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Marc-Alexandre Gagnon

American Express Now Lets You Swap Rewards Points For Zynga's Purple Cows | TechCrunch - 0 views

techcrunch.com/...-points-for-zyngas-purple-cows

3BT_NFC mobile payments

shared by Marc-Alexandre Gagnon on 06 Feb 12 - No Cached
  • American Express and Zynga are teaming up to make it easier than ever to turn your money into virtual cows, tractors, and whatever else the folks at the multibillion dollar social gaming company can cook up. And this time, it doesn’t involve actually forking over cash — at least, not directly.
  • You see, American Express is now allowing its customers to exchange their ‘membership rewards’ points for virtual goods and/or ‘game cards’ that can be redeemed for Zynga’s in-game currency. These points are earned as American Express customers use their cards — the AmEx site says that you get one point for “virtually every dollar you spend on your Card.”
  • Some of the rewards come fairly easy, with prices beginning at 200 points; others run into the thousands. To help make these rewards more appealing, Zynga is offering exclusive virtual items like a Purple Cow in FarmVille (540 AmEx member reward points), a Café World Amex Lightning Stove (1945 points), and other goods that can’t be acquired any other way in the games. More items will be coming on December 6, with support for more games, including FarmVille.
  • ...2 more annotations...
  • In addition to these virtual goods, users can buy game cards, with denominations starting at $2 for 200 points and running up to $50 for 5000 points (you can get both physical and virtual game cards). Do the math and you’ll notice that this is 100 points for every $1 of in-game credit. This works out to 1% of your spendings, which is a pretty standard ‘cash back’ amount seen in credit card rewards programs (some programs will do better than 1% for certain items, like hotels).
  • Obviously none of this is actually free — you’ll be giving up cash, discounted hotel rooms, or whatever other reward program you might have chosen instead of Zynga’s. But you can bet that plenty of people will make the switch regardless, if only because they want access to the exclusive items that Zynga is offering through the program. And the relatively small number of points needed to ‘purchase’ a new virtual good will mean that users can reward themselves more often, which they always like. After all, who doesn’t want an elusive purple cow wandering around their farm?
Marc-Alexandre Gagnon

Jiepang to deliver NFC check-ins and rewards to Chinese merchants * NFC World [26Aug11] - 0 views

www.nfcworld.com/...thousands-of-chinese-merchants

3BT_NFC mobile payments nfc rewards

shared by Marc-Alexandre Gagnon on 10 Nov 11 - No Cached
  • China's leading location-based social service is distributing NFC window stickers to more than 3,000 merchants in Shanghai, Guangzhou, Chengdu, Taipei and Hong Kong
  • Jiepang is to distribute NFC window stickers to more than 3,000 merchant partners in six cities in Greater China, including Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Chengdu, Taipei and Hong Kong.
  • Jiepang is China's leading location-based social service. Its users currently check in and earn rewards via a GPS-enabled smartphone app which comes preloaded on all new HTC, Sony Ericsson, Nokia and other smartphone brands in China, including all three of the new Nokia NFC smartphones announced earlier this week.
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  • Consumers use the service to check in to locations as well as to share tips, photos and comments. The system also automatically sends this information to a number of social networking platforms, such as Twitter and Facebook as well as local networks, so that friends and followers are notified whenever a Jiepang user checks in to a particular merchant.
  • Jiepang provides its fast growing network of merchant partners with a self-service platform they can use to provide offers to Jiepang users who check in to their locations, Leo Lee, Jiepang's marketing and business development manager in Hong Kong, has told NFC World.
  • The platform allows merchants to both choose the type of offer they wish to provide and set their offers so that rewards are triggered according to the kind of user actions they want to see. A reward can be offered, for example, each time a user checks in or only when they have checked in, say, three times during a set period of time.
  • Jiepang doesn't charge merchants for using the platform, and it doesn't plan to change this in the future, Lee added. The company's revenues, instead, come from partnerships Jiepang has established with brands such as Starbucks, McDonald's, Nike, Louis Vuitton and nearly 300 others. These enable the brands to use Jiepang "to reach, engage, and learn about their customers in both the offline and online worlds."
  • NFC offers a number of advantages over GPS to both users and merchants, Lee told NFC World. "NFC is a lot easier and convenient" for users, he says, and merchant partners can be sure that, when a user checks in, they really are present at their store. "GPS is not 100% accurate, you can be a few streets away," explains Lee.
  • The new service means that NFC phone users will be able to simply touch their phone to a window sticker in order to check in to a location and register their eligibility for a reward. Then, once they have fulfilled the criteria for a given reward, a mobile coupon for that merchant will be delivered to their phone. Jiepang users then simply show the coupon to the merchant in order to redeem it. Once accepted, the merchant voids the coupon by pressing an on-screen 'void' button on the customers' phone.
  • "NFC has a lot of possibilities for mobile commerce," says Lee. "We want to help small, medium and local merchants to use our platforms."
Marc-Alexandre Gagnon

