Textopoly Mobile Blog » mobile sites http://blog.textopoly.com Setting the trend in mobile engagement Tue, 18 Oct 2011 06:56:04 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.2 en hourly 1 Kickin Facts… http://blog.textopoly.com/2010/08/10/kickin-facts/ http://blog.textopoly.com/2010/08/10/kickin-facts/#comments Wed, 11 Aug 2010 00:26:17 +0000 Asif http://blog.textopoly.com/?p=883 You want exposure? You want people to know about your brand, your product, or your service; well the answer is in your pocket!

Mobile usage across the globe is growing faster and stronger than a 13 year old girl can say Justin Bieber! First, let me hit you with some facts:

-          According to the International Telecommunications [...]]]> You want exposure? You want people to know about your brand, your product, or your service; well the answer is in your pocket!

Mobile usage across the globe is growing faster and stronger than a 13 year old girl can say Justin Bieber! First, let me hit you with some facts:

-          According to the International Telecommunications Union, mobile subscribers will surpass 5 billion in 2010, which is over 70% of the global population! The world population in April was 6.8 billion! The ITU says growth is being driven by advanced services and handsets in developed countries and increased take-up of mobile health services and mobile banking in the developing world.

-          Gartner (March 2010) predicts that by 2011, over 85% of new handsets will be able to access the Mobile Web!

-          LeBron was never the king, SMS ruled all! According to Portfolio Research (Feb. 2010)

  • SMS is used by 4 billion consumers worldwide
  • In 2009 worldwide SMS traffic topped five trillion messages, and that figure is set to exceed 10 trillion in 2013.
  • MMS, mobile email and mobile IM are all growing strongly. The driver for MMS is the number of camera phones, for mobile email is the business market and while IM is popular with the youth market.
  • The global mobile messaging business is worth over US$150 billion, and will hit US$233 billion by 2014.

If your brand isn’t capable of reaching more than 2 million people, you’re not using mobile! And if you’re not using mobile, you are definitely not at full potential! Check the facts, call us up, let’s have some lunch, and then drop it like it’s hot.

Want to be at full potential? Email me at: asif[at]textopoly[dot]com. – P.S. – I don’t think Miami is going to win the championship this year.

]]> http://blog.textopoly.com/2010/08/10/kickin-facts/feed/ 0 WAP Sites – What Are Brands Waiting For? http://blog.textopoly.com/2010/04/04/wap-sites-what-are-brands-waiting-for/ http://blog.textopoly.com/2010/04/04/wap-sites-what-are-brands-waiting-for/#comments Mon, 05 Apr 2010 03:33:25 +0000 Shehzad http://blog.textopoly.com/?p=749 I am a man on the move.  I, like millions of others, like to use my mobile phone to make phone calls, check email, text and browse the internet for whatever my heart desires. But, every day I run into sites that are not optimized for mobile. I am shocked at the number of brands [...]]]> I am a man on the move.  I, like millions of others, like to use my mobile phone to make phone calls, check email, text and browse the internet for whatever my heart desires. But, every day I run into sites that are not optimized for mobile. I am shocked at the number of brands that still don’t have WAP sites!  Unfortunately, some of my favorite brands make that list: Subway, Virgin America, Club Monaco, GAP, NY Magazine, etc, etc.  So, I ask – What are brands waiting for?

Maybe brands think that mobile-internet hasn’t caught on?  That can’t be it.  Mobile-internet usage is increasing at near-exponential rates – 110% increase in 2009 over 2008. (http://leep.it/hR)

Maybe brands think that most people don’t have internet-accessible mobile devices. Don’t think so.  Nearly every (if not all) new mobile phone can access the web.  Granted, viewing may be more pleasurable on smartphones, but even smartphones are more prevalent today than ever before.  Every carrier offers a myriad of smartphones and many have become very affordable – special thanks to Google for indirectly paying carriers to sell Android phones (http://leep.it/hS)

Could it be that brands think users are happy accessing their normal websites from their mobile phones and thus they don’t need to create WAP sites? Nope.  A recent report shows that 60% of mobile-internet users have had problems accessing websites on their mobile in the last 12 months. Additionally, 51% have experienced content on websites being too large or too small. (http://leep.it/hT)

So I am left dumbfounded.  What in the world are brands waiting for? Do you know?

