Written by Tomi Monday, 05 January 2009 06:00
Blog Entry
A recent article on Digital & Direct News describes that Japanese fast-food chains have actively adopted mobile promotion methods in 2008. Mos Food Service, one of the top fast-food restaurant chains in Japan, has emphasized on reducing the number of its TV commercials and reallocating its budget towards mobile advertising. Through trials with different advertising and promotion methods, the company has recognized advertisements to mobile phones are well targeted and cost effective compared to its older strategies.
Lotteria, a rival fast-food chain, is also planning to emphasize sales promotion targeting to mobile phones. According to Keita Kojima, Product Promotion Team Manager of Lotteria, "We focus on our mobile phone site as a new sales promotion method and provide customers with three major contents; coupons, store locator, and food menu. We find mobile to be more effective in targeting desired market segments rather than delivering the message to a large indefinite number of customers."
McDonald’s Japan having over 10 million user subscriptions to their own mobile site, are also keen in studying the possibility of allowing customers to order meals online, redeem coupons, and pay for purchase via mobile phones. Currently customers can download an application to their phones, allowing them to choose coupons they wish to purchase. When making a purchase, the coupon is redeemed by simply placing the phone near the RFID reader, and instantly adding the item to the order. Furthermore, the payment can also be completed using NTT Docomo’s iD mobile wallet payment system.
Eikoh Harada, CEO of McDonald’s Holdings Japan describes the advantages of this new method: 1.) Distributing E-coupons are more cost efficient compared to print advertisements. 2.) Payment process is faster, where a 30 second reduction in processing time will increase sales with 5%. 3.) Mobile campaigning also allows for more targeted marketing according to the user profile and location and the effectiveness of promotions can also be directly measured through user ID recognition and feedback.
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