Understanding the Internet of Things and Mobile Marketing
Receiving email messages from friends and family is incredibly common, but soon we may be receiving messages from our fridges and toothbrushes. Is your milk about to go bad? Your refrigerator will send you a reminder for the next time you make a trip to the grocery. Even workout clothes are being designed to monitor a person’s heart rate and burned calories.
All this smart technology is part of the Internet of Things (IoT), a clunky term but one that refers to the various high-tech products equipped with an Internet connection that enables them to relay helpful data to the owner. Smart phones and watches were just the beginning, and now kitchen appliances, thermostats, and even baby onesies are being created with sensors that can relay information via an app or through email. All this is meant to improve the quality for life for consumers, but it also adds up to new marketing opportunities.
Person, Place and Thing: Everything Digitized
Whether you’re at the coffee shop or at the office, it’s clear that we’re becoming an increasingly mobile society. This is giving companies a pathway to better connect with consumers through mobile marketing strategies that extend information on sales, events and coupons.
With the arrival of IoT, information can be gathered and analyzed on customer behavior from the product itself about how, when, and why the product is used. From this data, a company can formulate a game plan for the next line of products or services based on consumer data. They can get an idea of the best circumstances for certain products and understand why in one instance the purchase was a hit and why in another the purchase is now collecting dust in the closet.