]]> http://blog.textopoly.com/2010/04/04/wap-sites-what-are-brands-waiting-for/feed/ 0 The Headache of Building a Beautiful Mobile Web Site http://blog.textopoly.com/2010/01/06/the-headache-of-building-a-beautiful-mobile-web-site/ http://blog.textopoly.com/2010/01/06/the-headache-of-building-a-beautiful-mobile-web-site/#comments Wed, 06 Jan 2010 18:24:06 +0000 Naushad http://blog.textopoly.com/?p=49 A while ago we were contacted by Yamaha who wanted us to build out a fully function WAP site featuring their Marine Division’s new product line for 2010.  This sounded like a great opportunity for Textopoly and after several rounds of designs we were ready to set it up and make it work.  If anyone [...]]]> A while ago we were contacted by Yamaha who wanted us to build out a fully function WAP site featuring their Marine Division’s new product line for 2010.  This sounded like a great opportunity for Textopoly and after several rounds of designs we were ready to set it up and make it work.  If anyone has ever had the pleasure of building a site to make sure that it works in Internet Explorer 6, then they would understand what a headache it is to build for micro browsers.  First, let’s break down what WAP is – Wikipedia states that WAP is:

Wireless Application Protocol (commonly referred to as WAP) is an open international standard[1] for application layer network communications in a wireless communication environment. Its main use is to enable access to the Mobile Web from a mobile phone or PDA.

What they are trying to say is:

WAP is how you access the internet on your phone.  A WAP browser (Micro Browser) is your phones internal browser.
– Evan

Originally this site was designed and built for iPhone users.  As an iPhone user myself, I know how beautiful a website and/or WAP site can look.  Being able to break out of the mold of either full sites which look tiny on the screen or a slimmed down/image free version of the site (think Amazon’s WAP site) was also a unique challenge that we took great pride in overcoming.  We created a site designed specifically for the iPhone, each page textured and rendered to look stunning on the portable computer.  As Utopian as we were becoming we realized that there was one slight drawback when developing for the iPhone – Blackberry, Motorola, Samsung, and many of the other handsets had errors that we didn’t expect.

Through testing on all major devices we realized that we had some major formatting issues.  Blackberry caused the page to reformat itself, because, well, the browser is buggy.  Blackberry defaults have style sheets turned off.  It also likes to break code, reformat pages, and destroy anything and everything in its wake.  It’s like the Terminator of browsers.  For being a ’smart-phone’ you would think they would have built a better browser.  The annoying part is their new phones are not much better.  Additionally, Motorola and Samsung phones would show the area that is supposed to be transparent in a PNG image, defeating the purpose of a PNG image.  All in all, these were some of the minor issues among many.

To boil down to a point, if you’re interested in viewing WAP sites, building WAP sites, or even thinking about WAP sites you pretty much have two handsets to think about – Apple’s iPhone and Google’s Android.  I say we as an industry give up on what it looks like on other/older phones.  It’s kind of like IE6, we should just stop supporting it and focus on the future instead of the legacy.  We’re on the cusp of a potential tidal wave of designer sites.  This is the best way to push ourselves as designers and developers.  By limiting us with older handsets, we limit our creativity and imagination.  Besides, people on older handsets aren’t looking and utilizing WAP sites anyway, they’re too busy playing Snake.  I loved that game.

We’re in the process of re-working the Yamaha WAP site, but to see the original design before it changes go check it out for yourself by having a link sent to you. Go to our homepage (www.textopoly.com) – enter in your phone number and presto you’ll have the site sent to you!

]]> http://blog.textopoly.com/2010/01/06/the-headache-of-building-a-beautiful-mobile-web-site/feed/ 4 ‘Oh Disney Where Art Thou?’ http://blog.textopoly.com/2009/12/27/oh-disney-where-art-thou/ http://blog.textopoly.com/2009/12/27/oh-disney-where-art-thou/#comments Mon, 28 Dec 2009 03:20:54 +0000 Asif http://blog.textopoly.com/?p=415 I starting writing this blog while listening to a webinar about mobile; one of the panelists was explaining how brands and agencies will pay more attention to mobile if they can understand its full potential ‘reach.’  We’ve heard many times before that most agencies and brands don’t fully understand the reach of mobile, or how [...]]]> I starting writing this blog while listening to a webinar about mobile; one of the panelists was explaining how brands and agencies will pay more attention to mobile if they can understand its full potential ‘reach.’  We’ve heard many times before that most agencies and brands don’t fully understand the reach of mobile, or how to utilize it. Now, I’m not going go into detail about statistics of mobile nor try and to pitch mobile, but I will tell you how Disney has used mobile and how their reach is global.

