Back-to-SchoolCase Study: 2008MobileBehavior Client: AT&T

Background & Overview

• The Back-to-School (BTS) timeframe represents one of the most significant sources of annual revenue for MobileBehavior client AT&T

• Each year, as AT&T’s Youth and Mobile Marketing Agency-of-Record, MobileBehavior creates and activates a summer-to-fall BTS strategy that includes a mix of online, offline and mobile brand and agency activities designed to: – Increase average revenue per user

– Drive new customer acquisition

– Create and extend relevance for the AT&T brand among youth

– Increase engagement time with AT&T via the handset

Situation Analysis: 2008• Following AT&T’s acquisition of BellSouth and

the call to create resonance for “the new AT&T” among youth during this massive transitioning exercise, AT&T faced growing competitive pressures in areas of value, network reliability/speed and handset selection

• Carriers and MVNOs were creating packages, programs and promotions designed to target underpenetrated youth segments including content creators and thought-leading influencers operating in low overall user count, but high-volume capacity in online social networking sites and virtual worlds

• Music continued to play central role in switching behavior among youth with the need to maintain lead position in this “choice”, content and event-driven category more important than ever

Key BTS Youth Trends and Drivers

• Social networking continued to be a dominant force in shaping teen identity – youth belong to several

• User generated content trending still upward as the medium to broadcast lives of youth online and on mobile

• Virtual worlds & massively multiplayer online gaming were growing in popularity, with specific affinity interests ranging from in-world 3-D object building (Second Life) to simply resonating with a popular TV program (Virtual Laguna Beach)

• Top teen passions at the moment were music, media, gaming, communication and fashion

• Teen girls had emerged as the key communicators, leading in social networks and usage of SMS and MMS

• Teen boys continued to lead the usage of mobile internet, games, and videos

Goals

1. Maintain wireless youth share in the face of competition, high general market churn, and recent Cingular/AT&T merger

2. Spotlight the power of new handsets and applications to youth in new and innovative ways

3. Deliver greater revenue intensity – stimulate usage & adoption of mobile data products

4. Make the new AT&T brand for wireless accessible and relevant to youth

5. Preserve Cingular/AT&T as the “perceived by” leader in key categories among youth: social networking, music, shopping

Strategy

• Permeate the lives of our youth target 24/7

• Leverage key passions including music, entertainment, fashion, and friends on a national and local level

• Create platforms and promotions that give youth the opportunity to both consume, create and share mobile content

• Enhance experiences already important to youth by creating opportunities for them to use AT&T wireless products and services in ways that are meaningful

• Bring the online/offline worlds of today’s young people directly onto the wireless handset

• Create mobile content paths that are easy to navigate (keywords/shortcodes, custom BTS WAP microsites)

• Rapidly develop applications to deliver the online social network experience to the mobile device as youth continue to gravitate toward these properties during BTS

• Leverage highly targeted online, offline and mobile consumer touch-points to ensure influencer targets and content creators further their “niche-to-mass” authority and peer power by becoming AT&T promoters, brand advocates and loyalists

Event Activation

Vans Warped Tour:360 Mobile Integration

Situation

• In 2008 AT&T entered its fifth consecutive year as title sponsor of Vans Warped Tour, a 50-city, 500K attendee, evergreen summer alt rock event series

• “Presented by AT&T” had to be taken further to ensure the full impact of the brand relative to a youth music festival was experienced by youth on and off-site, and ported to the handset as extensively as possible

Strategy

• The Warped device deck was designed by MB to act as the launch point for all BTS activities, creating centralized WAP presence for the event and unique text and photo messaging experiences powered by mobile

• Mobile devices were made the hub of the festival experience, where visitors received event –related content and targeted drive-to-retail local market BTS incentives/unique mobile affinity bundle content purchasing opportunities

Execution

• MB licensed, aggregated and presented all tour content on a single Vans WAP microsite easily accessible via WAP push from a keyword/shortcode path

• Mobile site featured exclusive Warped Tour ringtones, live tones, concert video, Warped photo gallery community pages, LBS applications for tour routing and guide info, band schedules, loyalty program provisioning, and more

• Unique event experiences are activated by AT&T mobile phones, including VIP backstage performances by artists and mobile gaming competitions featuring popular properties like Guitar Hero

Results

• The program generated more than $1MM of revenue from Vans mobile content and experienced a 24% mobile coupon conversion rate during the BTS buying window

• More than 650K text and photo messages were sent and received by concert attendees and fans of the tour

Campus Movie/MusicFest: User Generated Mobile Content

Situation

• Campus MovieFest entered its second year partnership with AT&T/MB in 2008 during BTS

• The 10-month tour was expanded by MB on behalf of AT&T to launch in August and run through the BTS window as students returned to campus and throughout the school year

• MB created an integrated program that positioned AT&T as the enabler to create short films by providing students with the technology and training needed and at no cost to them

Strategy

• Make mobile devices the hub of the film and music festival experience

• Allow visitors to experience event content, receive targeted AT&T BTS product info and exclusive purchase opportunities

• Give youth the opportunity to leverage the AT&T distribution power by featuring the “best of” student-shot content and making it available for purchase to all AT&T customers (rev share w/student filmmakers) on 65MM handsets

Execution

• Streamed the best movies over mobile using AT&T video platform

• Created SMS keywords (MOVIES and MUSIC) to shortcode 2251 to get instant access

