ARCHIVES: This is legacy content from before Marketing Dive acquired Mobile Marketer in early 2017. Some information, such as publication dates, may not have migrated over. Check out the new Marketing Dive site for the latest marketing news.

Whole Foods tells customers to eat right with new app

Fancy an organic foods chain telling its own customers to eat healthier? Well, that is exactly the premise of the Whole Foods Market Missions application.

The free application was created in response to the demand for health advice by Whole Foods shoppers. It encompasses healthy eating and exercise tips through simple steps for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch users.

?Branded apps can be integrated into the overall marketing strategy of a retailer such as Whole Foods to increase brand loyalty,? said Mark Beccue, senior analyst for consumer mobility at ABI Research, New York.

?A branded app can increase top-of-mind awareness, keeping consumers engaged with the company, which makes sense,? he said. ?Whole Foods is trying to get someone to come in every week.?

Whole Foods, Austin, TX, is the nation?s largest grocer of natural and organic products.

Smoothie operator
The Market Missions application centers around more than 70 missions encouraging consumers to lead healthier lifestyles.

Missions such as ?Advanced Lettuceness? and ?Smoothie Operator? let consumers complete a progression of healthy steps to earn badges.

Consumers can create a profile to track their badges and favorite tips to share via Facebook, Twitter and email. Tips feature advice on selecting and storing food, nutrition and cooking.

The application also uses the mobile device?s GPS to locate nearby Whole Foods stores.

Whole Foods declined comment on this story.

?I think that Whole Foods has done some very smart things here,? said Augie Ray, San Francisco-based senior analyst for social computing at Forrester Research.

?It?s not just some senseless things like taking a picture of produce,? he said. ?They are supporting the mission of Whole Foods, which is having their customers live a healthier lifestyle.?

?People are going to play games because they have an affinity towards the brand. Whole Foods has created a game around something people care about, like improving their health.?

Hold foods
Fourteen percent of online adults are playing social games, according to Forrester. Consumers ages 18-24 are three times more likely to play than those ages 55-66, and women are likelier to play social games than men.

?This is not a program that will appeal to a very wide swath of their consumers,? Mr. Ray said.

?What?s important for marketers to understand is that [14 percent] is not necessarily a small number, but that?s not a significant portion of a general number,? he said. ?Women are more likely to be a portion of gamers than men.?

?This is the sort of marketing tactic that will appeal to young, generally female people. It depends on how much sharing is involved. There seems to be a tendency toward reporting your location. If what they want to do is appeal to a younger, maybe more female audience, they can do that. ?
That said, the target for this latest effort is not immediately obvious to some.

?In terms of Whole Foods? target demographic [for the Missions? application], I am not overly familiar with its sweet spot,? ABI?s Mr. Beccue said. ?Whole Foods is a premium and a natural food store?that?s not always the people who are out trying to go out and lose weight.

?Maybe they are not trying to reach all of their core customers,? he said. ?Maybe this is just kind of an outreach.?

Whole Foods? more than 270 stores nationwide and in Britain offer organic and natural groceries. 

Brands sold within Whole Foods include Wellspring Company, Bread & Circus, Mrs. Gooch?s, Fresh Fields, Bread of Life, Amrion, Merchant of Vino, Allegro Coffee, Wholepeople.com, Nature?s Heartland, Food for Thought, Harry?s Farmers Market, Select Fish, Fresh & Wild and Wild Oats Markets.

Here is a screen grab of the application:

Super marketing
The company launched its first iPhone application, Whole Foods Market Recipes last year. That application lets consumers create meals based around special diets such as gluten-free or vegan, and with ingredients they have on-hand.

With the Market Recipes application, consumers can search through recipes by categories such as ?Budget? and ?Cooking with Kids? and build shopping lists based on them.

However, the Whole Foods Market Missions application may not have mass appeal.

?The Missions app is used very personally, so I think personal motivation to get the badges would work for brand engagement,? ABI?s Mr. Beccue said.

?The part that I would be skeptical about is the bragging rights,? he said. ?How likely are people to share what they are doing with a community which doesn?t even know them? It seems like kind of a stretch.?

Here is another screen grab of the application:

Forrester?s Mr. Ray agreed that Whole Foods may not generate a large audience for the Market Missions application.

?If they want to create more buzz, there?s not a lot of marketers doing this,? Mr. Ray said.

?What we shouldn?t expect is huge numbers of people to be playing this game,? he said. ?Whole Foods knows this is going to be a niche audience and this will meet the expectations of this niche audience.?