Disney currently covers almost every available mobile content delivery method available: Disney mobile WAP sites, streaming mobile video, mobile games, ring tones, wallpapers, SMS updates and news, mobile Disney radio app., SMS campaigns and more! Disney entered the mobile space in 1999 and since then is the number 1 mobile entertainment media; with a mobile presence in over 40 countries and deals through 80 carriers and over 6,000 products across 20 product categories all via mobile. This seamless integration of their brand into mobile allows them to reach its consumers clear across the world, including impoverished countries in Africa and central Asia on a ubiquitous device. The more people you touch using the most intimate method of communication, the more loyalty, and brand recognition you create.

As 2010 approaches, and you’re looking back on 2009 think about this: Can your brand reach someone in Africa…?  Or better yet, are you reaching 90% of the U.S. in their pockets? – Spend some time with us, we’ll show you how. Oh, to help further education on mobile and get a free lunch visit this: http://bit.ly/7AZKZM

Want to talk more about mobile and its potential reach!? Email me at: Asif[at]Textopoly[dot]com

]]> http://blog.textopoly.com/2009/12/27/oh-disney-where-art-thou/feed/ 0 Yamaha Watercraft Establishes Footprint in Mobile with SMS + WAP http://blog.textopoly.com/2009/12/27/yamaha-watercraft-establishes-footprint-in-mobile-with-sms-wap/ http://blog.textopoly.com/2009/12/27/yamaha-watercraft-establishes-footprint-in-mobile-with-sms-wap/#comments Mon, 28 Dec 2009 03:12:00 +0000 Naushad http://blog.textopoly.com/?p=401 Check out our latest release below.  We’re really proud of the work we’ve been doing with Yamaha.

With a 400% increase in customer signups, Yamaha storms on to mobile circuit with innovative mobile engagement campaign created by Textopoly, Inc.

Costa Mesa CA- December 2, 2009 – Textopoly, Inc., a bleeding-edge mobile engagement company specializing [...]]]> Check out our latest release below.  We’re really proud of the work we’ve been doing with Yamaha.

With a 400% increase in customer signups, Yamaha storms on to mobile circuit with innovative mobile engagement campaign created by Textopoly, Inc.

Costa Mesa CA- December 2, 2009 – Textopoly, Inc., a bleeding-edge mobile engagement company specializing in all things mobile, and Yamaha Watercraft, which oversees the sales, marketing and distribution of Yamaha WaveRunner® personal watercraft and sport boats in the US, announced today the success of their new mobile marketing campaign which has seen a 400 percent increase in consumer signups through a unique mobile sweepstakes. Yamaha’s new sweepstakes give consumers a weekly chance to win water-sport accessories as well as a chance at the grand prize of a 2010 Yamaha VX Cruiser®. Additionally, through Textopoly, Yamaha launched 2 full mobile websites for WaveRunners and Boats to better interact, engage, and create a compelling dialogue with their customers.

“Our brand and our products are important aspects of people’s lives, and we are constantly looking for new and exciting ways to engage our customer base. The consumption models for information have radically changed toward those that are more immediate, interactive and relevant,” said Bryan Seti, National Marketing Manager for Yamaha Watercraft. “To complement our Internet and new media activities aimed at this new paradigm of communication, we researched the opportunity in mobile and established the solution requirements we needed to make it a success. Textopoly stood out from the pack with a turnkey offering and a multi-faceted mobile engagement strategy that has been pivotal to our success.”

Textopoly’s solution included mo:base, a Web-based SMS database management and broadcast tool that could be applied across both Yamaha product lines. The SMS strategy was furthered by the creation of individual WAP sites to personalize the relationship with customers, provide timely and relevant content and present a compelling reason for subscribers to stay connected with the brand on their mobile device.

