Zoompass launches Android application

Following in the footsteps of the Blackberry and Iphone application, Zoompass has recently launched a payment application for Android based devices.

Like it’s Iphone and Blackberry cousins, the Android based Zoompass application will enable Android device users to send, receive and request financial transaction on-the-go. Of course, this convenience is at a cost of approx $0.50 depending on the transaction. More details on the fees can be found here.

Zoompass is a mobile payment service provider which enables customers of specific wireless carriers (Bell, Telus and Rogers) to quickly make secure financial transactions from their mobile devices.  Zoompass is provided by Enstream, a joint venture company owned by Bell, Telus and Rogers.

CRTC blows Wind Mobile down

Very disappointing decision from the CRTC which in my opinion does not service the Canadian people the way it should. For details, please visit http://www.crtc.gc.ca/eng/archive/2009/2009-678.htm

Costco sells Black doll named “lil Monkey”

Wow..you would think with Obama being president, Oprah celebrating her 25th season and Tyler Perry opening his own production studio and a bunch of other successful black people in the media, this sort of stuff would not happen.  But then again, perhaps its because of the heightened sense of our ability to be accomplished in society which fuels “no sense” decision such as the one made by Costco to place a Black doll name “lil Monkey” on it’s store shelves.

As a marketer..I really don’t understand how this product could have made it to the store shelves without sparking some sort of concern from Costco reps.  The irony is it would still be there if complaints were not submitted.

This would have been wrong regardless of the minority.

http://www.snopes.com/racial/business/cuddlewithme.asp

Google Street View launches in Canada

I blogged about this back in April…http://www.bonfireconsulting.ca/?p=76

Google Street View has finally launched in Canada! I have to say that I am impressed. The application allows you to view areas with accuracy.

To try it out yourself, just visit google maps – look for a location and click on “street view”.

Keep in contact with your customers

My wife is a photograph and scrapbook addict! We have about 10 or more photo albums all organized by date and event – even have dedicated albums for the kids.

To support her habit, my wife uses a web based service calls Snapfish (by HP) to develop her photos. Now we’ve tried other online services, but Snapfish seems to provide the best user experience and the best price so far.

And now, they also win the award for best customer relationship management!

Because of work and other projects, my wife has not been able to be as active with developing photographs. The other day she received an email from Snapfish, which communicated the following points:

• They noticed there has not been an recent activity on the account
• They are making enhancements to there existing services
• CTA (call to action) to advise them if they have done something wrong to lead to less activity
• Offer 50 free prints as a incentive to being developing photos with them again

This is a very effective communication for the following reasons:

• Re-engage existing customers who may have not been active. It’s usually less expensive to re-activate existing customers vs acquiring new ones.
• Provides an opportunity for lapsed customers to provide feedback on possible reasons for decrease in usage of services. This could result in a customer win-back.
• Provide details on enhancements to their services. Shows evolution in making their services better as well as makes them more competitive.
• Provides an incentive. I assume the folks at Snapfish crunched the numbers before determining the appropriate number of free prints to offer a customer. Therefore I assume 50 free prints is well worth it to get my wife to use their services again. I’d say it was – as we’ll probably end up developing twice as many prints in one session.

Coupe of things I may have done differently in this communication are:

• Provided an online version of the email to ensure those with ‘finicky’ email clients are able to read the message (email best practice)
• Added a viral refer-a-friend component with an additional incentive for those who refer and have their friends signup for the Snapfish service

End result. Customer relationship marketing communications such as this one have multiple purposes and can prove to be very effective in re-engaging an existing customer base.

Beware of me too marketing

Me too marketing is the practice of business owners communicating their products or services to their target, without differentiating themselves from their competitors.

To help be successful, business owners must find ways to communicate what differentiates them from their competitors to potential customers.  What makes you better geared or more knowledgeable than the next product or service provider. Believe it or not, the difference does not have to directly relate to your offering; as long as they provide added value.

Me too marketing is not always bad – it allows potential customers to perform very high-level comparison of you and your competitors. However, should your customers also come across other added value your competitors offer which you don’t, this could tip the scale of customer selection in your competitors favor.

Always try and stand-out from your competitors in as many ways as possible. It will help you Get Noticed!

Wind Mobile and MyScreen team up

Last week I wrote about Wind Mobile, the new entrant in Canada’s wireless landscape (by the way, thank you to all who caught my typo in the article). Well this week I learned Wind will be teaming up with MyScreen.

For those who may not know – MyScreen is a permission based mobile marketing company. MyScreens proprietary campaign platform allows mobile customers to opt-in to receiving targeted marketing ads on their mobile devices (Windows, Palm and Blackberry based operating systems). When a user opts-in, they receive a prompt to download and install a small application which manage serving the ads. My assumption is Wind-branded handsets will have the application baked into the OS.

As the subscriber views ads, they receive rewards which they can redeem with their mobile service provider.

An interesting idea, this may be how Wind plans to provide inexpensive mobile service.

Will subscribers like it?