Mobile banking trends to watch out for in 2012 - Mobile Commerce Daily - Banking - 0 views

www.mobilecommercedaily.com/...-looking-beyond-basic-services

3BT_NFC mobile payments

shared by Marc-Alexandre Gagnon on 30 Dec 11 - No Cached
  • Mobile banking will continue to grow next year across a multiple fronts. Not only will more banks jump into mobile with optimized sites and application, but financial institutions will also build their existing mobile programs with a variety of new services.
  • Much of the interest in mobile banking is being driven by consumers, who tend to interact more with a mobile banking solution than they do Internet banking. On average, customers use a mobile banking app three times per week and only use traditional Internet banking two times per week, according Malauzai Software.
  • “We see a demand for mobile via the application and text messaging,” said Jim Simpson, vice president of information technology at City Bank Texas, Lubbock, TX, which has over 30 locations across Texas.
  • ...12 more annotations...
  • “We are looking to provide innovative services to our customers,” he said. “We have to be competitive and to be competitive you have to offer these services.
  • Banks that feature a rewards program will increasingly look to mobile to drive interactivity for the program and drive customers back into mobile banking apps.
  • For example, City Bank Texas will introduce a new service early next year that enables customers to quickly and easily temporarily turn off their debit card via the mobile app if they have lost it and then turn it back on just as easily. Currently, customers have to find and call the bank’s 800 number to accomplish this.
  • Mobile check capture Many of the big banks currently give customers the ability to deposit checks into their bank accounts using their mobile phones. However, next year more banks are likely to jump onboard and offer this service to meet consumer demand. Malauzai Software’s research shows that a lot of bank customers are investigating remote capture on their mobile phones even if they have not made a deposit yet. For those customers who are using the service, they typically deposit one to two items per month. “We see mobile check capture becoming really big in 2012 – we expect over half of our clients to adopt it next year,” said Robb Gaynor, chief product officer and co-founder of Malauzai Software Inc., Austin, TX.
  • “If we can move certain things to mobile so customers can do them on their own time via mobile, it’s a big advantage. It is a stickiness that gets them to stay with us.”
  • For example, City Bank Texas offers a rewards account that enables customers to earn higher interest rates and ATM fee refunds based on how much they use the bank’s various services. However, because there was no way for customers to keep track of how many transactions they made or how close they are to earning a reward, customers were frequently calling the call center for this information.
  • To address this, City Bank Texas put a real-time reward monitoring service in its mobile app. Now customers can use the app to find out how many more transactions they need to reach the next level of rewards.
  • Person-to-person payments Person-to-person payments have been around for several years but use has been limited because the transactions did not take place in real time. However, with Visa recently changing certain rules to enable two consumers to exchange debit card information in a secure way, person-to-person payments will now be able to show up in someone’s checking account within seconds. Visa is expected to roll out a solution for person-to-person payments in the first quarter of 2012. “With real time settlements, you will see a lot more customers use person-to-person payments,” Mr. Gaynor said. “We see this as the beginning of real mobile banking.”
  • Some banks may try to ease customers into mobile payments to get them comfortable with the idea. For example, City Bank Texas will give mobile customers next year a way to manage their prepaid, loyalty and gifts card via the mobile app.
  • “This is the first step to moving customers to mobile payments concepts,” City Bank Texas’ Mr. Simpson said. “New companies are sprouting up weekly to do mobile payments but the problem is that the debit card is not broken yet – it is still relatively easy to swipe that card.
  • Mobile marketing Mobile offers and deals from retailers and third-party services such as Groupon and others were a big phenomenon in 2011. Next year, banks will be looking to cash in on the opportunity here by providing local offers via their mobile banking apps. Bank customers will be able to opt-in to the service so they can receive offers via the mobile banking app when they walk past a local business making an offer and redeem the offer via the app as well. In the past, banks have been reluctant to allow other business to market to their customers but because of the personal nature of a mobile phone and the ability to serve offers based on a customer’s location, this is starting to change. “We see this as a huge opportunity for banks to start making money through the mobile channel as offers are redeemed,” Malauzai’s Mr. Gaynor said “We feel it can be pulled off in an unobtrusive, value-added way.”
  • Customized apps Currently, a lot of banks have one mobile app for all of their customers. However, next year there will be a growing number of customized banking apps that are tailored to the needs of a specific customer group. For example, regional banks could customize apps based on which local market a customer belongs to. Or, an app could be customized to the needs of college students, who often have a different set of services available to them. “The first generation of mobile apps lost some of the customization found in Internet banking but now we are seeing more customized mobile experiences,” Mr. Gaynor said. “This is an example of how mobile banking is getting smarter and banks are trying to deliver a better mobile experience,” he said.
D'coda Dcoda

