Consumer loyalty rewards via those store-branded faux credit cards, weekly e-mails or punch-and-go cards are slowly becoming a thing of the past with the increasing power of the handy mobile devices we can’t seem to put down.
The “third screen” is proving to be a pivotal touch point for brands to not only reach consumers, but to reward them for their business through “hyper-local advertising” services such as CardStar, mFoundry, ShopKick, Gowalla and Foursquare, just to name a few.
“Hyper-local advertising should be about much more than simply clicking on a banner ad — it should be about connecting with brands and getting rewarded for loyalty. Brands want to turn their existing customers into better ones,” said Sam Altman, co-founder and CEO of Loopt.
The number of iPhone apps increases by the day, with millions available for every purpose under sun. Location-based services and social games are tied to retail to enhance the overall consumer experience, possibly creating brand evangelists with every free cup of coffee or “mayor” and “boss” badge awarded, but aside from retail, what other industries can benefit?
Higher Education isn’t an industry that is necessarily based on “consumers,” but its institutions are definitely brands- complete with an identity, values and a strategy to position and differentiate itself from a field of competition that ranges in the thousands. For this industry, brand evangelism and “consumer” (student) loyalty is just as important, but besides an interactive campus map, how else can colleges and universities leverage these tools for their advantage?
Stanford University is a great example of how institutions are finding ways to integrate these same services for various purposes. A couple of months ago, Stanford’s Commencement went mobile with a unique collaboration with Loopt Star, a social mapping application and mobile rewards game.
Students were able to download the app to their iPhone or iPad, follow their friends and earn a special Class of 2010 graduation gift by checking in to multiple Commencement events.
According to the Stanford Alumni Association, the collaboration served two purposes:
1.To help students get the most out of their Commencement experience and
2.To help them keep in touch with one another as alumni.
What Stanford is attempting to achieve is less about rewarding students and more about enhancing the connections of people, ideas and experiences on its campus. It’s about that ever-popular word that floats around when “social media” is mentioned – engagement.
Clearly, mobile technology is how young people access the web and it is increasingly becoming the expectation that you can connect at anytime, anywhere and that’s where technology is headed. Everyone has to embrace it. Everyone.