“We’re very excited to work with a forward thinking brand like Yamaha,” said Naushad Huda, CEO of Textopoly, Inc. “Yamaha has made a strong statement by incorporating innovative mobile tactics within their traditional marketing strategy. Yamaha has definitely become a pioneer within its industry and we’re excited to work with them to develop more innovative, high ROI mobile campaigns in 2010.”

Textopoly helped Yamaha Watercraft leverage the unique attributes of mobile and reach their current level of mobile marketing ingenuity with SMS, web-to-mobile widgets and targeted WAP sites, integrated with feeds from Twitter and Pitch Engine’s RSS.

To visit the Yamaha Watercraft WAP sites, please visit www.waverunner.mobi or www.yamahaboats.mobi from your mobile device.  To join the SMS campaign, please text WAVE to 70734 or BOAT to 70734.  Message and data rates may apply.

About Yamaha Watercraft
Yamaha Boats and WaveRunner personal watercraft are products of the Yamaha Watercraft Group, a division of Yamaha Motor Corporation, USA. Headquartered in Kennesaw, GA, the Yamaha Watercraft Group is responsible for the sales, marketing and distribution of Yamaha watercraft in the United States.

About Textopoly, Inc.

Textopoly is a mobile engagement agency that creates highly customized campaigns for brands and agencies wanting to reach their audiences via mobile. Whether it is through texting, the mobile internet, or applications, they bring the brand straight to the users fingertips through easy and fun interactions. Through an evolving form of marketing, as well as research and dedication to both the technology at hand and its best practices, Textopoly is becoming the leading pioneer in setting the trends in mobile engagements. Visit Textopoly’s brand new website at www.textopoly.com.

]]> http://blog.textopoly.com/2009/12/27/yamaha-watercraft-establishes-footprint-in-mobile-with-sms-wap/feed/ 2 Nokia, Nokia, Nokia… http://blog.textopoly.com/2009/11/03/nokia-nokia-nokia/ http://blog.textopoly.com/2009/11/03/nokia-nokia-nokia/#comments Tue, 03 Nov 2009 07:36:22 +0000 Asif http://blog.textopoly.com/?p=280 Nokia, Nokia, Nokia…

I have always loved Nokia. I think they produce high quality mobile phones that are user friendly. My first cell phone was the Nokia 8290, by far the best cell phone I ever had. I loved playing ‘snake’ in the black and green background color, and sending text messages to friends cool [...]]]> Nokia, Nokia, Nokia…

I have always loved Nokia. I think they produce high quality mobile phones that are user friendly. My first cell phone was the Nokia 8290, by far the best cell phone I ever had. I loved playing ‘snake’ in the black and green background color, and sending text messages to friends cool enough to have the same phone.

Sadly, Nokia, as it sits today, has lost over 10% of the US market share over the past few years and is down to approx. 7% of US market share[1]. However, globally, Nokia holds the largest market share at roughly 40%![2] The global monster has recently been involved with a myriad of rumors ranging from possible tag team collaboration with AT&T, possible tag team collaboration with Verizon, and as a total introduction into the US market as a new CARRIER! Currently, the only thing that we know that is accurate is their 2010 introduction of the NOKIA netbook. This netbook will be priced around $500.00 US, and will run on Windows 7 on the AT&T 3G network. Now, this may seem that Nokia would have no intention of teaming with anyone else, and would continue its strong relationship with AT&T, right? Wrong! Nokia, along with Verizon have wanted to create a device that would challenge the iPhone for some time now. Nokia lost a large portion of its shares due primarily to the introduction of the iPhone. Here is rumor number 2:

Rumor has it that Verizon has teamed with Nokia to create the first 4G mobile device. Everyone knows that this past month at the GSMA Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Verizon announced that it will test its new 4G network that uses a technology called Long Term Evolution or LTE[3], this year and will begin aggressive rollouts in 2010 (news.cnet.com).  It has also been said at a recent conference in Texas, that Nokia has been recently testing with LTE technology. This tag team collaboration, weather true or false would help both companies gain ground on Apple and AT&T. IPhone’s popularity in the US market has definitely hurt Nokia’s share in the smart-phone market.

Nokia’s ability to produce high quality mobile phones and Verizon’s strong coverage could be the kryptonite to the iPhone.  Personally speaking, I would love for that to happen.

