O2 More, the mobile marketing platform launched by O2, which promises to match your interests to relevant advertisers via data the mobile phone provider holds for you, has announced that they have increased their customer base from 2 million in March, to 6 million now.
The increase in user sign-ups indicates that consumers are becoming increasingly willing to receive advertising messages via their phones.
The O2 service works by matching preference information customers give to O2 with data O2 holds on those customers, such as phone usage and location, delivering highly personalised campaigns for advertisers.
Shaun Gregory, Managing Director of O2 Media, told Mobile that “consumer attitudes are changing and there is a willingness to interact and engage.”
Business SMS services are becoming an increasingly popular way for brands to open up a unique one-to-one dialogue with customers and create real engagement.
With read rates for SMS messages typically exceeding 90 per cent, brands are able to tailor individual messages to customers in a way that is impossible when using other advertising mediums such as TV or radio. As well as personalisation, other benefits offered by SMS advertising include the ability to benefit from generous volume discounts.
A survey undertaken by the Direct Marketing Association (DMA) found that SMS marketing campaigns were among the most successful of all mobile ad mediums. The use of SMS Short Codes (e.g. text ‘YES’ to 80806), for example, are proven to significantly increase response rates to advertising campaigns and can generate immediate responses for advertisers.
O2’s UK 2G mobile network provides voice and data services to 99% of the UK population, while the company’s 3G (HSPA+ 900 / 2100 MHz) network currently provides voice and high speed data services to over 84% of the UK population.
