Cell phones are no longer simply a way of talking when on the move. They are now email clients, media players, cameras, social networking tools, GPS systems and more. Mobile phones truly are the most important means of personal communications to any individual, which is why stadiums being able to interact with spectators on their handsets is so valuable in developing a productive dialogue.
Bluetooth proximity broadcasting enables venues to create Zones, in which the venue 'owns' the airwaves reaching cell phones at their location. This is ideal for sending information services, interactive games, website links or adverts to spectators for free.
The number of mobile handsets in circulation world wide is staggering (over 261 million subscribers in the USA and 74 million in the UK). 70 per cent of the 900 million phones sold each year are Bluetooth-enabled, creating a huge market for this form of mobile marketing.
With such a large market, many brands and sponsors are moving their marketing budgets towards mobile technologies as traditional methods of advertising such as television, cinema and even the web prove to be less relevant to an increasingly mobile consumer lifestyle. This gives venues a fantastic opportunity to offer brands a culturally relevant way of reaching specific target groups as they visit their locations, opening additional marketing budgets from brands and sponsors to forward thinking venues.
Benefits of Proximity Marketing
Bluetooth broadcasting is hugely beneficial as it is highly targeted being location and time specific. It also has the benefit of being free for consumers to receive messages, this removes any privacy or subscriptions concerns which are often encountered in other types of mobile marketing.
Large venues such as stadiums can even segment their 'Zones' to reach different types of spectator at the same time; for example, home fans can receive team sheets and discount offers for season tickets whereas away fans at the same game could be receiving food and beverage offers.
Bluetooth broadcasting offers venues many benefits including:
* It is free for handset owners to receive downloads, increasing uptake.
* It is completely measurable with every download being logged.
* It is standards based and legal (it operates in the unlicensed, 2.4 GHz ISM band).
* It can be targeted to a specific location, group or event at any time.
* It offers opt-in and opt-out of messages allowing verification of sender.
Integrated Approach
Some of the latest Bluetooth stadium solutions now integrate with giant screens allowing messages sent to phones to be relevant to what is being displayed on screen. This could increase the longevity of existing investments in video technologies by bringing content from the giant screen to the mobile screen simultaneously.
Bluetooth technology therefore offers a solution to stadiums and venues which leverages their real estate assets to target phones with timely and relevant content such as team sheets to sports fans, music download discounts at gigs, conferencing facility details to businesses and betting applications to race goers and fans.
In our transient and self-sufficient society when it comes to consumers receiving information and advertising on their mobile phones the more location based Bluetooth will deliver a strategic platform for reaching target groups when gathered together.
http://www.sportspromedia.com/notes_and_insights/_a/bluetooth_opens_up_new_revenue_streams_for_stadiums/
Friday, 27 November 2009
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