Badgeville & Janrain: Turning Serious Games Players Into Loyal Brand Advocates [29Apr11] - 0 views

seriousgamesmarket.blogspot.com/...e-janrain-turning-serious.html

6GEO

shared by D'coda Dcoda on 27 May 11 - No Cached
  • “After carefully weighing our options for building a social rewards solution in-house versus integrating with a best in class technology provider, we selected Badgeville, a recognized leader in the space, for their comprehensive, lightweight and flexible platform,” said Larry Drebes, CEO, Janrain.
  • Badgeville jumped onto the scene when they won “Audience Choice” at TechCrunch last fall. Within two quarters they’ve captured 50 clients for their “white label” social rewards, loyalty and analytics platform.
  • Badgeville helps web publishers of all sizes increase audience engagement and unlock new monetization opportunities. The Palo Alto– based company provides platform that makes it easy for web publishers, to increase user loyalty and engagement. 
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  • Badgeville aspires to democratize the Foursquare experience beyond retail by enabling publishers and other segments to build their own game mechanics and incentives platforms.
  • Publishers who use Badgeville can set up an account, offer defined rewards and track visitor behavior with realtime analytics. Badgeville works for any company that has a community on its site: anyone from gaming to education, to retail and more can use the service to reward people for checking into a site, taking tests or simply browsing through products. Virtually anything can correspond to a badge reward.
  • “It’s not about pageviews anymore.” Publishers can award badges for the behavior of their choice, such as leaving a comment or becoming a fan of the site on Facebook. Readers can also compare their results to friends’ on social networks like Facebook.”
Marc-Alexandre Gagnon

Gamification on intranets: the risks of playing along « Adoption « ClearBox C... - 0 views

www.clearboxconsulting.co.uk/ets-the-risks-of-playing-along

shared by Marc-Alexandre Gagnon on 25 Sep 11 - No Cached
  • But points and badgest are a very basic “carrot” approach. Pink says that in the main carrots and sticks don’t work except for basic repetitive tasks where there is little intrinsic motivation.
  • For anything involving knowledge or creativity, what matters is: Autonomy – deciding how and when to do things Mastery – the reward in gaining a skill and learning Purpose – the sense that the task is part of a greater goal.
  • What concerns me is that points and badges are none of the above, they are just  extrinsic motivation.
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  • Generally, when simple rewards are offered in return for acts that should have intrinsic rewards, people start to forget the real reason they are sharing and optimize their game-based scores instead. For example, instead of giving 1 comprehensive answer, they give 3 partial answers for 3x the points. Or people may withhold answers until they can maximize their points – ceasing to co-operate.
  • 2) Where mastery developed in the game is a re-usable skill.
  • Differentials in reward can de-motivate the many to the benefit of the few. Just as high salaries for the top 5% can breed resentment in the other 95% and make them less productive, so can an element of competition can switch off the masses who feel their efforts won’t make a difference to the leader board, even if it would have made a difference to  the real-world problem on the Q&A forum.
  • 1) Making intrinsically dull tasks more interesting.
  • Usually games are rewarding for a while and then people tire of them – they hold limited appeal for mastery. If you’ve made it central to your collaboration approach and this happens, then what?
  • 3) Where the only purpose you can offer is recognition
  • I hope as the field matures some good case studies emerge, but for now  if you want employees to share knowledge or collaborate more effectively, then games are low on purpose, irrelevant at best to autonomy (and at worst they may get in the way) and may also suppress creative thinking.
Marc-Alexandre Gagnon

Gamification - Richard Baxter at Distilled's SearchLove - State of Search [25Oct11] - 0 views

www.stateofsearch.com/u-richard-baxter-at-searchlove

shared by Marc-Alexandre Gagnon on 26 Oct 11 - No Cached
  • Get Glue:
  • In their first three months, 1 million users, 100 million data points and shipped out thousands and thousands of stickers. Amazing, but how on earth are they making profit? Because it’s an advertising platform and collecting information on demographics, popularity, etc. and providing the entertainment industry with amazing data – sold.
  • SEOmoz
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  • “The point system has dramatically improved engagement + contribution on Moz. We’ve grown community content 200%+ in the past 24 months.”
  • Step 1: You need points.
  • But points are meaningless without a leader board.
  • Step 2: You need a leaderboard to get people’s competitive spirit out and allow them to compare and be compared against others.
  • Salesforce does the same with Nitro by gamifying real life. Sales guys get stats to see what they’re doing well, awards them with points and badges but it also lets them compare to others.
  • We can also use game mechanics to help people learn how to use our products – Richard mentions Ribbon Hero 2 where clippy teaches you how to use Microsoft Office products. Rather than having him jump up when it thinks you need help (as was the case back in the day) you have challenges to help clippy fix his CV, etc. Your userbase is having fun and you’re helping them learn about your product.
  • Encourage users to hand over data - it makes us smarter marketers.
  • Who does this? LinkedIn with the goals and “profile completeness” – SEOmoz does the same thing.
  • Badges?
  • Rich doesn’t know that Foursquare should work but the beauty of it is that does. Rich thinks this has to do with velocity and the fact that it makes quite boring stuff exciting and PR worthy – not knowing when a reward is coming and the fact that they come almost at random is what Rich feels makes this work.
  • Virtual Currency/Goods
  • If you have a crappy product it really doesn’t matter.
  • What could we do/take away from this?
  • Gamification for Good – IMOK, a checkin platform for kids. Connected just from one phone to the other and checking in lets the parent know they’re ok.
  • Reward with Status- top contributors in Webmaster forums will get flown out to Google and learn all sorts of things.
  • Create signups/sales with loss aversion
  • Help people drive their business
  • Generate Reviews- badge and point system for heavy users?
  • Increase signups
  • Reward for Gifting
  • Reward for Uplaoding Content
  • Generate links
  • Increase social shares
  • Motivate internally to do the same - get your inhouse team to answer FAQ type questions and reward them for their interaction and points.
Marc-Alexandre Gagnon

