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Mogreet puts the video in texts

Written on: Nov 4, 2009
Author: Gavin Dunaway |
: Share; Mogreet puts the video in texts

ADOTAS – “I want to show this to you on a BlackBerry,” Mogreet CEO James Citron says to me, eschewing the slimmer, sexier iPhone to his right for the short and stocky Berry. “Everything looks good on an iPhone, but most people don’t realize how good video shows up on a BlackBerry.”

He texts RBX to a shortcode and in less than a minute the Berry buzzes, eager to show its new message. Citron opens it up and the screen displays a sharp video featuring a member of the New York Jets football team realizing one of his teammates has punk’d him by plastering his car with “For Sale” stickers. I give a good chuckle and read the fine print (which is actually normal size for a smartphone) to learn about online Reebok apparel discounts and a contest to win a free jersey.

Today, Nov. 4, Mogreet peels off the beta label on the first mobile video messaging platform, a tool it’s aiming at brands and ad agencies alike. The platform can reach 200 million U.S. mobile devices through every major carrier. And the platform supports an estimated 2,300 handsets.

You read that right — handsets, not just smartphones. Citron is quick to note that while smartphones fever is getting hotter by the minute, 75% of mobile users in the U.S. still have plain old cell phones. Mogreet’s technology was designed to be ubiquitous.

“Companies came to us and said, ‘Man, iPhones are cool, but that’s only 15 to 20 million users,’” Citron says. “So our task was to figure out how to turn every phone into an iPhone…. To create the same experience you get from watching an ad on TV or a viral video on a mobile device.”

Citron compares text messaging today to email in 1993. Similar to how friends and family would forward each other chain mail, jokes and the occasional coupon, they now do the same thing with text messages — which could be a boon for brands that take advantage of this segment.

In the beta process, Mogreet discovered that the average recipient forwarded the video message to five contacts, giving it a viral effect of five times. In addition, the messages had an open rate of more than 90% and a click-through rate of 50%. Benchmarking that to the single digits of most email blasts is jaw-dropping.

In addition, brands don’t need middlemen or code monkeys to work their magic at an eye-stabbingly slow pace — agencies are able to directly upload their creative content to the platform and send. Results too come at warp speed — a company can log in 10 minutes and track open rates and geography. The platform almost instantly measures ROI.

“The average person responds to a text in 18 seconds,” Mogreet says. “They’ll respond to a brand’s offer just as fast.”

The next step is targeted offers by geography — Twitter and Facebook are jumping into this game, so it makes sense that mobile advertising should offer the same targeting feature. Citron goes into quick details about a campaign for a film that also sends showtimes at local theaters based on the location of the device and a link to buy tickets.

Knock, knock — the future’s here.

Reader Comments.

Dear James, WAY TO GO MOGREET… YOU ARE ON TOP OF THIS …. GOOD LUCK…. I SUPPORT YOUR EFFORT AND IDEA ALL THE WAY

Posted by Judy | 6:54 pm on November 7, 2009.

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