In mobile marketing, it’s all about adding value. A Harris Interactive poll last fall found that 26% of users will accept ads on their cell phones if they also get free applications that make their lives easier.

A company called Mobile Campus is adding that kind of value college by college, offering universities a free text-messaging platform to send SMS info about classes, sports teams and campus organizations. In return, Mobile gets the right to market, lightly and politely, to students who opt in.

(Direct) In mobile marketing, it’s all about adding value. A Harris Interactive poll last fall found that 26% of users will accept ads on their cell phones if they also get free applications that make their lives easier.

A company called Mobile Campus is adding that kind of value college by college, offering universities a free text-messaging platform to send SMS info about classes, sports teams, and campus organizations. In return, Mobile gets the right to market, lightly and politely, to students who opt in.

“We’ve created a channel that lets marketers reach this 18-24 demographic via a device that more than 90% of them carry at all times,” says Mobile Campus CEO George Tingo. The service now has a user base of 30,000 students on 11 college campuses, including the University of Texas at Austin and the University of Florida at Gainesville, and plans to have 100,000 users by the end of the year.

Students can sign up for the free text service online or through on-campus recruitment. A Web portal gives them a list of clubs and organizations allowed to access their school’s text platform — as many as 600 groups, in the case of the University of Florida. Users also can enter the categories in which they want to receive text ads: entertainment, food and restaurants, sports, health and beauty, etc.

Students get no more than two SMS ads a day, always in their interest categories. Most ads are for local merchants and retailers and offer deals, discounts, and promotions exclusive to the Mobile Campus platform, in the form of coupons that students can redeem in-store using their phones. “It’s got to be a financial offer or discount, not just a brand message,” Tingo says. “It’s got to be unavailable to the general public and better than any offer made to the public.”

Local retailers can use the channel to drive store traffic during slow periods. One Domino’s Pizza operator used a Mobile Campus promo to bridge a sales dead zone from 7 to 10 on Wednesday nights, offering free Cheesy Bread or Cinna Stix without purchase. “Kids were lining up out the door,” Tingo says. Redemption rates vary from 2% to 30%, depending on the category and offer.

Dell’s college division ran a promotion last fall that directed students to a Website for a chance to win a flat-screen TV, photo printer, or movie download. The contest was advertised on radio and in print. But Dell also used Mobile Campus to push the offer to 18,000 students in five of its academic markets.

The result was a 26% response rate to the wireless promo, says Amy Fowler, interactive marketing manager for Dell’s university division. More than 5,000 students registered all the way through, providing e-mail addresses to have Movielink downloads awarded to their accounts.

“Dell got a higher response rate in the first four hours of the campaign than they did in 30 days of promoting it in print and on the radio,” Tingo points out.

Related articles:

Making the Mobile Optimization Call

RU Ready 4 the DM Generation?

Mobile Marketing: Dunkin’ Donuts Serves SMS

Mobile Marketing: Applications and Implications