The Direct Marketing Voice » Digital & Social Media

QuantumDigital Launches QuantumCards, the First Ever Direct Mail Marketing iPhone App

by Cynthia Fedor | April 11th, 2012

It’s official! QuantumDigital just launched QuantumCards, the first direct mail marketing iPhone app designed to help SMBs grow local business while on the go.

Through QuantumCards, users can create, print and mail vibrant, full-color postcards to market their business in local neighborhoods–right from their iPhone. What’s unique about this application is that it offers users the ability to generate neighborhood mailing lists on the fly by using their smartphone’s geo-location feature or by typing in a target location. Service-based business professionals–like house painters, landscapers, real estate agents, or residential cleaners–no longer have to walk door to door distributing business cards or door hangers to prospects surrounding job sites. They can simply take a picture with their iPhone, write a personal message, and even link to their website or a video via QR code, then mail postcards to the neighborhood audience. SMBs can market their business in a matter of minutes; postcards mail next business day so they can start seeing results quickly.

Other benefits:

Allows businesses to market to local neighborhoods within minutes while on the go
Provides a social aspect to traditional marketing (take a photo with happy clients, share real events in real places, include a personal message, etc.)
Gives users the ability to link to digital content via QR code
Offers easy-to-execute marketing that both novice and expert marketer can use

QuantumCards is an ideal application for:

HOA (home owners association) groups and community advocates
Service-based businesses such as remodelers, roofers, landscapers, etc.
Locally owned businesses that rely on patronage from nearby audiences
Busy real estate professionals, home inspectors, etc.
Temporary and/or pop-up businesses needing local exposure fast

As more and more marketers are adopting mobile tools and technologies to promote their business, many may find the QuantumCards app to be an invaluable tool for keeping in touch with clients and generating additional local business.

Try QuantumCards for yourself. Download the app for free and instantly get your first postcard at no cost. If you post a review of your experience on the iTunes app store, you may also enter to win a $100 iTunes gift card courtesy of QuantumDigital.

What do you think of this new marketing application?

Small Business Marketing Tips from #SXSWi 2012

by Cynthia Fedor | March 14th, 2012

Didn’t get to attend the SXSW Interactive Festival in Austin this year? Have no fear. There’s a ton of notes available on Twitter. To make it easier than sifting through all of the information to find useful bits of information, I’ve outlined some helpful tweets from just a couple of the panels that I attended.

Feel free to use the associated hashtags to discover more information about each panel or leave a comment for this post to get a conversation started here.

Why Small is the New Big and Big is the New Small

Twitter Hashtag: #eggcellent

What was this panel about? Size doesn’t matter anymore. The over-riding lesson we are learning worldwide is that a business that gets ahead of the curve is a smart one, not necessarily a big one. The rapid development and adoption of information communication technologies (ICT) over the last ten years is driving this change. As consequence, businesses are leveraging new web, mobile and social technologies to interact with customers and prospects in a whole new way. A role reversal between SMB and Large Enterprise is taking place: SMB is becoming more ubiquitous and quantitative while Enterprise is becoming more personalized and qualitative. This session explores the causes, corrections, and outcomes of the changing dynamics within the marketplace that now allow SMB and Large Enterprise companies to compete for the same customers.

Takeaways:

Social is transforming IT, making it more accessible for small businesses to go to market & compete w/ the big boys.
Everything is becoming more local. Even big business needs to find ways to be unique & visible in local markets.
Get hyper-personal; make your customers your board members and sales force. They can be the greatest influencers that attract more business for you.
When customers are cheap to acquire don’t forget to work on loyalty and retaining that customer
Identify your differentiators and make those things drive your business. It’s not just about price.
What you do with data regardless of how big (or small) of a company you are is what will differentiate you

FutureShop–Virtual QR Stores, NFC Receipts & More

Twitter Hashtag: #futureshop

What was this panel about? The mobile shopping revolution isn’t theoretical, it’s here and it’s all around us. Innovations abound such as Tesco’s virtual QR grocery store in a Korean subway station, Levi’s digital fitting rooms, Nestlé’s instant deals for UPC scans of ice cream, and NFC payments that obliterate consumers’ need for a physical wallet. Providers of these and other game changing consumer experiences are mashing up new capabilities to create magical experiences and frenzied user adoption. Read More »

5 Mobile Trends Every Small Business Marketer Needs to Know

by Cynthia Fedor | March 7th, 2012

If you haven’t already, you need to start thinking about how consumers may interact with your business via mobile devices. According to comScore’s latest report, “2012 Mobile Future in Focus,” smartphone ownership nearly doubled in 2011 alone (more than 100 million Americans now have a smartphone) and a growing number of consumers are using them to perform activities such as search, email, social networking, and shopping.

Here are a few highlights from the report and why these mobile trends should matter to you.