Adding Gamification to Your Community | Social Media Today [25Oct11] - 0 views

socialmediatoday.com/...ng-gamification-your-community

shared by Marc-Alexandre Gagnon on 26 Oct 11 - No Cached
  • It is interesting to see gamification now being applied in a marketing/website/community context, because many marketers and community managers have already been using these techniques to build engagement for several years.
  • there are many ways to incorporate game mechanics into a community and which ones are appropriate depend a lot on the make-up of your community audience and what the ultimate goals for the community are.
  • my belief is that you need to gradually introduce new elements into a community and make sure that any new features are fully explained and documented.
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  • According to a definition in the Gamification Wiki,"Game Mechanics are constructs of rules and feedback loops intended to produce enjoyable gameplay."
  • Before you can add gamification to your community, you need to really understand your community.
  • Recency -- when was the last visit? Frequency -- how often does the member visit? Duration -- how long do members stay on the sight when they visit? Virality -- how often do members share content on the site?  and how much is their sharing amplified through their network? Ratings -- how often do members rate content on the site?
  • Community Goals
  • What goals are you trying to accomplish with the community?  Can you measure them?  Do you have any elements of gamification incorporated into your community today? Does your community platform support gamification elements?  Can you track your measures in your community system?
  • Measures of Engagement for a Community
  • Do you have an open or closed community?  Is your community a professional, social, support, informational, hybrid or something else community?  How do you want members to use the community?  How many members do you have and how many do you add in a typical week or month?  What is the typical member profile?  How engaged are your community members?  How do you measure engagement?  What motivates your members to join, participate and stay engaged in the community?  Do you have robust member profiles?  Are member profiles searchable?  Can members 'friend' or message other members?  Do you have a way for members to add their Twitter or Facebook accounts to their profiles?  How  easy is it for members to share content on other sites?
  • Suggestions for Community Gamification
  • Robust profile system [self-expression, status, achievement]-
  • I also want members to receive recognition for their achievements by earning badges that can be displayed on their profiles and announced via their social networks.  As a community manager, I want to be able to create different types of badges including limited edition or special occasion badges.
  • Point system [competition, achievement, reward, status] -
  • I definitely want to keep track of points, but I want to be able to customize the calculation of the points.  I don't know what the ideal point values would be, but I know that I would want to experiment with rewarding members for recent visits, the frequency and duration of their visits, their sharing of content on the site or in their social networks, creating content, participating in discussions or rating content.
  • Leaderboards [reward, status, achievement, recognition, competition] -
  • Customization is also important in the leaderboards.  I want to have multiple leaderboard; for example, I may want a weekly, monthly and all-time versions of the leaderboard that I will post in different parts of the community site to recognize leaders who are currently contributing the most to the community experience and to others who have been long time contributors.
  • Badges [status, achievement, reward, recognition, competition, self-expression]
  • First of all, the member profile system needs to be robust with the option to upload a picture and have free form bio descriptive fields.  Most importantly, I should be able to link my profile to my Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn profiles and possibly use single-sign-on use those services.  The profiles should also keep a history of a user's activity, badges and points.  Another requirement for the profile system is that members should be able to create virtual friendships or groups within the community site.
  • Content ratings have been around for awhile, and they are an important part of increasing engagement.  I would push the envelop further by making it easier for users to share their content ratings and to search for content based on the rating.
  • Content rating [altruism, self-expression] -
  • Content sharing [altruism, self-expression] -
  • Members must be able to easily share content they like within their social networks, via bookmarking sites and by email.
  • Challenges [competition, reward, achievement]
  • As a phase 2 implementation, I would also want to add some custom challenges to my community to drive additional engagement.  I am not sure what form these would take, but I would start thinking about how to incorporate challenges while implementing the other elements noted above.
Marc-Alexandre Gagnon

Dunkin' Donuts Rewards Foursquare & Facebook Places Check-Ins With Sweepstake Prizes @P... - 0 views

www.psfk.com/...ns-with-sweepstake-prizes.html

6GEO

shared by Marc-Alexandre Gagnon on 07 Dec 11 - No Cached
  • Dunkin’ Donuts is rewarding loyal customers with prizes in a new campaign that uses Foursquare and Facebook Places. “Get GifteD’D” runs through to December 23rd at Dunkin’ Donuts locations in New York, New Jersey and Connecticut. Users can check-in up to three times each day (at least an hour apart) for the chance to win prizes.
  • If they win, they are sent an email with instructions about how to redeem their prize. Each time someone checks-in, they are also entered into a sweepstake to win the grand prize of a $1,000 gift card and a Travelpro luggage package.
  • Through the campaign, Dunkin’ Donuts is giving away more than 1,780 instant prizes including gift cards from 1800Flowers, Mountain Creek and Pinstripe Bowl, coffee and Dunkin’ Donuts merchandise. Cathy Chavenet, New York-based field marketing manager at Dunkin’ Donuts, said: Mobile check-in programs like Facebook and Foursquare present an opportunity to reward Dunkin’ Donuts’ loyal fans by doing something they are already doing – visiting Dunkin’ Donuts. The goal of the check-in, Get GifteDD program in particular, is to give our loyal guests a chance to win great prizes every day, just by checking into Facebook or Foursquare while at our restaurants in New York.
Marc-Alexandre Gagnon

