Coca-Cola, Chevrolet mobilize print ads for better tracking

By Giselle Tsirulnik

July 1, 2008

Snapshot of the future

Coca-Cola Co., GNC and General Motors Corp.'s Chevrolet have made their print ads in Men's Health magazine measurable using mobile.

The brands are using SnapTell's Snap.Send.Get platform to make their print ads interactive in the July Men's Health. Once consumers snap a picture of the ad and send it to SnapTell, they get a message back with product information, special offers and links to Web sites. All ads in that issue are SnapTell-enabled.

"Men's Health's objective is to make their print advertising measurable, enabling a clearer articulation of the value of print advertising to their advertisers," said Ameen Ahmad, vice president of product marketing at SnapTell, Palo Alto, CA.

Men's Health is a fitness, health and lifestyle magazine geared to men age 18-34 - exactly the demographic that is mobile-savvy and likely to use technology to satisfy curiosity.

Coca-Cola is using the Snap.Send.Get platform to promote its Powerade Zero. Readers get a mobile coupon that they can redeem for a free week at Powerade Zero fitness partner 24 Hour Fitness. The ad uses an MMS short code on AT&T's network.

GNC's ad asks readers to sign up to receive $5 off a $35 purchase at http://www.gnc.com and get exclusive offers, promotions and the latest health information on their mobile phones.

Chevrolet's motor division asks readers to snap a photo of the ad and send it to a short code to receive a link to a site with information on Chevy Malibu.

Other advertisers include AT&T, Anheuser-Busch, Honda Motors, Louis Vuitton, Quaker Oats, Procter & Gamble Co. and Unilever USA.

"SnapTell's solution adds value to the print advertising itself by offering a great deal of flexibility for marketers to provide instant brand messaging, sales incentives such as product samples and discounts, sweepstakes information and links to Web sites, photos and videos," Mr. Ahmad said.

SnapTell's work for Men's Health comes soon after the company ran a similar, but smaller, effort for Rolling Stone magazine.

Rolling Stone used the Snap.Send.Get mobile platform to convert print ads in its magazine into mobile interactive ads.

Participating advertisers included Allstate Insurance, Canadian Club, DiGiorno For One, Edge Shaving Gel and Discovery Channel. The SnapTell-enabled ads ran in the May 1 issue of Rolling Stone, asking readers to take a picture of the ads with their camera phone to receive customized messages and offers from the advertisers (see story).

Here's how it works.

Using SnapTell's Snap.Send.Get mobile readers can snap a photo of any ad in the magazine with their camera phone and send it to SnapTell to receive an instant promotional message on their handset.

The technology is compatible with all camera phones, does not require special software for downloading advertiser images and is an opt-in service for the reader.

"By extending the footprint of the print ad to the online world, Snap.Send.Get enables print publishes to quantify and show the effectiveness of print advertising, just as online ads," Mr. Ahmad said. "Advertisers can now manage their print advertising in a more effective way.

"The consumer, on the other hand, can easily and instantly access information needed at the right time to make a quick decision and move on with their busy lives," he said.

Comments on "Coca-Cola, Chevrolet mobilize print ads for better tracking"

1. Brett St Clair says:

   July 6, 2008 at 9:11am

   Surely advertising should be using technology to simplify marketing. Snap.tell seems to be a very complicated use of a basic service that has a greater reach than just phones with cameras, on top of that these phones need to be MMS capable and MMS enabled, so the real penetration rate is much lower than if they just used......... SMS i.e. please text this code to 33333 for further information, no need to take a photo and then create the MMS and then send. No need to explain on the print advert the long set of steps required to get the info....
   
   Tut tut, makes me sad when I see Marketers get misled by some technologists just because it looks and sounds cool.