Wireless: Communication

1
Wireless Communication research medium?
2
Background

• Take-up of SMS is well documented, now a
  ubiquitous medium in younger age groups
• E.g. 90 of 15-17 yr olds had sent an SMS in the
  last week, 29 had sent over 50 SMS in the last
  week
• Historically SMS is peer to peer communication
  but is now starting to include business to
  consumer
• Growth in SMS advertising
• Involves the development of large databases
  containing detailed demographic and behavioural
  profiling information
• A number of these companies now actively
  marketing research opportunities using these
  panels

3
Raises two key questions for researchers

• How effective is SMS as an advertising medium?
• Does the medium create new opportunities as a
  channel for research?

4
Background to the study

• Trial developed for The Mobile Channel (TMC)
• Recruited 1,000 mobile phone owners in greater
  London aged 16-30
• Explained to them that TMC would send them up to
  3 SMS adverts a day
• In return would receive incentives to the value
  of 5p per advert
• Trial lasted 6 weeks with 35 brands participating
• Structured telephone interviews undertaken with
  triallists to explore effectiveness of SMS
  adverts and reactions to experience
• Six focus groups also staged at end of the trial

5
Types of advert

• Brand building e.g. Tango Feed the Tango
  inside, Carlsberg Pulled? If Carlsberg ran a
  nightclub youd have pulled by now. Probably.
• Special offers e.g. A Dreamcast with 4 selected
  games for just 109.99 pounds at Electronics
  Boutique or Game. Details in store. Call 08456
  090 090 for your nearest store
• Timely media teasers e.g. Tube strike starts
  8pmAnger as Major says walk.see tonights
  Evening Standard for walking times map of key
  routes in London.

6
Types of advert

• Product, service or information request e.g.
  Have you remembered Mothers Day this Sunday?
  Its not too late to say it with flowers, just
  call Interflora on 0870 904 7474.
• Competitions Free Wella Shockwaves. 1st 50
  win! Text back WELLA now
• Polls / voting THE BLOCKBUSTER OSCARS VOTE
  Marilyn Monroe or Cameron Diaz. Txt us your fave
  female movie star, past or present. Let U know
  poll winners on Mar 18th!

7
Consumer response

• Overall a favourable response with 52 very
  satisfied and 42 fairly satisfied
• Issues identified as key to consumer acceptance
• Relevance Partly due to very personal nature of
  medium
• Frequency of advertising 82 considered 3 SMS
  adverts a day about right qualitative reseaech
  indicated that more could trigger deletion upon
  receipt
• Standard of copy Needs to be concise and
  entertaining or informative
• Reward Underpinned acceptance of junk mail,
  for younger consumers was an incentive in itself

8
Advertising effectiveness

• High levels of readership 81 did not delete any
  adverts before reading them, most read all the
  message and 77 read them as soon as they arrived
• High brand awareness 69 were able to recall 11
  or more of the 21 brands for which they received
  SMS adverts
• Some influence on brand attitudes Slightly more
  positive attitude towards a chocolate bar brand
  and TV channel between those receiving SMS
  adverts for these brand and control group

9
Advertising effectiveness (Inc wear out)

• Direct response 63 of triallists claimed to
  have replied / taken action as a result of
  receiving SMS advert
• 19 responded to product / service or information
  request
• Average response rates to competitions was 13
• 14 responded to a poll
• Other unintended responses
• 17 retained or forwarded SMS to a third party
• High number of unsolicited, often humorous
  responses
• Little evidence of wear out over the course of
  the trial

10
Creative execution

• Copy quality is critical, realists wanted SMS
  adverts that were
• Short, to the point (28)
• Funny / entertaining (26)
• Area that interests them (20)
• Eye catching (13)
• Prize / promotion (12)
• Tough challenge for 160 characters
• Also important not to repeat adverts equivalent
  to telling someone the same joke twice
• Greater receptiveness for SMS adverts for low
  price items

11
Advertising effectiveness Implications

• SMS adverts have great potential as an
  advertising medium, especially for low ticket
  items aimed at younger consumers
• For long terms effectiveness to be maintained
  need to consider
• Effectiveness is very much linked to SMS adverts
  that grab attention need to be very creative
  within 160 characters
• SMS adverts must be relevant Need to explicitly
  collect profiling information and use carefully
• Explicit permission is essential Spamming will
  potentially create an irritating intrusion
  possibly leading to negative perceptions of the
  brand