How Amex, Foursquare, and Others Advanced the Digital Wallet in 2011 | ClickZ - 0 views

www.clickz.com/...e-advanced-digital-wallet-2011

3BT_NFC mobile payments

shared by Marc-Alexandre Gagnon on 27 Dec 11 - No Cached
  • The so-called digital wallet made important strides in 2011, sometimes eliminating the logistical need for paper vouchers, mobile apps, QR codes, and even cell phones.
  • At times this transition seems to be sneaking up on us. Earlier this month, thousands of merchants nationwide didn't know they had gained foot traffic and sales thanks to American Express and Foursquare. Amex rewarded consumers who synced their credit cards with their Foursquare accounts with $10 back if they spent the same at local businesses after checking in with the geo-social app. That effort followed up a successful post-Black Friday stint dubbed "Small Business Saturday," when Amex users checking in on Foursquare could get a $25 credit if they spent $25 with a local merchant.
  • Jake Furst, a business development director at New York-based Foursquare, said there was little to no organizational outreach to local businesses. "The merchants didn't necessarily know what was happening as we drove customers to their locations," he explained. "Small Business Saturday was a huge success. We got a ton of interest from Foursquare users and Amex card holders that didn't know about Foursquare yet."
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  • While the aforementioned offers have expired, merchants can set up new Foursquare check-in deals via Amex's "Go Social" self-service center for SMBs.
  • Here's how the Amex-Foursquare marriage works for consumers: Sync Amex card with Foursquare account online. Check in at a location. Tap a "redeem offer" button. Pay with Amex card. Get a Foursquare push notification about the money-back reward (see image) within moments after the card is swiped by the merchant.
  • Swipely has begun working with 150 merchants in Boston, its launch market. The start-up offers consumers the chance to sync a credit card to its loyalty program. From there, whenever they spend money at a participating merchant, they can receive a reward or discount. Swipely supplies local businesses with point-of-sale signage and materials to promote the program.
  • Angus Davis, Swipely CEO, said his product should attract consumers and businesses alike because of its usability. There's no need for a smartphone app, much less a printed voucher, he said, in order for shoppers to get rewarded for retail store visits.
  • "Consumers don't have to change the way they behave in order to check in," Davis said. "Nor do they have to change the way they pay by scanning a QR code [or] using newfangled technology. Our program employs technology that everyone already has and uses."
  • He added, "For the local merchant, the program doesn't require any changes in the store. They don't have to upgrade hardware, install software, implement any special cards, or re-train their staff."
  • The 33-year-old CEO said his company would expand to New York, San Francisco, and other major cities in the first half of the upcoming year. "I do think that 2012 is a very ripe time for disruption," Davis said, "especially as the payment space interacts with Main Street merchants."
  • Other noteworthy developments as digital wallets came into focus during 2011: March/April:Groupon and LivingSocial launch "GrouponNow" and "Instant Deals", respectively, which allow consumers to buy time-sensitive offers with one click on their smart phones. To use the mobile commerce feature, users need to input their credit cards into their daily deals accounts. May 9: Scvngr struck a partnership with American Express to make redeeming LevelUp deals easier for consumers. Amex members who buy the deals need only use their cards while making a purchase to get the discount. As is the case with Swipely, it's not necessary to show the store clerk a paper voucher, barcode, or message on a mobile screen. May 26: Google introduced Google Wallet, which lets consumers pay for Google Offers and other items through their Google account. The Wallet mobile app works with credit card users for Citi, MasterCard, and First Data. Aug. 1: Verizon partnered with Amex to serve as the mobile carrier's digital wallet platform. The telecom was one of the first in its competitive space to create its own digital wallet.
Marc-Alexandre Gagnon

Finextra: PayPal aims to become your digital ID; unveils new bank, vendor, currency par... - 0 views

www.finextra.com/...fullstory.aspx

3BT_NFC mobile payments

shared by Marc-Alexandre Gagnon on 06 Feb 12 - No Cached
  • PayPal has taken the wraps off its single sign-on digital identity service for online shopping, PayPal Access. The move comes as the San Jose-based payments operator unveils a series of new partnerships with a host of banking technology suppliers at the BAI Retail delivery show in Chicago.
  • PayPal Access is designed to simplify the checkout process by enabling the company's 100 million account holders to sign in at participating retailers' sites with just their PayPal user name and password.
  • The initiative is a key element of X.Commerce, a new division of PayPal parent company eBay, that aims to provide a common set of APIs for building consumer-facing online merchant services.
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  • Commenting on PayPal Access, Damon Hougland, general manager of identity & informatics, X.commerce, says: "Results from early adopters show that consumers are more willing to engage with merchants because they can use their PayPal account to check out instead of having to deal with the hassle of entering name, address and payment information. This has huge implications for mobile commerce and merchant sales among new and existing customers."
  • Separately, PayPal is introducing a series of new relationships with banking technology suppliers as it bids to make it easier for banks to incorporate its services into their offerings. This morning it announced a partnership with NCR and S1 that enables people to make real-time person-to-person payments from cash machines.
  • Other vendors lined up for the PayPal treatment include mobile outfit mFoundry, account opening specialist MeridienLink, community banking vendor BanVue, and airmiles operator ezRezSoftware. The latter partnership envisages the creation of an application that would enable consumers to convert their airmiles points into cash for spending on the Web.
  • Dan Schatt, general manager of financial innovations at PayPal, explains: "With this partnership, airline and other reward programme members will have access to the entire 'catalogue' of merchandise the Internet offers by using their rewards anywhere PayPal is accepted."
  • Set for take-off in 2012, United Airlines' frequent flyer programme, will be the first rewards scheme to allow PayPal account holders to use miles as a currency.
Marc-Alexandre Gagnon

