R u redi 4 text marketing?: Phone firms getting set: Advertising coming soon to a cellphone near you!
Featured in the National Post

17/03/03- Advertisers are itching to forge agreements with wireless phone companies to reach the teens and young adults who have led the way into the world of text messaging.

"Not a week goes by that we don't get a call from a large national brand-name company saying, 'come and talk to me about text messaging'," said Roman Bodnarchuk, chief executive of N5R.com, a digital marketing company.

The Toronto-based agency aims to link advertisers with wireless-telephone-service providers like Bell Mobility, Telus Mobility, Microcell and Rogers AT&T Wireless.

The last has the largest customer base in Canada with 2.7-million of its subscribers using phones that are enabled for two-way text messaging or short message service (SMS).

So far, it has been teens and young adults that have enthusiastically embraced SMS.

"In North American right now its nothing short of a phenomenon in the youth category. Between April and December there was a 100% increase in the number of messages," said John Boynton, vice-president of consumer marketing with Rogers in Toronto. About 21-million messages were sent in December.

Mr. Bodnarchuk explained why teens and young adults have been attracted to SMS.

"BlackBerries are cool, but very expensive. And wireless laptops are not that portable. And besides, e-mail is too slow for these kids, they want instant response."

SMS is portable, it's silent -- making communication possible during science class -- and cheap. Carriers charge about 15 cents for each message sent and it is free to receive.

Young people have come up with a language to fit the space limitations of the tiny phone screens. POS means parents over shoulder; TOY is Thinking of you.

To this point, advertisers have been shut out for the most part. Carriers have kept the gateway to their client base closely guarded fearing unfettered access could open their customers to spam.

"It would be a dangerous move to throw the databases open and provide those to advertisers without having an opt-in from customers," said Mark Quigley, research director with The Yankee Group in Kanata, Ont. The carriers understand that.

"At this point in time we don't let anybody else's content go to our customer base," said Mr. Boynton. "We did not want it to go the way of Internet."

Instead, Rogers and other carriers have been working with broadcasters to promote SMS and get people using it.

Last Thursday, for example, MuchMusic launched a national text-messaging campaign for the DVD launch of the teen thriller, Swimfan. Rogers customers were invited to register their wireless phone numbers on the Swimfan microsite and receive daily hits of movie trivia on their phones. By text messaging back the correct answers, they could win daily prizes.

Television shows like Pop Stars enable people to cast votes using SMS. And Sportsnet set up registration so hockey fans could get text updates on their fans for last week's NHL hockey draft.

Those initiatives have been more about getting people comfortable using the technology than about selling product. But that is about to change.

Mr. Boynton said Rogers is working with direct-marketing agencies to negotiate deals with advertisers who want access to the market. Campaigns are expected to begin in the next couple of months.

"It will be this spring. We have hooked up one aggregator and completed all the tests of the network and platform. The technology works."

And demand is significant Mr. Boynton said.

"It's very exciting. We're right at the apex and agencies and clients are starting to clamour all over for it."

Mr. Quigley said it's now up to advertisers to come up with creative ways to get customers to agree to receiving their messages.

Advertisers will have to negotiate specific access deals with wireless companies and will be given a limited number of contacts with customers. The carriers will maintain strict controls on the communications.

Mr. Bodnarchuk believes the really exciting opportunity for advertisers with SMS is location-based marketing which is on its way. Once the carriers equip phones with some sort of global positioning device, marketers have a unique opportunity he said.

"It means that if you enter the Banana Republic contest, and give them permission to contact you, next time you walk into Yorkdale Shopping Centre, the transponder they have put in Yorkdale sends you a promotional offer."

Mr. Bodnarchuk won't divulge which advertisers he's working with, but said they are working on a wave of campaigns to launch this summer via SMS.

Sources say a large soft drink company could be the first with a sizable campaign.

Eamon Hoey, senior partner with Hoey Associates in Toronto agrees SMS presents a tremendous opportunity to advertisers but believes it is farther away than marketers might think, particularly when it comes to getting people over 30 using SMS to a point where they represent a real opportunity to advertisers.

"I'm not suggesting the usefulness is not there what I'm saying is when you look at the evolution of the market, Europeans are 10 years ahead of us. We have a long way to go. Typically people don't just jump from using one service voice to another text."

Even if adults don't ever adopt it to a point where they SMS their spouse to remind them to pick up the bread, it could still be a marketing tool, according to Mr. Quigley.

"Let's say you're a wine connoisseur. You go in to the vintages store and sign up so you agree to get info via a text message on your phone when a new Bordeaux comes in. They can now send you product messages."

Glenn Lowson, National Post / John Boynton, vice-president of consumer marketing with Rogers AT&T Wireless, says the phone firm is working with direct marketing agencies to negotiate text-messaging deals with advertisers.