What Meijer has Learned From its Mobile Initiatives

Consumers text a mobile code to receive text messages from Meijer and a free, user-specific Redbox movie code promo valid one time for a free movie rental. Meijer has also expanded its mobile program with mobile apps.

Meijer's Wine List iPhone app — which enables on-the-go consumers to explore wines — won a 2010 Silver Racie award. Sponsored by the National Retail Federation, the Racie Awards honor the best retail ads, commercials, digital efforts and communication materials during the past year. Each piece of work is judged on creativity, strategy, results and innovation.

Meijer has also since added a web-enabled mobile commerce site and a mobile circular. What's more, a high percentage of Meijer's social posts are coming from mobile phones, and Baumgardner said Meijer is looking at this as a "real-time opportunity. When you use social to support mobile, watch SMS offers go viral on Twitter."

So, what has Meijer learned so far from its mobile marketing/mobile commerce initiatives? Baumgardner listed the following four things:

• Dabble in the space, but only for a short time. "If your coporate office gives you a little bit of a leash, make sure to present them with results, and fast," he said. "All the metrics are fine, but where are the sales, the ultimate KPI?";
• complexity is an understatement;
• always changing is an understatement; and
• as media consumption behaviors evolve, "figuring [mobile] out has become job number one," he said.

Also during the presentation, Mike Romano, co-founder and executive vice president of SmartReply, a mobile technology and services provider (and Meijer's mobile vendor), discussed why mobile is an important tool today.

A key reason, Romano said, is the decline of traditional media. Forty-four percent of viewers skip through television commercials with TiVo/DVR; costs are increasing for direct mail; and an average marketing email is read within 48 hours.