Wikets, The Social Commerce App With $1.5M In Funding, Rewards Users For Recommendation... - 0 views

techcrunch.com/...ards-users-for-recommendations

shared by Marc-Alexandre Gagnon on 08 Nov 11 - No Cached
  • In September, Wikets, Inc., announced it had raised $1.5 million from venture firms Andreessen Horowitz and Battery Ventures, as well as from six angel investors, to build a new iPhone application that allows users to rate products and share those recommendations with friends. Today, the app has gone live in iTunes.
  • The resulting product is deceptively simple. You make a recommendation, optionally share it with friends via Facebook or Twitter, and then get rewarded in the form of points that can be later turned in for gift cards at online merchants.
  • At launch, Wikets lets you recommend products from its featured partners and from 60 major retailers, including iTunes (music and apps), Etsy, eBay, Amazon, Best Buy, The Home Depot, Wine.com, and others, as well as any place you can pull up on Yelp or Foursquare. You can also scan a product’s barcode, if you choose.
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  • In order to encourage usage, Wikets doles out points for your recommendations, other in-app activity, and, most importantly, your purchases. (100 points = $1.00 USD). These points can later be redeemed for gift cards from select merchants.
  • In the app’s main stream, which includes all the recommendations on the service, there’s a search button to find recommendations from others or to find users by name, plus filters for popular recommendations, nearby recommendations and recommended people. As you browse through this stream, discovering new content, you can tap a button to add items to your wishlist or strike up a conversation around the item in question through a comments feature.
Marc-Alexandre Gagnon

Does Facebook hold the future of mobile payments in its hands? - Mobile Commerce Daily ... - 0 views

www.mobilecommercedaily.com/...f-mobile-payments-in-its-hands

3BT_NFC mobile payments

shared by Marc-Alexandre Gagnon on 06 Feb 12 - No Cached
  • With more than 200 million mobile users, Facebook and its currency platform Credits is poised to be the future of how we pay for both virtual and physical goods.
  • Right now there are various different technologies and start-ups actively looking at ways to penetrate the mobile payments market. Each company has taken a different approach, from digital bar codes to near field communication (NFC).
  • Introduced in May of 2009, Facebook Credits was originally designed as a virtual currency to allow people to make purchases within games and non-gaming applications on the Facebook platform.
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  • Much like Apple with iTunes, Facebook takes a 30 percent cut on every dollar spent through the Credits platform.
  • Today users can buy Credits with 15 currencies, including U.S. dollars, Euros, the British Pound and the Venezuelan Bolivar.
  • It is important to first highlight, that for any mobile payments system to work, consumers will need to open some form of application to allow users to connect the phone to complete the payment. 
  • To date, Facebook sees over 200 million unique users accessing the social network through a mobile devices each month.
  • Almost all of the major brands who would adopt mobile payments in the beginning (i.e. Best Buy, Gap, Target) have invested heavily into growing a Facebook presence. It is this ability to connect to users and their social graph through a Facebook payment option that makes Credits and mobile payments an attractive model.
  • From this point, it is Facebook’s network that makes its payment option so attractive. As I scan my phone to finalize my purchase, I am presented with the option to share this purchase with my friends. Selecting yes, opens up an additional discount for my friends and I. From there my friends have the option to use the promotion through Best Buy’s ecommerce page or on location.
  • For now, Facebook prefers to play down talk of its broader ambitions for Credits. The 30 percent tax Facebook imposes on those who accept Credits might be too high to allow for the regular sale physical goods and services.
  • Other big players include PayPal who has more than 81 million active registered accounts and 210 million accounts, in 190 markets and it supported 24 currencies.
  • Google, with its Google Checkout and Android phones is also set to be a big player. With NFC technology being implemented on all future Google phones, we expect a mobile payment app preloaded on these phones. 
  • Probably an even bigger player is Apple and its 100 million iTunes users. The iPhone is set to be the main phone to drive mobile payments, even if other phones offer these features. But one thing is for sure: the mobile (social) payments market will be fragmented for the first few years and Facebook is easily in the position to come out victorious.
  • While analysts feel 2011 is the year for mobile payments, there is still uncertainty of how quickly consumers will move their wallet to a digital format or what platform they will use. 
  • One factor that is definite is the speed at which small business will adapt mobile transactions.
  • Third-party companies such as Bling Nation and Square to name a few win over merchants by cutting the transaction process fee by as much as 50 percent. With consumers swiping their debits cards more so than ever, this is a huge savings for any company.
  • Additionally, the three major U.S wireless carriers, Verizon Wireless, AT&T and T-Mobile partnered with Discover Card to form a mobile payment company called “Isis,” a venture to provide mobile payment carrier billing solution for payments.
  • The closet form of mobile payments in the U.S. that can be utilized nationally is the Starbucks digital gift card. 
  • While this option only applies to Starbucks stores, consumers can now makes purchases by scanning their phones.
  • The biggest challenge, currently keeping mobile payments from going mainstream is technology adoption. 
  • Not only do consumers need to carry a phone that has the correct technology, retailers also need to implement technology that connects with the phone.
  • Other challenges that could cause slow growth are the number of companies attempting to break into the space. 
  • From small start-ups to large tech companies such as Google and Apple, many consumers could be slow to adopt as they wait it out and see which platform becomes widely adopted.
  • To truly accelerate growth, we believe a large company needs to step up and look at the opportunity as a way to break into the $6.2 trillion retail market by covering the costs of technology adoption.
  • One player who is seen to have this ability is Apple. 
  • As the largest tech company in the world, rumors have come up, that Apple will implement NFC technology into the next generation iPhone 5 and with 100 million users already connected through iTunes, giving away the retail technology to scan mobile payments could be a quick way to gain accelerated usage.
  • Though it cannot be applied to all of your purchases, Starbucks seems to be the furthest along, allowing customers to purchase digital gift cards that can be scanned at all Starbuck locations nationwide.
  • To help accelerate growth, implementing a rewards program will draw more consumers to try the new payment platform.  This option to collect and track rewards is one of the key features that have helped Starbucks see quicker adoption.
Marc-Alexandre Gagnon

