Mobile marketing pays off

Link Mobility more than doubled its delivery of messaging services last year using Ericsson’s Internet Payment eXchange (IPX).
Link Mobility provides applications for enterprises and organizations to reach users by sending a voice, text, fax message or a link to a mobile portal. Using IPX, the company can have a large number of mobile messages sent and delivered securely and quickly. IPX also facilitates payments with a single interface and direct connections to mobile operators. Johan Wästlund, Link Mobility’s CEO, says IPX is a great service in terms of quality of delivery and payment administration. “We are a small company, but thanks to IPX we have been able focus on developing our applications and taking care of our 350 enterprise customers.” He adds that Link Mobility is unique in the sense that it can provide a high volume of services while maintaining high quality.The company works primarily in the Nordic countries but with IPX its services can be delivered globally. Customers include leading Swedish retail companies such as Bokia, KappAhl, Team Sportia, ICA and KF, the gas company Preem and the Swedish bank SEB.Mobile marketing is Link Mobility’s most popular service, often used by retail companies to reach customers and club members with attractive offers and discounts via SMS and mobile portals.“Companies have previously been using e-mail to reach customers directly but today the mobile phone and text messaging are becoming increasingly popular,” Wästlund says. “We went from sending 15 million mobile text messages in 2007 to 39 million in 2008.” The past year’s growth has made Link Mobility Sweden’s leading targeted SMS service provider.Link Mobility is not the only company benefiting from this growth. Studies show that retail companies experience an average 7 percent increase in customers in their stores and 4 percent increase in revenues shortly after a targeted SMS with an attractive offering has been sent out. Operators have also seen volume benefits from these types of messages.Many companies have started to use mobile messaging to communicate with their employees. Link Mobility has an application used to inform employees of urgent IT problems. “It can also be used for an alarm to inform employees if something is wrong with a product they have in stock,” Wästlund says. “By sending a mobile message with this type of urgent information, companies can reach their employees faster and more efficiently than ever before.”He adds that mobile internet is taking messaging services one step further, making them even more attractive. “For example, if you are waiting for the bus you could send a text message to the bus company asking when the next bus is coming,” he says. “They could then locate you to find out which bus stop you are at and send you a text back to let you know when the next bus will show up.”Wästlund believes it will also become more attractive to make these services more personal, to focus on a specific target group or individual,” he says. “Transaction services from banks, where the user could for example get withdrawal notifications on the mobile, have great potential.”

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