a complete list of Buzz Award winners here.

All The Wild Horses (Text MUSTANG to 44144)

Next month, as horse enthusiasts attend the three big horse events – the Rolex Kentucky Three Day Event, Keeneland Race and Sales and The Kentucky Derby – event goers will be greeted with billboards urging them to save America’s wild horses.

The American Wild Horse Preservation billboards debut this week in Lexington and Louisville, Kentucky and ask citizen activists to text in to “Stop Wild Horse Roundups.”

The billboards are sponsored on behalf of the American Wild Horse Preservation Campaign (AWHPC) by coalition partners Return to Freedom’s American Wild Horse Sanctuary, Madeleine Pickens, The Cloud Foundation and Lifesavers Wild Horse Rescue.

The campaign looks to save America’s iconic mustangs threatened by a federal policy that rounds them up by the thousands off the Western range, and stockpiles them in government holding facilities in the Midwest.

By texting MUSTANG to 44144, mobile activists will be asked to join the effort to save wild horses by asking Congress to suspend The Bureau of Land Management’s (BLM) cruel wild horse roundups.  Texters will be sent a URL to go to for more information on sending a letter to Congress to stop funding BLM’s program and asked to forward the text to friends.

Kentucky is an international hub for horse enthusiasts and the perfect launch pad for the campaign.  With horse lovers from around the country coming to town, the organization is sure to build its mobile advocacy list and engage event goers with the cause.

We are honored to be a part of this campaign and look forward to helping The American Wild Horse Preservation successfully engage with activists to stop the roundups.

For more information you can also visit: http://www.wildhorsepreservation.com/.

Ski Resort Goes Social

Here’s a great example of a smart brand linking Facebook, Twitter and SMS to drive positive direct marketing results:

Alpine Meadows Ski Resort in Lake Tahoe, California successfully launched a social media campaign on March 16 — and has experienced great results.

The resort kicked off the campaign by sending a message to its existing mobile database, Twitter followers and Facebook fans. Alpine is asking users to text AMPALS to 67463 for a chance to win a pair of season passes (weekday + Sunday).

To encourage visitors to spread the word, Alpine is allowing users to send friends a text to sign up and win as well.  Each referral also counts as an additional entry for the original customer.

Alpine has found its mobile list eager to pass along information about the contest.  Once fans of the resort realize that the more people they refer the better their chances of winning, subscription activity goes up considerably.

In fact, 45 percent of the entries have come from referrals, with the top referrer so far getting 20 of his friends to text in to sign up.

The campaign runs through April 15th, and Alpine is sending out periodic messages reminding people to text in to the keyword to enter the contest.

You can enter to win the passes by texting AMPALS to 67463.

Marketers Say Yes to Social Media. Or Not?

eMarketer recently posted the results to the “The Marketing Trends Report 2010” from Anderson Analytics and the Marketing Executives Networking Group (MENG).

The report found “Marketing ROI” is currently the most important trend to marketing executives.

Social Media also made the top 10 trends for executives with 72 percent of respondents planning a social strategy for this year and 36 percent listing “Social Media ROI” as an important buzzword in 2010.

Don’t get too excited though, according to the same research, even though marketers know they need to have an overall social media strategy – they are also sick of hearing about it.

Along with being one of the most important buzz terms this year, “social media” was also found to be one of the most annoying.  Nearly 30 percent of those surveyed are sick of the phrase.  15 percent were annoyed specifically by Twitter.

That said, even if people are tired of hearing or reading about it (or not), social spending is predicted to increase in 2010 (which is not surprising).

Your best bet – look over the buzzwords and use it as a checklist for your 2010 marketing plan.  And maybe review the buzzwords and make sure you are addressing them (or intentionally not using them).

You can read eMarketer’s full post here.

How Consumers Use Mobile Internet

MediaPost’s Research Brief recently highlighted a survey from Ruder Finn on how Americans use the mobile internet.  The post is worth a quick read and provides some insight on how people use their phones (which is helpful for crafting a mobile strategy).

You can read the full post here.

The survey, the Mobile Intent Index, showed the driving factor behind people using their mobile phones to go online is immediacy.  And that people use their mobile phones as a “social connector” – with 91 percent of mobile users going online to socialize, compared to the 79 percent of traditional internet users.

According to the survey, the top social intents are:

• Instant messaging (62 percent)
• Forwarding emails (58 percent), content (40 percent) and photos (38 percent)
• Posting comments on social networking sites (45 percent)
• Connecting to people on social networking sites (43 percent)

Interestingly, the survey also found the mobile internet users are more likely to manage finances online than traditional internet users (1.6 times more likely) and that mobile intent differs by age and gender.

The study found:

• Men are 18 percent more likely to use their mobile phone to “escape”
• Youth are 9 percent more likely to shop over the mobile internet than the average mobile user.
• Seniors are 18 percent more likely to use the mobile internet to educate themselves.

You can check out Ruder-Finn’s full results here.

The Oscar Effect

Last week was really something!

In the wake of “The Cove” winning the Best Documentary Oscar, there was an explosion of interest in the film’s mobile activism list, both among viewers and members of the press.

The mobile list – which was in the tens of thousands before the Oscars – almost doubled in size.

The filmmakers behind “The Cove” now have an army of informed and motivated citizen activists receiving timely and pertinent communications.  It’s really exciting to watch this play out, and to note what a great tool mobile is for rallying like-minded people behind a cause.

Ric O’Barry was seemingly everywhere last week, doing the cable news circuit and hobnobbing with the likes of Anderson Cooper and Mike Huckabee.

The New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, The Huffington Post and Mashable all covered the story, and Ellen DeGeneres even tweeted the shortcode to her 4.3 million followers via @TheEllenShow.

Mobile trade publications highlighted Waterfall Mobile’s role in this historic activism campaign, with Mobile Marketer, Mobile Marketing Watch and GoMo News all writing stories, to name only a few.

You can check out all of the coverage on the Waterfall Mobile press page.

Great News from WaveMarket

Recently, Waterfall Mobile announced it will now be providing location-based mobile marketing services to customers through a new partnership with WaveMarket.

Today, our friends over at WaveMarket put out some exciting news: T-Mobile has joined the company’s Veriplace® Cloud Location Platform.

Congratulations to our partners at WaveMarket.  We are looking forward to our continued work with you!