In my previous job, I had this great idea and that was mobile marketing. Yes, what a great, innovative idea for a ski resort. We can offer all of our customers up-to-date information about snow, events, specials, yeah!
I was stoked, of course, it was my idea. Well, hate to tell you friends (and myself ouch!) it didn't go so well. In a whole year less than 500 hundred people signed up for our mobile service. That sucks, considering more then 500 people show up in 1 day to ski and snowboard.
So, I will list some of the reasons I believe it failed, and you can agree with me or add on your own thoughts.
- Relevance- A person (me) had to log onto the system each time to send a text. That meant waking up at 5am to send Powder alerts- fun for me. How about those days off!
- Expense- is mobile marketing really worth it? We really had no way to track the results and for our very small list (I mean really small) to send a text cost more then $1 a person, and that is not including the monthly fee anyway.
- Activation- do you know how hoops a company has to go through just to get the right to send you a text? A lot! More then 3000 people initial sent a first text to the resort, but then never responded back allowing us to continue to text them.
As you can image, this wasn't my brightest plan, but at least I know now.... I'll just keep telling myself that to feel better.
Seems like it would be a great idea! As technology improves and various links and feeds can be automated, that could improve your point 1. And after introduction, technology costs normally go down, so I would hope that the cost is no longer more than $1 per person. I wouldn't say it wasn't the brightest plan. Maybe you were just a little ahead of your time and technology is only just starting to catch up to you.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Julie about you being a head of your time. Mobile marketing is being used these days and the rules are less rigid. Maybe the marketing tactic just needs to have some time to become mainstream. With more cell phone carriers having unlimited text messaging plans at a lower rate, mobile marketing might be able to take advantage of that down the road.
ReplyDeleteIt's a shame you didn't have quite the right tech to make it work. There was recent Apple ad advertising an app that checks snow conditions, so you must have been on to something.
ReplyDeleteThat stinks that you didn't have the right resources. As Geoff says, you could have been the one to develop the iPhone app and not have needed the MBA.... Companies are utilizing all sorts of different utilities in order to implement these endeavors and making them extremely simple. The inherent costs (with you having to log in) were higher than realized, and ended up being insurmountable. But don't lose hope - you should try it again. With your experience, you could be invaluable to another company.
ReplyDelete