How to get a million to the Million Man March

Enough has been said about mobile marketing in general. So let’s focus on some practical matters for a change and see how integrated marketing solutions could add value to a highly influential cause.
During April of this year funny man Desmond Dube organized the Million Man March, an initiative that encouraged a million South African citizens to march against crime to the Union Building in Pretoria.
To be honest, if it wasn’t for the industry I’m in and my work involved on the internet, the Million Man March would’ve gone by me completely unnoticed. And in fact, I think to many of us, it did. The final attendance figures of the march was an estimated 10 000 people.
This was the first Million Man March initiative and therefore posed a number of flaws in the model. These flaws I’d like to highlight here and then hopefully provide some ideas which could’ve spread the message across a wider audience of South Africans.
A television ad campaign was aired apparently, which to this date I have not seen. (Have you?)
Details about the march were also printed in some of the national newspapers. I don’t read any newspapers, so of course this went by unnoticed as well.
Then finally, the march was held in Pretoria only. This posed an enormous logistical problem for anyone outside the Pretoria area to attend.
On the internet though, a Google SA search for “million man march” return an astonishing 14 900 results. Perennial events coordinator, Facebook, was brought in on the action as well and secured a great number of followers as well.
Along with the Million Man March website, it was head honcho of the Mobile Marketing Division at Mail & Guardian Online, Nic Haralambous that made a significant contribution to the cause. Nic is the author of the popular South African Blog, SA Rocks, and used this medium to spread the message of the march across the blogging fraternity.
I caught up with Nic today and asked him how mobile could’ve played a greater part in Desmond’s attempt of getting 1m pairs of feet to the venue.
Firstly, we both felt that the march should’ve been spread across all the major cities of South Africa: Cape Town, Durban, PE, Pretoria and Johannesburg.
I felt more awareness around the campaign in the lead up to the march was necessary when Nic suggested a geo-based mobile marketing campaign that corresponds with each event around the country. In laymen’s terms this means that relevant information will be sent through to mobile phone owners of each designated city and surrounds.
A good example of this would’ve been to feed live stats on crime related issues on a regular basis: “2 hijacks, 2 rapes and 7 murders occurred in Durban during the last 24 hours. Show your support. March against crime.”
When proper awareness around the march has been reached, Nic also suggested setting up a Bluetooth campaign within a 5 km radius of the stadiums / venues.
When people find themselves within this range, the mobile campaign would drive a permission based sms to the user’s phone: “Would you like to exchange data with Million Man March?”
Of course, if the user replies with a yes, a relevant message can be sent to the mobile phone encouraging the person to visit the venue, donate to the cause or carry the message forward.
To the question ‘why mobile’, my answer is simple: Statistics have shown that “There are currently more cell phones in South Africa than TVs, telephones, radios and taxis combined.”
Do the math.

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