• Sold ringtones from performing bands with % of revenue to artists

• Text voting for top films using mobile

• Localized retail offers to drive new customer signups

Results

• Generated more than $250K in incremental user-generated content revenue

• Over 145K SMS messages sent and received on the event community deck

• Over 10K unique video viewing sessions on mobile

Social Networking Sites, Virtual Worlds

& Crowdsourcing

Facebook Developers’ Challenge

Situation• MobileBehavior tapped into the popularity of Facebook and crowdsourcing,

creating a new way for youth to collaborate with AT&T and communicate with each other as they headed back to school

• Facebook had made their mobile and web APIs available to consumers and brands to allow users to develop applications around utility for use on the Facebook property

Strategy• Preserve AT&T as the leader in mobile social networking and utility

applications with established and emerging properties and platforms• Drive new mobile revenue for AT&T by tapping the power of budding

developer communities online• Create a new way for Facebook users to interact with each other via mobile,

and make it known that AT&T empowers youth to create mobile utility on the network and on Facebook

Execution• MB used this new open Facebook platform for AT&T, challenging developers

to create compelling mobile applications that incorporated AT&T wireless services into user Facebook profiles

• Competition reward: $5,000 and featured in AT&T media/”Sponsored Stories” on Facebook

Results• 894 Users installed the Developers’ Challenge application• 125 final applications developed, submitted and verified by users during BTS

promo period• 280K unique impressions of “Sponsored Story” contest on Facebook

newsfeed• 2.4MM total impressions of Sponsored Story

Virtual MTV: In-world – to – Mobile PathsSituation• MB created and activated a one-of-a-kind brand ambassador program

in “Virtual MTV,” a virtual 3D environment designed for brands to interact with youth in affinity TV programming virtual environments

Strategy• Provide in-world users with one-of-a-kind unique access to virtual

events and mobile rewards, provided by AT&T and delivered via mobile devices

• Create an ongoing relationship with consumers, cultivating long-term interaction and driving brand preference and willingness to recommend

Execution• Mobile Behavior designed an entire in-world activation program,

centered around a virtual brand ambassador “Tony Fresh”• Tony roamed the world, interacted with in-world youth, provided

branded AT&T rewards and hosted events where players could learn about AT&T products and download them to their handsets

• The program was extended to in-world youth to act as virtual brand ambassadors and receive exclusive mobile content and vanity items in exchange for their promotion services

• In-world virtual kiosks allowed users to access exclusive AT&T mobile content

Results• Over 575K AT&T branded rewards distributed in-world• 35K click-throughs from in-world kiosks to access AT&T content and

information

Shopping, Couponing and Location-Relevant Services

Situation• The “last 50 feet” is the Holy Grail of retail. How do you interact with

customers in an engaging way to close the sale?• AT&T was in need of alignment with youth-relevant brands and specifically

matching the AT&T brand’s services with popular youth retail/offline shopping destinations

• MB also needed to gauge youth appetite for emerging social and location-based mobile couponing services that would arrive with new LBS applications coming following BTS and during holiday on the network

Strategy• Drive purchase and consumer engagement by offering youth consumers

limited time offers delivered on their mobile device• Create an integrated partnership with youth entertainment product retailer

FYE on an “Insider Deals” mobile couponing program that placed mobile CTAs (keyword/shortcode paths to discounts) in high volume youth retail environments

• Educate consumers on new mobile coupon availability and test success for future deployment

Execution• 3 month “Insider Deals” SMS-based campaign launched at 700+ FYE retail

locations across the U.S.• Call to action messaging on signage in-store, on payment terminals and on

receipts – coupon redemption made extremely simple via SMSResults• The targeted mobile offers resulted in a 36% conversion rate during the BTS

promo period, significantly higher than any AT&T web or mobile program to date

• Campaign generated 250K “endorsed handset impressions” for AT&T and FYE, driving increased participation in mobile couponing programs following this activation series

“Insider Deals” Wireless Couponing

Socialight: User-Created Campus Guide Situation• MobileBehavior deployed a pilot social shopping program for

NYU students to test the effectiveness of location based retail on mobile

Strategy• Gauge consumer interest in social shopping and location based

mobile offers• Provide college audience with interactive mobile guide when it

matters most to incoming freshmen discovering New York City and activities/locations on and around campus

Execution• MB developed an integrated program with Socialight, a “social-

mapping” service to identify top New York City retail locations of interest to incoming NYU freshmen

• All locations were tagged on an interactive map for students to discover on mobile and linked to expanded content on the handset

• Students were provided with a platform to create, discover and share locations on their handsets, creating user-driven momentum

• Content was accessible over mobile by texting a NYC zip code or cross street to receive peer and MB programmed localized content relevant during the BTS period

Results• 5,600 “sticky shadows”/user generated mobile media created

during BTS window• AT&T Socialight channel ranked in top 5 during promo period

and campus outreach

Cross-Impact of Programs

Overall 2008 BTS Results

The combined impact of MobileBehavior’s online, offline, and mobile back-to-school strategic recommendations and specific program activations were groundbreaking for the client:• AT&T experienced a 3% YOY youth share increase following the BTS series of

integrated programs developed by MB• Top competitor Verizon was again relegated to the #2 subscriber count and youth

share position, even with a huge media, advertising, and tour sponsorship dollar commitment against V CAST products and services

• “Willingness to Recommend” AT&T increased among youth and outpaced all competitors in this category in panel and commissioned research conducted following the series of BTS promotions* (MIV Jan 2009)

• AT&T once again secured lead position in the social networking category as reported by youth* (MIV Jan 2009)

• Revenue derived from BTS promotion-related events, applications, mobile content, handsets and accessories exceeded $3.5MM

• More than 3MM unique youth subscribers visited MB-architected and implemented mobile BTS sites on and off-portal