[1] New York Time – ‘Nokia Tries to Undo Blunders in U.S.’ – Oct. 18, 2009

[2] Fortune Magazine – ‘Nokia’s North American Problem’

[3] Long Term Evolution or LTE technology is the last step toward the 4th generation of radio technologies designed to increase the capacity and speed of mobile telephone networks. Where the current generation of mobile telecommunication networks are collectively known as 3G, LTE is marketed as 4G.

]]> http://blog.textopoly.com/2009/11/03/nokia-nokia-nokia/feed/ 0 Are we just a “Mobile Marketing Agency”? (nope!) http://blog.textopoly.com/2009/09/19/are-we-just-a-mobile-marketing-agency-nope/ http://blog.textopoly.com/2009/09/19/are-we-just-a-mobile-marketing-agency-nope/#comments Sat, 19 Sep 2009 20:23:50 +0000 Naushad http://blog.textopoly.com/?p=160

Textopoly does not fit into a neat box in the mobile world. Over the years I’ve tried to find the most accurate way to describe what it is that we do. And over theses same years mobile has grown dramatically in regulations, technology, creativity, etc. – and we’ve grown with it. We’ve stayed fluid and [...]]]> Naushad's Soapbox

Textopoly does not fit into a neat box in the mobile world. Over the years I’ve tried to find the most accurate way to describe what it is that we do. And over theses same years mobile has grown dramatically in regulations, technology, creativity, etc. – and we’ve grown with it. We’ve stayed fluid and well educated in mobile while keeping a focus on mobile. I think our business can be broken down into 2 large categories, Sexy and Unsexy – stay with me now!

The Unsexy: We’re not an aggregator, yet we service and manage both standard rate and premium dedicated short codes. We maintain relationships with Aggregators, Carriers, complete all required applications, provide strategies on how to efficiently get short codes certified and provide extra services such as giving guidance on, and hosting Terms and Conditions. On an ongoing basis we review advertising material for Carrier compliancy, manage audits and provide insight on various detailed areas of the business such as: refund policies; continuously changing Carrier requirements for standard and premium messaging; opt outs requirements by Carrier; AT&T subscription renewals process; and much more fun stuff!

The Sexy: For our agency and brand clients we provide strategy and innovative concepts that use mobile tactics such as SMS, WAP and mobile Applications to achieve a set of goals that insure maximum return on investment (ROI). This side of the business also includes advertising the marketing campaign through various mobile media opportunities such as banner ads on mobile publisher sites and Carrier decks. We create the banner ads using our in-house designers and then purchase media on WAP sites through relationships we have with various Carriers directly. We have strong relationships with agencies who controls Carrier advertising decks, so are able to purchase media directly from them in addition to media directly from publisher sites.

Mobile marketing and mobile advertising are best executed through integration with traditional marketing channels such as Online (including Social Networking) and TV. Our Digital Services create applications that use these traditional marketing channels in conjunction with mobile. For example, Super Text Mobile which is our Facebook application and mo:base which our web-to-mobile widget that easily captures mobile numbers from any website, web banner ad (!) or email and rapidly delivers branded content to handsets.

So given all this is it fair to call Textopoly just a mobile marketing agency? No, it’s not. We’re a Mobile Engagement Agency, we enable mobile communication.

]]> http://blog.textopoly.com/2009/09/19/are-we-just-a-mobile-marketing-agency-nope/feed/ 1 Welcome to Textopoly’s Mobile Blog http://blog.textopoly.com/2009/08/27/this-is-our-sticky-post/ http://blog.textopoly.com/2009/08/27/this-is-our-sticky-post/#comments Thu, 27 Aug 2009 20:54:42 +0000 Naushad http://blog.textopoly.com/?p=32 Welcome to our Textopoly Blog! We made this so clients, mobile groupies, and curious passer byers can not only get caught up on mobile news but be enlightened by our thoughts and interests. So take a look around and feel free to share your thoughts as well. And remember, text like no [...]]]> Welcome to our Textopoly Blog! We made this so clients, mobile groupies, and curious passer byers can not only get caught up on mobile news but be enlightened by our thoughts and interests. So take a look around and feel free to share your thoughts as well. And remember, text like no one is watching.

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