My guess is yes. But likely will appeal much more to the youth or student segment. Subscribers who are on tight budgets and are willing to take advantage of a cheaper plan at the expense of turning their smartphone into a virtual billboard. Personally, I would be more interested in other results such as the affect of battery life on my device, personal information and amount of control I have on the ads I view. I do have to admit, it would be cool to be able to receive coupons on my mobile device, coupons I want to receive and actually use.

Will marketers like it?

That’s easy, if subscribers like it – Marketers will eat it up ;o)

As a marketer, I would be interested in knowing what the cost model for such campaigns are. My assumption is they would be similar to existing sms campaigns. Or perhaps they will follow an online ad serving model i.e. impressions vs clicks.  I think It would be very attractive to marketers if there was the ability to target the ads based on the location of the subscribers.

Subsidized or not, I do hope that Wind provides this as an optional service to its subscribers allowing their customers to choose if they want to participate in this model.

Choice, if that’s not one major selling point for a mobile subscriber than I don’t know what is.

Canada get ready for Wind Mobile

For the past several months there has been lots of chatter on a new  mobile entrant to rival the likes of Rogers, Bell and Telus (affectionately known as “Robbers” and “Bellus”). There has been numerous details leaked to the online community about Globalive (parent company of Wind mobile) making a huge splash with their entry into the Canadian telcom market. This was fueled with the purchase of spectrum released by the CRTC.

Today I received an email announcing the new brand of the newest kid on the telco block – Wind Mobile (www.windmobile.ca).

My initial thoughts of the website are good. The look/feel Wind is going for is much different then its above mentioned competition. The site maintains the ability to support user-generated content and social media plugins allow visitors to register and speak their minds on what type of mobile service provider they want.

This to me, is a great approach at using social media as a way to effectively communicate with their customers. Instead of “force fitting” a social media tactic into their marketing mix – just because it seems like a good idea or because their competitors do it, Wind Mobile has changed the usage of social media by wireless brands, bringing it back to what I see as its grass roots. A medium for people to congregate, share and voice their opinions and thoughts. This is very different from the usual regarding mobile carriers.

This approach to mobile service has not been attempted in Canada, but is long overdue. I for one am very happy at the potential Wind has and am hoping they shake up the mobile offering.  For too long Canadians have been made to settle paying for below average customer service, crippled handset features and over-priced data plans.

My only hope is Wind Mobile holds true to its current direction and really works at changing the face of Canadian mobile providers by actually listening to their customers vs. making decisions that only benefit its stockholders.

Word of advice for my readers – anyone looking to sign long-term contracts (2 or 3 years) with mobile providers…DON’T DO IT!  Wait to see what Wind has to offer – from the initial looks of it – you will not be disappointed.

Content management anyone?

As business owners – a major part of your marketing mix should be your website. Any business (small or medium) without one is not taking advantage of all the internet has to offer regarding marketing and customer service (You don’t need a consultant to tell you this).

For my business, my website was one of the first things I implemented, now this may not be the same for all types of businesses, but if your looking to put together a fairly simple website which you can content manage yourself, I urge you to look at Wordpress.

Originally meant for blogs, Wordpress has grown into a easy content management tool enabling business owners to manage the content of their sites with ease. There are literally thousands of free and paid templates which will allow you to change the look/feel of your site within a couple clicks. If your looking to customize, that can be attained through wordpress as well.

Want a unique design – you can have a template designed specifically for you and use wordpress to content manage adding additional page with ease.

Along with the tons of templates – wordpress also offers plugins to help business owners (or content managers) expand the functionality of their pages.

Wordpress may not be for the business owner which requires extensive flexibility over their site pages – however for the owner who wants to have a fair level of ability to content manage their site – wordpress may be the answer for them.

Don’t break your brand promise

No one likes when a promise is broken. The same reigns true for a brand promise.

The aim for any business owner (or any customer-facing staff) should be to ensure all customer user experiences and interactions end with fulfillment of their brand promise. Commitment of the promise will do wonders in building the trust aspect of customer relationships. This can prove to be very influential in the decision making process for potential customers.  We (I say we because everyone is a customer at some point) buy products and use services of the brands we trust.  So to be frank….

No trust = no sale

Good real-life example; in August 2008 Maple Leaf foods had communicated a recall of some of their popular products due to possible Listeria bacteria contamination. If you ask anyone in the food industry, brand trust is one of the major corner-stones of their value proposition to their customers; after-all, would you eat at a restaurant that received a yellow PASS from the Food and Health department?  Or in the case of Maple Leaf foods, purchase products that may have been exposed to a potentially deadly bacteria?

Just as important as a broken brand promise is the business response to one.  In the case of Maple Leaf foods, a aggressive ad campaign was launched where the CEO of Maple Leaf foods, Michael McCain, appear in. In the ads he reassured people of Maple Leaf commitment to quality produced food products and the promise to make Maple Leaf food safe for its customers.

What’s the lesson here? Always make sure you keep your brand promise. And when in a situation where that promise may be broken – ensure you make every effort to re-establish that promise to your customers.

Maple Leaf Foods has recently been struck with anther recall due to suspected Listeria contamination. It will be interested to see how they manage this most recent recall from a brand promise aspect.

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