American Express Launches $100M Fund To Invest In Digital Commerce Startups | TechCrunch - 0 views

techcrunch.com/...t-in-digital-commerce-startups

3BT_NFC mobile payments

shared by Marc-Alexandre Gagnon on 08 Nov 11 - No Cached
  • Recently, American Express has been pushing its own internal digital commerce initiatives including the company’s digital wallet, Serve. Serve integrates a variety of payment options into a single account that can be funded from a bank account, debit, credit or charge card. AmEx also announced a number of recent partnerships in the payments space include Foursquare, Facebook and even Zynga for personalized deals. But today, the financial company is reaching beyond its own internal payments projects to launch a $100 million fund to invest in startups and companies in the digital commerce space.
  • The digital commerce initiative will make investments in a number of areas involving the digital commerce experience, including loyalty and rewards, mobile and online payment management, fee-based services, security and fraud detection and data analysis.
  • “The payments industry is undergoing a fundamental change as the very nature of commerce is redefined,” he explains. “This fund is designed to encourage innovation in the payments space.”
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  • AmEx has previously invested in a number of technology companies such as Clickable, Rearden Commerce, and Payfone but this is the first formalized fund established by the company.
Marc-Alexandre Gagnon

Starbucks launches mobile payments app - Marketing news - Marketing magazine [24Nov11] - 0 views

www.marketingmagazine.co.uk/...1105810

3BT_NFC mobile payments

shared by Marc-Alexandre Gagnon on 24 Nov 11 - No Cached
  • Starbucks, the coffee chain, is installing a mobile payment system in the form of an iPhone app into 700 of its outlets across the UK and Ireland, following a successful US roll-out.
  • The Starbucks app will be available for iPhone and iPod Touch users from 5 January and allows consumers to pay for their items through their phone with the aim to reduce transaction time by around 10 seconds.
  • Consumers who own a registered Starbucks Card, part of the chain’s loyalty programme, will be able to link the balance on their reward card to the Starbucks app.
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  • Brian Waring, vice president, marketing and category, Starbucks UK and Ireland, said: "Customers want to be served quickly, but fewer want to use cash.
  • Starbucks first launched the app in the US earlier this year across 6,800 stores, which have since processed more than 20 million mobile transactions.
  • Each consumer with a reward card will be given a unique barcode that will appear on the app and can be scanned at the till.
  • "We wanted to find a way for them to pay in the quickest way possible. Because our customers want it, we have created our own custom-built mobile payment technology rather than waiting for the near field communication technology which is currently not widely available.
  • "We're always thinking of new ways to add value to our customers and give them more reasons to choose Starbucks."
  • Starbucks teamed up with Apple in October this year to launch a digital initiative called "Pick of the week", offering its customers a free selected iTunes music track or book to download.
D'coda Dcoda

Timberland and Geocaching launch Location-based event ''the Trail of Heroes'' in Europe... - 0 views

www.mmdnewswire.com/timberland-41738.html

6GEO

shared by D'coda Dcoda on 19 May 11 - No Cached
  • The series of events will be launching in Paris, Brussels, Madrid, London, Milan and Berlin on the 18th of May, the aim of this high-tech outdoor treasure hunt is to encourage people to rediscover the environmental treasures hidden in these great cities by harnessing every day technology in their search for geocaches, rewards and fun. For all those taking part the rewards are multiple: besides the satisfaction of discovering beautiful outdoor locations, the geocaches, the give-aways and the joy of adventure, Timberland is offering a hiking trip to Iceland
  • D'coda Dcoda on 19 May 11
     
