"Minority Report" flat-out rocks. What a great movie.
Remember the scene where Tom Cruise runs through the mall with the "precog" played by Samantha Morton? And the security guys can track his movements because of a futuristic location-based retinal-scanning technology Steven Spielberg brilliantly set up in an earlier scene?
Armchair futurists in the mobile space have been touting LBS (location-based service) as the next big thing in digital marketing for years now.
But while location targeting has come a long way in recent years, we aren't quite to "Minority Report" just yet.
Let's cut through clutter, bust a few myths, and focus on the things marketers can and cannot currently do with LBS.
- Yes, the mobile Web has a few ways to triangulate your location, and mobile apps can be location-aware leveraging the GPS chips on your phone. But they must be turned on in order to transmit that data or you need a subscriber to download an app to the phone.
- Sprint is the first carrier to open up its network for commercializing location-based messaging – nirvana for digital marketers. AT&T is just starting to open the kimono – and once the AT&Ts and Verizons fully join the party, LBS can become a mass marketing option.
- Costs for real-time network "pings" must be rationalized with marketing demand. $20 CPM on top of your existing budget will be tough to stomach. Don't forget that is fee for every network "ping" not just the ones you deem useful.
- iPhone applications frequently employ locations to do neat tricks – check out Yelp Monocle for a mind-blowing experience. But at present the app market is a walled garden system; uniting the location data, the app and brands in a speedy and meaningful way will take some doing.
- Twitter has integrated LBS into its APIs so marketers can (theoretically) pick up the location of a given social media maven's most recent tweet, and market accordingly.
- Privacy pundits have not yet begun to tackle this tsunami (which is coming). Even if all vendors play nicely and make LBS services strictly opt-in, defining those rules of engagement is going to take some time.
So yes, LBS does exist – and it's getting better all the time. Apple just recently put out a scathing warning to iPhone app developers telling them NOT to bother submitting apps that use location for only more targeted ads. They threw down the gauntlet, saying a more relevant ad is not valuable enough to justify giving real time location.
"Minority Report" depicts a pretty frightening scenario, and Mr. Spielberg makes a good point: customer privacy is critical.
If mobile coupons are going to be differentiated from spam in the eyes of the consumer, they must be delivered at the correct time, in a convenient location, and – most importantly – to a receptive person.
The moral of the story? If they haven't already, marketers should be building broad subscription lists today so they are ready when LBS becomes widely available.
P.S. Sign me up to automatically put in my Starbucks order when I'm two blocks away (oh, and give me 50% off!) I know they are tracking me already somehow… <p>
Matt Silk is the SVP of Waterfall Mobile, a San Francisco-based company that provides world-class mobile messaging solutions and can be reached at msilk@waterfallmobile.com. He also writes for his blog Mobile Demystified and can be followed on Twitter @WaterfallMobile.
