No More ‘Faster Horses’ for Mobile Couponing
In a recent post on Retail Customer Experience.com, Jeff Weidauer speaks about how mobile couponing is heading in the wrong direction. He references the fact that marketers trying to replicate a coupon bar code on mobile devices can be compared to Henry Ford’s famous comment that if he had asked the public what he should build they would have told him - “A faster horse.”
While I agree with his well-thought-out points on the dire situation of mobile coupon display technology, I think the revolution is almost here - where the mobile channel becomes a serious contender in the value chain. And it all comes down to customer behavior (just like it always does).
Couponing has never been ideal for marketers or the public - with most coupons distributed willy-nilly in broadcast print media, and the vast majority of them never used. And people hate having to remember to clip and carry - not even willing in most cases to print at home with the slew of online coupon outfits.
Marketers also have to do a careful dance with couponing - realizing that they will unwillingly subsidize a portion of purchases that their loyal consumers would have already planned to make. And the higher the value, the more possible that they will shift the ideal price point in the consumer’s head for the product or service.
But when couponing is thought of differently, and more personally, we can get to a place where it starts making sense for everyone. For marketers the only realistic position is personalization - if they can’t customize the coupon value for the individual, then they don’t have any way to assist in developing any real relationship with the person. Once you are committed to personalization, the mobile channel starts to look more and more like the right place to be, and if you maintain focus on ease of use for the user, you’ll avoid the replication of real-world ‘Faster Horse’ mentality that the article takes issue with. For retailers, they will continue to push for solutions like Kroger has, that tie manufacturer value-off deals to their existing loyalty cards - creating frictionless experiences for the big chain shoppers.