    Merging key values of eco-friendly,love of the outdoors and adventure with mobile LBS technology
D'coda Dcoda

5 awesome ways brands are using location-based marketing [25May11] - 0 views

mohamedtazi.com/blog

6GEO

shared by D'coda Dcoda on 26 May 11 - No Cached
  • roughly 30 percent more individuals in the U.S. carry a smart phone than buy a daily newspaper.
  • New York Public Library In a move that embodies the public intellectual history of America and the perfect application of social media, the New York Public Library plans to celebrate its centennial smart phone style.
  • It recently launched a “Find the Future” Foursquare badge that encourages and rewards exploration of public libraries in New York City. It transforms visitors into library ambassadors who, via location-based check-ins, end up promoting library services, programs, and collections to their Foursquare friends.
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  • Badge winners get a one-year Foursquare Friends Membership at the library that comes with exclusive member-only perks such as the opportunity to win free NYPL event tickets and participate in behind-the-scenes tours
  • The library has also designed an app-based overnight scavenger hunt called “Find the Future: The Game.” On May 20, 500 pre-registered participants will complete tasks during a special launch event, before the game goes live to the public on May 21. The tasks encourage players to explore the library and historical objects such as the Declaration of Independence.
  • JetBlue Airways In January 2011, JetBlue Airways became the first U.S. airline to announce an integration between their frequent flyer rewards program and Facebook Places. JetBlue GoPlaces participants receive 25 TrueBlue frequent flyer points every time they check in to an official JetBlue airport location using Facebook Places. Those who accumulate 5,000 or more points can trade them in for free flights. While this is not exactly immediate gratification — it takes 200 airport check ins to earn a free flight — it’s still noteworthy.
D'coda Dcoda

YellowBrck Launches New Free Location-Based Social Network Mobile App for Moms & Dads [... - 0 views

www.prweb.com/...prweb8410361.htm

6GEO

shared by D'coda Dcoda on 17 May 11 - No Cached
  • at http://www.yellowbrck.com. Email PDF Print New York, NY (PRWEB) May 12, 2011 YellowBrck is a new location-based social network mobile application created for moms and dads on the go. By downloading the free YellowBrck iPhone/iPad app in the App Store, parents can easily share their activities and locations with friends and other parents, as well as score special savings incentives from retailers. YellowBrck was created as a way to connect parents, help them share tips on ways to keep their children entertained, and learn about the latest family spots and events nationwide. By checking into YellowBrck on a regular basis, users are able to earn discounts and rewards from their favorite retailers. YellowBrck empha
  • is a new location-based social network mobile application created for moms and dads on the go. By downloading the free YellowBrck iPhone/iPad app in the App Store, parents can easily share their activities and locations with friends and other parents, as well as score special savings incentives from retailers. YellowBrck was created as a way to connect parents, help them share tips on ways to keep their children entertained, and learn about the latest family spots and events nationwide. By checking into YellowBrck on a regular basis, users are able to earn discounts and rewards from their favorite retailers. YellowBrck emphasizes the social aspect, allowing parents to meet up with nearby parents, keep tabs on what activities their friends are doing, and discover family-friendly places in their neighborhood. An impromptu playdate at the park or a last-minute trip to the museum is easily shared on YellowBrck for others to join in. Parents are also able to check-in for everyday tasks pre-listed on the app, including potty training and getting dressed, with the chance to “win” virtual stickers and real world savings from online and brick & mortar retailers, including Totsy, Ecomom, Dapple, Abe’s Market, Torly Kid, and many more.
Marc-Alexandre Gagnon

ePayments Week: Will NFC add value? - O'Reilly Radar [29Sep11] - 0 views

radar.oreilly.com/...zon-fire-mobile-broadband.html

shared by Marc-Alexandre Gagnon on 30 Sep 11 - No Cached
  • Square's chief operating officer Keith Rabois went against the grain this week and questioned whether there was any value to be had by implementing near-field communications (NFC) for mobile payments.
  • He may have a point that the particular technology matters less than the mobile wallet itself.
  • To name just three: Merchants can administer reward and loyalty programs more efficiently if they're managed through phones rather than on rubber-stamped cards. Merchants can deliver location- and time-specific coupons if they are acquainted with a customer's phone. Placecast is showing how you can deliver offers within a geofenced area. Merchants will also have the opportunity to move discounts quickly if they need to clear inventory. All of that is theoretically possible today with Twitter, but first you have to get them to follow you. Once someone has paid with their phone, presumably it's a lower barrier to get them to agree to receive offers via that phone. Merchants can dynamically steer customers to their best payment option. If PayPal offers a lower percentage for a period than the merchant's credit card service, the merchant can offer products or services at a discount and let the customers choose on their devices.
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  • Merchants can administer reward and loyalty programs more efficiently if they're managed through phones rather than on rubber-stamped cards.
  • Merchants can deliver location- and time-specific coupons if they are acquainted with a customer's phone.
  • Merchants can dynamically steer customers to their best payment option.
  • it's our data that we'll be giving up in exchange for being on the receiving end of those benefits listed above
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