By Antony Bruno and Chris M. Walsh
Students at Chula Vista (Calif.) High School near San Diego were
treated to a particularly nice surprise on a recent Tuesday.
Rather than the standard fare of reading, writing and arithmetic, the
school doled out a healthy dose of Diddy, who made a guest appearance
courtesy of local hip-hop station XMOR-FM (Blazin 98).
The student body won the visit by sending the most text messages to
the radio station as part of a campaign to promote his new album,
"Press Play." The station opened the contest to all high schools in
the area, asking students to send a text message with the word "Diddy"
during a four-day period.
Chula Vista won the contest, logging 34,000 messages. Some students
reported sending in hundreds of messages each. In all, the station
received more than 170,000 text messages. The Diddy campaign is just
one implementation of many that show how record companies and radio
stations use text messaging as a promotional tool.
Once considered a service used only in Europe and Asia, text messaging
is emerging as an important form of communication in the United
States, with 40% of the nation's 220 million mobile phone users
sending text messages regularly, according to research from NPD Group.
By comparison, about 21 percent of U.S. subscribers have downloaded a
ringtone (although only about 10% can be considered "active"
downloaders), while about 9% have downloaded a mobile game.
According to CTIA-The Wireless Assn., U.S. subscribers sent close to
65 billion text messages through the first half of this year. That's
about double the number sent in the first half of 2005.
Record labels have latched onto this trend to sell ringtones and other
mobile content directly to fans, rather than relying solely on
wireless operators to generate sales.
"Every artist with every track, and all the merchandising and all the
advertising, we're using (text messaging) to try and drive business,"
says David Ellner, executive VP of operations for Universal
Motown/Republic Group. "The consumers, from a texting standpoint, are
completely literate with this."
Typically, this takes the form of a CD insert listing a special "short
code" to which fans can send a text message to buy ringtones and other
content.
"I don't think you will see a (marketing) tool coming out of Atlantic
Records -- anything from an album, flier or advertisement -- that
doesn't have some sort of mobile promotion," says Cyndi Allnot,
Atlantic Records' mobile marketing manager.
Labels also are incorporating text-message responses in their TV,
radio and print advertising as sort of a mobile URL, and consumers are
responding. According to October figures from mobile traffic
measurement firm M:Metrics, 7% of the U.S. mobile subscriber base has
used text messaging to respond to such ads. Compared with Spain and
the United Kingdom, which boast a 29% and 18.5% response rate
respectively, that number may seem low. But it's on par with the 10%
reported in France and actually beats the 3.5% reported in Germany.
Of that 7% who responded to ads using text messaging, 38% did so to
download some type of content, while 36% replied to a contest or
promotion. TV ads were the most successful at generating a response,
at 64%, while radio came in a distant second at 15%.
"Brands are intrigued by this medium, particularly those trying to
reach 18- to 34-year-olds who are media-literate and tech-savvy,"
M:Metrics founder Seamus McAteer says.
Compared with other entertainment industries, like film or TV, the
music industry is more sophisticated in its usage of text messaging as
a promotional tool, according to Dov Cohn, VP of product management
and strategy at Motricity, which helps operate text-message campaigns
on behalf of such labels as Universal Music Group and Wind-up Records.
"The music industry is more progressive because they are able to
immediately see the financial gain" through ringtone sales, he says,
"and they're looking to take more control over it and build their
brands more directly."
Labels are also using text messaging as a push marketing tool, sending
messages directly to the mobile phones of fans who have opted in to
receive alerts about their favorite artists.
"It's a huge priority for us because kids are moving off of e-mail and
onto text messaging and instant messaging," Atlantic's Allnot
says. "It basically has a 100% open rate."
In some cases, labels can even charge a fee for the text messages sent
in response to recoup their marketing costs, without selling a thing.
For instance, RCA Group ran a sweepstakes in conjunction with the
launch of Monica's new album earlier this month. With Adidas as a
sponsor, RCA invited fans to enter to win a $5,000 online shopping
spree by texting the word "Monica" to a short code. At 99 cents per
message, RCA is able to put that money back against other marketing
costs.
"This is probably the first promotion we ever ran where we didn't lose
money on prizing, advertising and things like that," says Sean
Rosenberg, director of mobile marketing at RCA Music Group.
Reuters/Billboard
Copyright 2006 Reuters Limited.
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http://telecom-digest.org/td-extra/more-news.html . Hundreds of new
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Antony Bruno & Chris Walsh (reuters@telecom-digest.org)