The Irritant Threshold of Wireless Marketing

Sometime in May this year, I received about four unsolicited text messages, which bordered on “joining the smart investors” to buy a particular bank’s shares. It was supposed to be a great way “to build my pyramid of wealth.”

There were yet a couple of other unsolicited text messages, which assumed that I was so dumb I did not have the vaguest idea of how HIV/AIDS was detected. To my surprise, this obnoxious style continues unabated! I am most disappointed in my GSM service provider for not protecting my personal information. Like Internet advertising, cell phone marketing should also be “opt-in” and provide a degree of privacy to wireless marketing recipients.

Marketing via cell phones is a sensitive business because any inclination to spam (act of sending unsolicited copies of the same information to many cell phone users) could provoke an angry backlash against a marketer. The bank cited above should have devised a better strategy of winning my permission to receive its text messages.

A recent study conducted by Ball State University’s Centre for Media Design in the United States had found that of the one in four students who reported receiving unsolicited advertisements via cell phone, most of them could not recall who sent the message or what product or service was being peddled (Matthew Maier 2005).

My phone is a personal device with a well-defined role. It is my personal space and I will forever show a low level of tolerance to abuse or over-eager misuse. Unsolicited advertisements on my phone are simply criminal. The mobile phone is a complex medium and as such, early marketing trials on it need to be carefully constructed. Examples of uncontrolled spam constitute a threat to mobile marketing because users of the device will only accept marketing approaches for which they have opted-in.

Marketers can, as a matter of fact, hope to overcome the problems associated with unsolicited advertisements by sending breaking news updates and other content only to consumers who “opted-in” and provided their own subscriber information. If I have willfully passed along my contact information, then I will be eager to receive text advertisements. For example, I would not mind having the latest news at my fingertips. Consequently, I should look forward to listening to targeted marketing messages.

Marketers could get subscribers’ permission and find ways to deliver real value to their audience. In order to persuade me to accept advertisements, there is a need to have them heavily personalized- I should be convinced that there is real value, and also that I am not exasperated.

The unsolicited campaigns that bombard our wireless units these days do not create any sense of a dialogue with us. So how can these marketers ensure their content is relevant to us?

In the United States marketing via cell phones is probably most associated with those products, which have a high frequency of consumer use. For example, the beer industry captures America’s 21-27 year-old consumers, because it is believed that the cell phone never leaves their ear (Rod Mano 20024).

Mobile marketing, if professionally done, enables marketers to build a database of consumers who have opted-in, for the purpose of interacting with their brands. That way, the database becomes vibrant, while the marketer interacts with a consumer anytime of the day. The database is actually made use of in driving business.

For us, consumers, content is sacrosanct. We have the ability to receive content that we have solicited, that we have opted into or given permission to receive at will. Assuming I am a big fan of any of our local musicians who is interested in knowing what he or she is up to, I should have the ability to get pieces of information, etc. about the musician at anytime. Of course that is because I did opt in.

A major advertiser could actually come up with an on-line programme to communicate to consumers many of the events in and around their environs. Some of these happenings may be sponsored by the company, while some are directly relevant to consumers’ ways of life. The opportunity for the company is to bring that activity into a wireless environment. For ever-busy executives, the advertiser should be able to alert consumers via their cell phones the day before the activity.

Meanwhile it is very important that marketers determine if it is necessary to explore mobile marketing vis-à-vis the type of relationship that they believe they need to have with their consumers, or that their customers would want to have with them (Denis McGarry 2004). If you must adopt this strategy as a marketer, then you really have to think of how you will add value for the consumers through the communication link.

As a marketer you are probably wondering how you can get consumers to opt-in. If you have a database, you can encourage everyone on the database to sign up. You can put an invitation to sign up to opt-in on a television commercial, for example. It is imperative that you have a lot of information about the user you are prospecting.

Permission-based marketing techniques will increase rates for the simple reason that users are predisposed to responding to messages that are being marketed. However, marketers, third party servers/networks and publishers must ensure that the data provided to and from cell phone users is secure.

In addition, I am in total support of legislation that would make it absolutely illegal to send a cell phone advertisement to a customer who has not opted-in. Regulatory organizations like the Advertising Practitioners Council of Nigeria (APCON), the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) and a future wireless advertising association should not condone wireless push campaigns without explicit subscriber permission and clear identification of the sender.

Even if after opting-in, each and every advertisement must offer a strong incentive for its recipient, either in the form of discounts and promotions, or in the form of non-monetary benefits precious to the recipient (Rosalie Nelson 2001).

I cannot stop stressing that wireless marketing must be “opt-in” and provide a measure of privacy to wireless marketing recipients. Marketers should therefore develop and publish their privacy statements for their wireless audiences, and give them an opportunity to “opt-out.”

As we look forward to a full-blown wireless marketing sector, it is important to note that though mobile operators will have a strong role to play, they will not control the business. They therefore need to partner with all the big brand retailers, especially those that have brand appeal among the youths.