Mobile Marketing

While gift cards are still made of plastic, digitally formatted gifts cards are increasing in popularity. (According to research by payments giant First Data, electronic gift card sales grew 71% from 2012 to 2013.) Consumers particularly like the customization options — including video and audio in some instances — that some retailers offer with digital cards.

Sterling, Va. - Social media demonstrated the best cost-efficiency of all major online advertising channels in second quarter 2014, coming in at 70% below the industry average for cost and showing a 32% cost decrease quarter over quarter. According to the Q2 2014 Media Intelligence Report from Neustar Inc., social’s reach-efficiency was 286% better than the next channel, portals, and its ability to reach exclusive users (not seen in other channels) improved by 65% quarter over quarter.

By Nicole Chen, brand outreach associate and Michael Olmstead, director, Plug and Play Retail

In today’s day and age, technology pervades into every aspect of our lives. With an emphasis on the fast and easy, nearly all of our day-to-day transactions are now being condensed and expressed through technological gateways. With new trends appearing in the startup space and technology industry every day, it is often difficult to choose what is a good investment and what may turn out to be a dud.

Columbus, Ohio – Express Inc. will be using Rich Media Messaging (RMM) technology from Iris Mobile to drive the fashion retailer’s seasonal “Back-to-Business” sweepstakes campaign with GQ Magazine. A combination of both a participant-based sweepstakes and a voting-based contest, this campaign will award one emerging startup entrepreneur with a grant from Express based on public votes.

New York -- Instagram is making itself more advertising-friendly, adding a new suite of business tools for its advertisers that will help the brands better control their campaigns and will allow them to gauge the success of their efforts.

The roll-out of the new features, which include an “account insights” tool that will allow marketers to track the performance of their ads in real-time using typical brand metrics such as impressions, reach, and engagement, will occur over the coming weeks and months, the photo-sharing giant said.

By Andrew Schneide, ZOG Digital

Shopping site Shopsavvy announced an update to its mobile app this week that adds functionality for users who are looking for the right price on the product they want.

The update increased the number of participating retail outlets from fewer than 40,000 to about 500,000. Additionally, products can be tracked by their barcodes using the app’s built-in scanner.

Shopping site Shopsavvy announced an update to its mobile app this week that adds functionality for users who are looking for the right price on the product they want.  

The update increased the number of participating retail outlets from fewer than 40,000 to about 500,000. Additionally, products can be tracked by their barcodes using the app’s built-in scanner.

Social media is slowly but surely moving from a promotional channel to a channel for direct transactions, as evidenced by the recent news that Facebook is testing a “buy” button of its own. Twitter has become a favored means of running time- and location-sensitive retail promotions, such as Twitter-based food truck promotions run by Ben & Jerry’s and Taco Bell, but so far has not presented itself as an effective means of exchanging goods for currency.

Head & Shoulders and brand ambassador Sofia Vergara are leveraging social media for the shampoo’s latest contest. And the winner gets to meet Vergara.

“I’m excited to give one of my fans the chance to become part of my family for a day,” said Vergara. “Everyone knows eight out of nine Vergaras use Head & Shoulders, now we’re looking for the 10th! We’re looking for someone who flaunts their beautiful, flake-free hair with a little Vergara attitude!”