Mobile Marketer Briefing on Mobile Advertising

ChaCha teamed up with the folks at Mobile Marketer to publish this white paper on mobile advertising. Check it out!

ChaCha Nominated by TechCrunch as Best Mobile Startup

We learned recently that ChaCha has been nominated for a TechCrunch "Crunchie" award as Best Mobile Startup for 2008. We appreciate the nomination and would love your support! Please cast your vote for Best Mobile Startup at this link - http://crunchies2008.techcrunch.com/votes/

eROI Study - Nothing Beats Texting

High school and college students greatly prefer texting over all other modes of communication including email according to a recent study by eROI. Given ChaCha's ability to reach this demographic with Rich SMS Advertising, I found this study particularly interesting! This further evidences what we are experiencing first-hand: Response rates to targeted text advertising are 5 - 10X better than any other form of mobile marketing.

Nielsen Reports - ChaCha Growth Explodes 300% to 28% Market Share

The title says it all - ChaCha is continuing to prove that the service is much more useful that first-generation algorithmic search engines on mobile. You can read the details here.

ChaCha & AT&T Forge Strategic Alliance

I wanted to share the news that AT&T announced a strategic alliance with ChaCha yesterday. The alliance will benefit both companies in many ways.

For ChaCha, the relationship means that AT&T is aligned with our 1-800-2ChaCha service and that they will be recommending our mobile advertising capabilities to AT&T advertisers. Aligning with the largest wireless carrier in the United States is an important strategic win for ChaCha and we expect the relationship to benefit our user base in many ways that we will be announcing on occassion over the coming months. It will also help further increase our rapidly growing base of businesses that are turning to ChaCha to drive superior results with their ad dollars.

AT&T will gain valuable brand alignment with ChaCha and exposure to the coveted 16 - 25 year old demographic. Now when you call 800-2ChaCha you will hear "Brought to you by AT&T" which is the first step in rolling out the public-facing elements of our partnership.

There will be more to come on this - please let me know what you think!

Reaching Consumers at Instant Gratification Moment Key to Mobile Commerce

On the go mobile users need quick relevant answers and solutions to their immediate needs. Due to the inherent limitations of web enabled mobile devices – small screens, slower connectivity and browser downloading capabilities – mobile marketers have to make the most of their limited interaction with mobile consumers. These on the go mobile users aren’t, in most cases, interested in surfing the web – they’ve got a specific need and turn to their web enabled mobile devices to find a quick answer. So, how do mobile marketers reach these consumers at their point of need?

There are numerous mobile search vendors in the marketplace today offering mobile users internet search capabilities. But, the problem is, typical mobile information services only provide algorithmic search results, which translates to links to “possible” answers. But now, mobile marketers have the opportunity to capitalize on the game changing technology that is revolutionizing mobile marketing – human assisted mobile answers. With mobile answers, consumers can quickly find specific answers to specific queries and mobile marketers can reach them at their point of need.

Say you’re visiting downtown Philadelphia and in dire need of a Mocha Venti Latte, only you have no idea where the nearest coffee house is…You call 411 or use mobile search and they locate 15 outlets in downtown Philly. Or, imagine this – you call or text your question on your mobile phone and a friendly “guide” not only tells you the exact location of the closest coffee house, but also provides you with a discount code to use at that coffee house. Want to know where and when a certain feature film is playing? Using mobile answers, a human guide provides the answer and at the same time asks you if you’d like to purchase tickets. Hmmm…you’ve heard a song on the radio, but you didn’t catch the song title…with mobile answers you can simply provide the guide with a few of the lyrics. Within minutes, the guide gives you the song title and artist and asks you if you’d like to purchase the CD or download an MP3 version.

This is mobile marketing at its finest — reaching consumers at their point of need in a targeted relevant way — versus the intrusiveness/shot gun approach of non-solicited advertising. Through the magic of mobile answers, mobile marketers are able to view behavioral patterns, intent to buy, promotion responsiveness, brand affinity and other key metrics. Tech savvy mobile users – especially the 18-24 year old crowd – have widely embraced mobile technology so it’s a natural fit for mobile marketers to harness the power of mobile answers to reach them in a method with which they are most comfortable! What’s more, today’s mobile devices are highly personal — so much so that they can be equated to a diary or to a personal “black book.” For marketers, this presents an extraordinary opportunity to carry on an intimate dialogue through highly targeted marketing to a massive group of consumers.

Walt Reviews Google's Answer to iPhone

A lot of people have been asking me what I think of T-Mobile's new phone with the Android operating system from Google. Since I have never used one, I am not much help... But thankfully
Walt Mossberg of the WSJ provided a good review of the new phone this week. Check it out here.