On Technology and the Future: Education, IoT, AI, Mobility, Games

Using the Power of Mobile for Good Causes

On 12/04/2007

The New York Times has an article on “cellphone fundraising”, which unfortunately focuses on the wrong points: They mainly report about PR-needy consumer-protection associations that quarrel about the fact that users who want to donate $20 to the Red Cross are being charged 4x 15c SMS charges as the agreed maximum donation is $5 (and they would probably be quarreling if there wasn’t a maximum for it would drive people into certain poverty).

Folks, you need to get out more! Isn’t it great that you can donate money to the Red Cross like this? The administrative costs for a mobile campaign will arguably be lower (and hence the return for the charity higher) than with the use of traditional means. The Red Cross gets more money. Everyone wins!

The concept of cause-related mobile campaigns – and that doesn’t only include actual fundraising – is fantastic:

As has been mentioned a gazillion times, mobile phones have the capacity to being the most targeted marketing approach known today. Conversion rates should be very high and acquisition cost per capita therefore very low. E.g. did Rights Group’s collaboration with U2 and the ONE campaign exceed 25% response!
People tend to part easier with their money for causes they believe in. In particular calls for smaller amounts as they are already customarily being paid for via mobiles would appear to be attractive.
Premium SMS is one of the most efficient micro-billing tools in the world. It is globally available and simple to use.
The overall cost of premium SMS would need to be lower than those for traditional fundraising.

More power to mobile charity work!

Amp'd ARPU >$100, >$30 on data, >$15 on content

By Volker

On 10/04/2007

Now, this should be welcome news to the mobile content folks: more than $30 ARPU on data consumption vs the industry average $6.74 (which is what IDC reported), and more than half of that are from content (more than double the industry average).

These are the figures MVNO Amp’d has released. Some juicy mobile content stuff in there:

– 5% of original content sees 30% of all downloads.
– The niche lives: ultimate fighting and super-cross see a lot of traction.
– Amp’d subscribers download more full music tracks than ringtones (which nicely confirms my explanation of that trend set out a few days ago here).

Congrats!

Crazy numbers: mobile marketing worth $19bn by 2011?

By Volker

On 10/04/2007

According to ABI Research, mobile marketing will be worth a staggering $11bn by 2011. Apparently, by the end of this year, it will already be a rather honourable $3bn market.

Now, I don’t have the means (or inclination) to buy the underlying report but at least they divulge that the amount is to include proceeds from mobile search and mobile video, and I suppose one could predict that, in 4 years time, there may well be more advanced devices that will actually make it fun and worthwhile to use them for more elaborate surfing and rich media consumption. Not very specific though. Other than some foggy reference to the wealth of data carriers sit on and “due in part to mobile broadcast networks’ presence in all major markets” (doh!), all the rest is apparently, well, apparent…

To me, it’s a whole lot crystal ball-type assumptions.

GPS mobile phone showcase – 30% take-up with the right service!!!

By Volker

On 09/04/2007

And the pretty news comes from Disney Mobile. The MVNO shared some insight on usage patterns of its subscribers, and there is some interesting little pieces of information that would suggest that the combination of a consumer value driver (here: security) with a technology (here: GPS) might make a business:

Allegedly 30% of the their subscribers use its GPS location tracking services (parents can locate their kids via the handsets’ GPS functionality), and parents who do so use the feature 14 times per month on average.

56% of Disney Mobile subscribers are adults and 44% are children.

A take-up rate of 30% of a relatively novel service with high service usage (every other day) is pretty impressive for any media!

Final blurb: 30% of location requests were made from the Web and 70% from the handset, demonstrating the cross-platform nature of the application – and the huge potential of mobiles.

US ringtone sales down: Novelty wearing off? Nah!

By Volker

On 09/04/2007

Broadcast Music (BMI) projects that U.S. ringtone sales will dip to $550m in retail sales in 2007, down US$50 million from calendar year 2006.

Here’s why according to BMI: “We believe that the ringtone market’s growth has leveled off and the novelty phase has ended.” You can read more of it here

I do not think this explanation is accurate. I suspect that it is not novelty wearing off but the kids and technology smartening up: 1) phones and computers often come equipped with Bluetooth now, 2) new phones usually are MP3-capable. The kids have figured out how to transfer their favourite tunes to their phones via Bluetooth.

This might result in sub-optimal loops being cut (i.e. the tones not rolling as nicely as a ringtone as a professionally-made one might) but on $1.99 saving per tone (when the full track costs you a mere $0.99 on iTunes), that is a no-brainer. Also: with programmes like Garage band et al, every kid can cut loops into MP3s, too.

This last bit is perhaps the one that killed it off: if a product is unique in that it is defensible against similar products on other media, pricing is not under direct pressure as it is not directly comparable (e.g. monophonic ringtones and recorded music). If it becomes comparable (e.g. MP3’s on mobile phones vs. iTunes), there has to be something special justifying a higher price-point. The higher the difference in pricing, the better that USP has to be. 20-second loop cut by a pro? Not good enough…

Conclusion? Bad piece of pricing policy and marketing, I would suggest. Elementary, isn’t it? You’ve screwed up your own market, folks…

Venture Capital: Kawasaki's hints on how to get to it…

By Volker

On 08/04/2007

This post is not strictly mobile (it could be used for mobile ventures though, too, and, besides, why does it have to?).

In any event, the intelligent and funny posts of Guy Kawasaki (amongst other things blogger, early-stage VC and previous big gun at Apple) are really good reading. So: here’s his take on “How to get the Attention of a Venture Capitalist” although, in this case, the treat of Guy’s colleague at Garage, Bill Reichert, might be even more relevant: it should actually helps you to also KEEP that VC’s attention, so make sure to also check out Bill’s notes on “How to Fix your Pitch“.

First GPS-equipped mass market phone out in Europe

By Volker

On 05/04/2007

It’s out of its cage! Nokia tells us it started shipping the brand-spanking new N95, which includes – a first outside advanced markets such as Japan – GPS on board of a mobile phone (next to MP3 player with proper 3.5mm audio connector [!], 3D hardware acceleration, WLAN and a 5 mega pixel camera with Carl Zeiss lense)

Now, not only does the phone have GPS but also comes preloaded with Nokia Maps, an application that has the street maps for 150 countries in (the few remaining countries that presumably include such remote places like Queen Anne land in Antarctica probably don’t have streets!).

This would arguably be into the face of Roger McNamee (see yesterday’s post on this) concerning the defeat of multi-purpose devices. If the N95 would take over, it would probably be bye-bye to TomTom and other SatNav single-purpose devices. Since you are carrying your phone with you, it would also reduce the risk of your car being broken into: thieves apparently are mainly to into SatNav devices these days…