4. Create a conversation with the consumer.
“Participation media” is the new buzz word in mobile. Campaigns that create a dialog with the consumer are more effective in generating conversions and are more measurable than simple media placement campaigns. A campaign can engage its audience by inviting the user to answer a question, play a game, or look something up. These invitations maximize campaign response rates.
Subtlety is not effective. An unclear, confusing or hard-to-notice call to action will get lost, even on the small screen. One example of this is an SMS campaign for the last Harry Potter novel. After being invited to vote on whether Harry Potter would die (the text message below on the left), audiences were initially sent the text "Harry Potter 40% off Learn more Reply HARRY." After that copy was tweaked to "Thank you for voting! Harry Potter 7 goes on sale July 21st. Get 40% off at Borders Books, reply BORDERS," responses improved by nearly 30 percent.
A conversation can go beyond a simple question and answer. Brands can create an ongoing connection with consumers by offering sponsored content that fits with their brand identity. Coors Brewing Company is the National Football League's "Official Beer Sponsor." Its agency, DraftFCB, wanted a campaign to support the fanatical interest of passionate NFL fans, so they sponsored NFL Draft text message alerts, offering consumers over the age of 21 the opportunity to opt in to Coors Light NFL Draft alerts, which are real-time text message updates on the first-round NFL draft picks with Coors branding on every message. This SMS alert service saw thousands of sports fans opt-in to these branded messages with no additional promotion outside of SMS.