Marketers and retailers have been grappling with how to best capitalize on “organic” foot traffic near their stores for decades. “The heavy lifting is done! All I need to do is get them in the door!”
Enter geo-targeting (and its other contextually-aware brethren).
The term “geo-targeting” has been around a while, and it’s been used fairly primitively for a number of years. And, by primitive, I mean clunky and/or irrelevant.
But, recent advances in mobile tech have presented some pretty compelling, sophisticated and (surprisingly) user-friendly options that marketers should take notice of. Coincidentally, this is also the reason they were the focus of a LOT of conversation at this year’s South by Southwest.
That was then…
It was great for consumers because they had the serendipity of encountering these deals by chance. It was great for VS because they knew for a fact that the people taking advantage of the offers were converting from their doorstep.
But, it was also extremely cumbersome – especially because a large population at the time likely had no idea how to switch on their Bluetooth in order to take advantage of the offer (likely resulting in some frustrated customers).
But, they were working with what they had available to them. Nothing else was to the point where it made sense to use on any scale – especially GPS.
This is now…
Fast-forward to 2012. In the last few years GPS technology has gotten significantly better. Outdoors, GPS can get down to a 3-meter radius. This all but ensures that marketers now have the ability to serve location-aware offers to consumers when it’s going to be most relevant to them – when they’re at or near the store.
Where these apps have previously been is geo-fencing in its most primitive form. At its most basic, geo-fencing involves creating virtual boundaries that, when crossed, trigger interactions in the real world, most often a push notification to someone’s phone.
Google and Facebook have tried to jump in and affect/evolve the space, weaving locations into status updates and photo posting. But this still is fairly basic.
“Remind me to do the dishes when I get home.”
Apple built the ability to geo-fence into the most current version of iOS and now Siri can remind you pick up milk the next time you’re at the store. Through the “magic” of geo-location, a reminder can now pop up on your phone when you pull into the Kroger parking lot.
Companies like Qualcomm have seen the marketing potential of a technology like this. Their location-aware app NEER gives users the benefit of self-serve reminders and marketers the opportunity to serve coupons and special offers when those reminders pop up.
Imagine being reminded when walking into a store that you have Coca-Cola on your shopping list. But, in that same reminder, you see a coupon for $1.00 off a 12-pack of Pepsi. Pretty compelling from a marketing perspective, no?
NEER, and many other companies including Foursquare, Facebook and Google, among others, is just scratching the surface of what CAN be done now that GPS and geo-fencing technology has matured to the point of relevance.
It’s easy to understand, easy to use and potentially extremely compelling for both users and marketers.
But there are issues with geo-targeting
Even though the technology has matured and become very useful, both consumers and marketers pay a price for using it. With all these applications trying to track our every step, our batteries and our sanity may be taking the hit.5%, WTF?
“Battery drain” is one of the biggest issues with geo-targeting. Any app that depends on tracking a consumer’s location means that the app is continuously sucking down a tremendous amount of battery life.
While smartphones/mobile devices have evolved to be miniature computers that are easily carried, battery technology is still trying to catch up. If an app uses too much battery life, consumers are likely to delete the app altogether. Case in point, location-aware social app Highlight was the talk of SXSW, but by day three many people had removed it because their phones just couldn’t take the battery suck.
Foursquare founder Dennis Crowley even acknowledged this challenge during a one-on-one session with TechCrunch’s MG Siegler, stating that the company is trying to find a way to balance the potential power of its Radar feature with not draining a user’s phone.
I’m not over there
Geo-fencing accuracy is getting better every day, but right now it can occasionally be wildly inaccurate. I personally have noticed some apps triggering almost two miles away from the actual location. When a consumer is alerted to a 50 percent discount on a cup of coffee and the location is two miles away, the offer loses its impact. That’s a scenario that’s lose-lose for consumers and brands.That’s really creepy…
For consumers, one of the biggest red flags when it comes to actually adopting apps that know where they are is the potential creepiness factor. One of the reasons that the afore-mentioned Highlight was such a point of discussion was the fact that it told people you didn’t know a lot of information about you. For some this was really cool. For others it was, well, creepy.
Extrapolate this out and think about how people will react to marketers getting their hands on apps like this – and we will. It’s going to become EXTREMELY important to use this technology the right way.
We’ll need to find a way to make compelling outweigh creepy.
Who’s trying to solve these problems?
Amber Case, CEO of Geoloqi and self-proclaimed cyborg anthropologist, gave a keynote address about the potential for, and advances in, geo-fencing on mobile devices.
As a consumer app, Geoloqi is a private, real-time mobile and web platform for securely sharing location data. The API is a platform that third party developers and publishers can use while building mobile apps that use geo-location. The API can save companies hours of costly development because all the calls are wrapped into a streamlined package that developers can easily use. The platform also offers analytics services.
To the user, this means that they can set their train stop in Geoloqi, take a nap and have it buzz to wake them up when they’re getting close. Or, they can be taking a walk through their neighborhood and have information they never knew about the 150 year-old building across the street served up to them – all opt-in of course.
Recently Geoloqi developed a new algorithm to ensure that the service won’t run all the time, thus saving battery life. The algorithm is 29% more efficient than Apple’s Notes app, the program on the iPhone that is responsible for the geo-fencing triggers like the location reminders mentioned above. The Geoloqi service has background location awareness, but does so using contextual cues, thus intelligently managing a consumer’s battery by switching between multiple forms of location-tracking sources, like GPS, Wi-Fi, and carrier signals.
This platform is one giant step in the right direction for geo-targeting consumers. It’s tackling some of the fundamental issues with geo-targeting consumers, like inaccurate geo-fencing and services that drain mobile batteries, while serving content that is compelling enough that people will WANT to share their location.
How should we proceed?
Geo-targeting, and geo-fencing are still relatively young technologies, but very promising. The possibilities are pretty much endless at this point.Retailers and marketers should definitely stay close to the advances in this area. Being the first to understand and own this space could have a major impact on their business.
Most importantly, don’t make consumers regret letting you know they’re near your store. Make the offers compelling. Look for opportunities to test, figure out what is resonating with customers and roll those initiatives out at scale.
No comments:
Post a Comment