SMS / Website Integration Examples
Wed, Oct 27 2004
A while ago I talked about how SMS can be used to communicate with your customers: sending "special today only" alerts, that sort of thing.
In the last few weeks I've seen a couple of interesting examples that might get you thinking about ways you can use SMS in your business, particularly when linked to your website or intranet.
The first example is from Connex, public transport operators in Melbourne. They have launched a system where you can go to their website (www.connexmelbourne.com.au) and sign up for timetable information or schedule updates. By registering for schedule updates you can specify your usual travel patterns (such as "I travel from Croydon to Flinders Street at 8:00am from Monday to Friday"), and Connex stores this information in a personal profile.
Then if there are any events which alter train scheduling their system cross-references the services effected with the profiles of registered users. It then automatically sends an SMS to those users to tell them about the delay.
That's a much more elegant way to handle it than just spewing an SMS at every single user, even ones that don't normally use the effected services. A great example of useful user profiling.
The second example is something you've probably noticed if you've bought a Big M flavoured milk recently: most Big M cartons now have a large "song a minute to be won" banner across the top. Looking at the competition in detail it's actually a collaboration between National Foods Milk Ltd, Sony Music, and a music download site called Soundbuzz (www.soundbuzz.com).
The way it works is that when you purchase a Big M you can SMS part of the barcode, your name, your postcode, and your phone number to a competition number. At the other end a computer stores your details and determines whether you have won a prize. It then sends back an SMS to winners which contains a secret code and a website address: by going to the website and entering the code you can select a song and download it free.
Here's the catch (or clever bit, depending which side of the fence you sit on): to redeem your prize you have to register with the site, which includes providing contact details and agreeing to their privacy policy. By agreeing to their privacy policy you give them permission to contact you at any time with promotions or whatever else they feel like sending you. At that point they've got your mobile phone number (from your original SMS), your name, your email address, and the suburb you live in (remember they wanted your postcode in the original SMS?)
From their point of view it's an all-round winning situation. They're building a big database of contacts complete with contact details and permission to perform follow-up push marketing, they've got geographic information so they can do regional promotions, and it's effectively cost them about 5 cents per user for an SMS back to say whether the user has "won" or not. Even the cost of providing the "prizes" is minimal: all they're doing is providing access to download a music file. There may be small royalty fee involved, but I suspect not since Sony is also involved in the promotion. Their contribution is probably waiving or at least discounting the fees for each song.
How much does it cost *your* business to add a new contact to your database, complete with contact details and geographic information? A lot more than 5 cents I'll bet!
It may not be immediately obvious how either of those examples can be applied to your business, but think about these questions:
* Do you have something you can offer as a low-cost prize for people who give you contact details?
* Do you have access to any kind of time-critical information which your customers may want to receive by SMS?
Random ideas include:
* A real-estate agent letting people sign up to be notified of properties within their designated price range and area.
* A sporting club using SMS to notify players of the next scheduled game.
* A financial management business sending updates when portfolio values change beyond defined threshholds.
* A retailer or wholesaler sending an SMS to a customer when a back-ordered item arrives.
* A company running a sales seminar, a course or a product launch sending an SMS reminder the day before the event is scheduled to start to make sure attendees don't forget to attend.
* An insurance company sending an SMS alert to customers who haven't renewed their coverage 7 days before a policy expires, warning them their cover is about to end.
That's just a start. There are a huge number of ways that businesses can use SMS to communicate with customers and suppliers, especially when it's integrated with a CRM (customer relationship management) system that allows your contact database to be segmented and personalised content to be delivered to each one.
If you've got any other ideas about uses for SMS please let me know - I'd love to hear about it. Shoot me an email at jon@ivt.com.au.