12
Agenda

• The effectiveness of SMS as an advertising medium
• The effectiveness of SMS as a research tool

13
Willingness to participate

• Of a sample of 3,474 mobile phone owners on NOPs
  e-panel, only 19 gave permission for us to
  contact them for research using SMS
• Surprised at low co-operation rate given they had
  agreed to take part in online surveys
• Undertook an on-line survey with 500 panellists
  who had refused to understand their reasons
• 76 response rate, 89 completion rate so still
  willing to do surveys, just not via SMS

14
Willingness to participate (cont)

• Key reasons given for not participating in SMS
  surveys were
• The personal relationship that they have with
  their mobile telephone
• The intrusive nature of SMS
• The perceived cost of receiving our surveys of
  sending their replies
• The volume of SMS Spam
• The limited in-box storage capacity on mobile
  phones
• The belief that online surveys are more
  convenient
• However we were encouraged to find that the
  demographic profile of panel members willing to
  participate in SMS surveys did not differ from
  the overall SMS using population

15
Willingness to participate (cont)

• Undertook a further test among 5,500 members of
  our online panel who use SMS to request
  permission to undertake SMS research
• Emphasised that NOP would coverall costs, that we
  would reward participation, surveys would be
  short and sent occasionally
• Effect of this was to increase co-operation from
  19 to 27
• Still not very high levels of co-operation but
  needs to be put into a broader context.

16
Willingness to participate (cont)

• Asked our on-line panel about their willingness
  to undertake surveys by telephone and mail
• 76 willing to do so by mail, 16 by telephone
• Findings consistent with 2001 COMR Respondent
  Cooperation Industry Image Study
• By telephone found consumers prefer Internet and
  mail surveys to the more intrusive telephone
  method
• By Internet found 79 preferred Internet research
  whilst 3 preferred telephone, mail was preferred
  by 12

17
The research task

• We then explored the types of research that might
  be conducted using SMS
• Designed to test the effects on SMS survey
  response and completion rates of
• asking different types of questions
• using different interview lengths
• for different durations of time

18
Response rates Elapsed mins from SMS dispatch to
response
19
Response rates by survey duration

• Overall response rates were high at 63
• Demographic profile of the reporting sample
  closely matched that of the selected panellists
• Response rates survey duration
• Highest response rate (69) found on diary survey
• Indicates SMS a useful too for ongoing panel work
• Also little wear-out over time with 73 active
  over course of the 5 days
• However, number of respondents to complete all 3
  questions was 81-84 whilst with one day surveys
  it was 92-99
• Data suggests that SMS may be suitable for panel
  based research
• Possibly due to interactive nature of medium

20
Response rates by number types of question

• No evidence to suggest that response rates fell
  with number of questions asked
• Has encouraged us to trial longer questionnaires
• Respondents were willing to answer a wide range
  of sensitive questions relating to religion,
  absenteeism, political affiliation
• Opportunity to explore even more sensitive areas

21
Satisfaction with SMS surveys

• Asked an open-ended question What do you think
  about being interviewed via SMS like this?
• Overwhelming reaction to the process was
  positive
• Easy to do, at my convenience. More likely to
  receive notification than by e-mail. Costs me
  money though and typing replies can be tedious

22
Implications of SMS for research

• SMS as a survey method appeals to a minority of
  our online realists
• Appeal limited by fear of intrusiveness, cost of
  SMS
• Major benefit is the speed of the response with a
  third of responses received within a minute
• Respondents would answer more questions than
  previously considered
• Maybe have particular strengths in conducting
  panel research

23
Overall conclusions

• Medium has potential to be a disruptive
  technology in advertising arena
• Has potential to create high levels of
  readership, ad awareness, positive brand shifts,
  high levels of direct response
• Medium has less potential to play a disruptive
  role in research
• A useful addition to suit individual that may
  well have niche applications
• Increasingly expect to use wider variety of media
  for research (telephone, IVR, web iTV)
• Challenge for research community is to understand
  their fit and relative effectiveness of different
  approaches