So, I just had lunch at Pricci in Buckhead, and as I was waiting at the red light at Pharr and Peachtree, I saw an advertisement on a bus stop that said, “Text TAN to 38714.” So I did, of course.

After the initial confirmation message (”Hollywood Tans Alerts. No charge per msg but stnd rates apply. Up to 5 alerts per month. Reply YES to continue. Txt STOP to end or HELP 4 info.”), I received a pretty cool offer:

Show this text 2 any
Hollywood Tans - ATL
salon & get 1 FREE HT60
or a $10 spray tan. Call
404-240-3323 for info.

As a marketer I’m thinking, how cool is that! For the cost of one poster and some ad space, you not only put your brand-name in the palm of someone’s hand, but you also get that person in your store where you can sell them even more stuff. Sure you can do that with direct mail, but then you have to go to the trouble of buying a mailing list, printing the addresses on thousands of postcards, paying to mail them all, and then hoping that the consumer doesn’t immediately throw your postcard in the trash.

But with mobile, you get your name on an outdoor sign and in a phone, you establish an interactive relationship with a local consumer who wants to receive your promotions, and you get to continually market to that person through a cool, new medium. What’s more, you get to save some trees and call yourself green because you use a paperless form of advertising.

And as a consumer, I thought it was pretty cool, too. Sure I’m already a lovely golden brown from floating around the pool with my sister, but I’m thinking that an airbrush tan might be neat. (I hear they can airbrush the illusion of abs on your stomach.) And just as I’m trying to decide whether I can stand in my underwear while a stranger spray paints my body, I pass by the Hollywood Tans location on Peachtree. Instant abs, here I come!

Now that’s mobile marketing done right. Pretty impressive stuff, huh?

Tags: Atlanta, Buckhead, direct mail, green, Hollywood Tans, mailing list, marketing, out of home marketing, Peachtree, RAZR, SMS

This entry was posted on Wednesday, July 9th, 2008 at 3:20 pm and is filed under Miss Mobile. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.