14 DAY TRIAL // B2C mobile messaging company Outspoken has announced that its mobile marketing platform is now a supporter of Apple’s Passbook application that stores airline boarding passes, coupons, movie tickets, loyalty cards, and gift cards, with the ability to access and redeem passes. The company has some interesting numbers to share about Apple’s e-commerce tool.
Thanks to the new Passbook integration, Outspoken clients will now be able to send coupons, gift cards, boarding passes, and more directly to their own customers via MMS or SMS.
Since the pass can be customized by location, it will dynamically open up on the device when a consumer reaches the relevant destination, such as an airport or a particular restaurant.
A form of e-commerce, Passbook is ranked as the fourth most popular commerce application on smartphones, according to Arbitron, an international media and marketing research firm. Passbook comes pre-installed with every iOS 7 device, including iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad.
Arbitron says in a report released earlier this week that “Passbook [...] was the number four mobile app, used by 8.1 percent of the Arbitron Mobile smartphone panelists.”
The company also found that Apple’s solution, when compared to similar mobile-commerce tools, “garnered far less average time in use and far fewer sessions than apps that include the ability to search for something to buy.”
For comparison, eBay is the most used mobile app, with a 14.3 percent share. Cybershoppers use the app in 34.6 sessions for an average of one hour and 48 minutes.
James Citron, president of Outspoken, said, “Passbook’s rapid growth demonstrates that consumers want to receive valuable offers and store useful information, like boarding passes and loyalty cards, on their mobile devices.”
“Starting today, merchants can now reach all of their customers with Passbook offers because passes can now be delivered via Outspoken’s SMS and MMS messaging platform, which reaches 98 percent of United States consumers,” added Citron.
Outspoken’s Passbook offering is unique in that it doesn’t require a specific application download by a consumer, providing the greatest reach of any Passbook offering available today, the company says.
“We are living in a digital era, where mobile coupons have a 10-to-1 redemption rate over traditional coupons, and people lose interest with each extra click it takes to get the information they want,” Citron continued.
“Outspoken’s Passbook offering provides a streamlined experience for both brands and consumers alike, yielding increased mobile engagement and commerce for brands, and a simpler way for consumers to receive and access the information they care about,” the Outspoken executive concluded.