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The concept of mobile marketing is not a new one, but in the world of association marketing it most certainly is. I’m sure most of us can remember what life was like without a cell phone. Now, I can’t leave the house in the morning without mine. The cell phone has morphed from the mounted car-phone to the ridiculous bag-phone, all the way to what it is today, which is a basically a hand held PC.
According to Wired Magazine, cell phone sales out pace PC sales by more than three times and most of which come with web browsing capabilities. Projected sales of smart phones are expected to reach upward of 300 million units within 2010. There is a relatively quiet battle going on between such media giants as Google, Microsoft, Apple, AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile and Sprint for that last bastion of media which lies in your pocket or purse. All of these heavyweights are frantically working on providing the best solution for a mobile operating system because of the fact that our cell phones are the greatest untapped marketing medium remaining.
How can association marketers harness this power?
Typically, association marketing is very reactive rather than proactive. This is a fantastic opportunity for your organization to be ahead of the curve. There are several benefits to embracing this technology, but the most important and the focus of this article is how providing a mobile conference website can impact your annual conference.
- Dramatically reduce printing costs, be eco-friendly and streamline registration all at the same time. This website which is specifically programmed for mobile web browsing can streamline registration and supply attendees with directories, daily schedules and last minute updates all of which would traditionally would have been printed.
- A simple blog can be utilized to push real-time event summaries to attendees.
- Imagine the power of getting immediate answers to a survey or poll within the largest meeting or a small break out groups.
- Provide a summary of the previous day’s events and highlight upcoming key events.
- Gain additional advertising revenue by offering a new more targeted medium.
How about your organization?
This is just a brief glimpse of how a mobile website can be applied to association marketing, but I’m sure you can imagine the many more benefits your organization can reap by embracing this cutting edge technology.
In closing, I would like to ask for your feedback and assistance. AssociaDirect currently has the technology to implement a mobile website and I would like to extend an offer to any association that would like to offer their conference up as a beta site. AssociaDirect will design and build a basic conference website absolutely free of charge. All I ask in return is your honest feedback and word of mouth.
Please leave your comments below or contact me directly if you would like to participate as a beta site.