Nearly 50% of U.S. and Canadian mobile subscribers used mobile browsers. That means they’re potentially visiting your website while on their smartphone, tablet, or other mobile device with access to the web. If your website is not optimized to look good or be functional on these devices, you could be providing an unsatisfactory user experience or even losing customers.

Tips on getting your site ready for mobile devices: choose blog/website templates that utilize responsive design or that are mobile-friendly; choose an ecommerce solution that offers a mobile version of your store site in parallel with the ‘regular’ version; or use tools like Mobify to create a mobile version of your existing site.

40.8% of U.S. consumers used email via their mobile device. If the emails you send to prospects and/or customers—like eNewsletters, promotional offers, order confirmation emails, etc.—are not optimized for viewing on smaller screens, then you could be providing an unsatisfactory user experience or missing out on opportunities to close more business.

For tips on designing emails that work well on both desktop and mobile devices, check out the article, “6 Tips for Optimizing Email for Mobile.”

26.5% of U.S. consumers accessed maps on their mobile device. Maps give consumers the ability to search for businesses around their current location or find routes to get to a local business. To reach these consumers, ensure that your business’s location not only shows up on the maps that they’re accessing, but that the information about your businesses is accurate and kept up to date.

Now, you may be asking, “How do I get my business listed on iPhone maps?” Much of the data displayed on mapping applications comes from Google. If you haven’t already, set up a Google Places page for your business. Be sure to choose the category that best describes your business from a consumer’s perspective and include a keyword-rich description. For example, people often use these maps to search for local businesses via general terms like “restaurants”, “shoe repair”, “book store”, and so on. Additionally, if there are industry specific mobile applications that have mapping features that help consumers find local businesses, make sure your business has a profile set up on those too (I’m thinking about apps like Urbanspoon, for example). Read More »

Og the Social Media Expert?

by Eric Welch | February 24th, 2012

As we careen headlong into an uncertain 2012—a year which could, according to some, bring about the end of the world or, at the very least, give rise to more of those cool gadgets we can’t seem to get enough of—the phenomenon of social media continues to grow exponentially like some enormous mutant beanstalk on steroids. But where is it all headed? And once we get there, will we even know why?

The short answer is “we don’t know.” The long answer is “weee… dooon’t… knooow.” Consider the humble cave man. We’ll call him ‘Og’ (although his real name was probably something closer to ‘Snorts-While-Chomping-On-Mammoth-Ribs’). There he was, hunting and gathering much like his fellow cavemen in a state of Neanderthal bliss, confident that his existence tomorrow would be virtually identical to his existence today, as it probably would for the rest of his life (barring the quite likely scenarios of being eaten by a sabertooth cat or killed in an epic battle with a rival tribe).

One fine Pleistocene day, a fellow tribesman taps Og on the shoulder, or kicks him in the shin (the traditional Neanderthal afternoon greeting) and motions him to come over and check out what he’s done on the wall of his cave. There, on the bare stone in the dim firelight, a crude image of last week’s mammoth hunt greets Og’s tired old eyes (by the way, Og is 34 and already qualifies for Medicave). He stares in absolute awe as the memories and sensations of nearly being trampled by the gargantuan beast come flooding back to him in a tidal wave of emotion. Mind. Blown.

Fast-forward to 2012. Or, as I like to call it, the Sociomobilmediamania Era. No longer compelled to hunt and gather to ensure our basic survival, the people of the modern world (and by that, I mean developed nations) are pretty much free to explore and indulge in all sorts of fascinating pursuits—from fantasy football leagues, to 3D movies, to the gigantic time sucks that are Facebook and Pinterest—confident that our existence tomorrow will be virtually identical to our existence today, as it probably will be for the rest of our liv… but wait! Not so fast. There’s another force at work the likes of which ancient man never saw coming. Read More »

The Quick and Dirty Way to Generate QR Codes and Track Response

by Cynthia Fedor | February 21st, 2012

For small business owners that are investigating new ways to optimize and track local marketing initiatives, QR codes can be intimidating. QR codes are high-tech looking. They’re kind of ugly. And, worst of all, they force marketers to examine how traditional media, like direct mail and print, can work with digital media and digital platforms in a seamless way. A lot of small business owners I know are very savvy and open to learning about new technologies. Even so, many are not sure how to actually generate a QR code, when and where to use one, and how to tell if consumers are even scanning them.

This post is dedicated to the do-it-yourself small business owners out there. For you, I’ve outlined a quick and dirty way to generate QR codes and track responses. Read More »

QuantumDigital Launches QuantumCards, the First Ever Direct Mail Marketing iPhone App

Small Business Marketing Tips from #SXSWi 2012

5 Mobile Trends Every Small Business Marketer Needs to Know

Og the Social Media Expert?

The Quick and Dirty Way to Generate QR Codes and Track Response

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