Direct mail has arrived at the cutting edge. Vindigo Inc., creator of a New York entertainment guide for Palm devices, began a mailing in late April that the company’s marketing head expects will reap a 20% response.
Vindigo’s personal navigator software – also called Vindigo – lets users find restaurants, bars and retail stores near their current location. For example, someone who wants to eat at a Chinese restaurant in Chelsea taps that category into Vindigo’s Eat section and receives a restaurant recommendation along with reviews, dollar and quality ratings, address, telephone number, cross streets and directions – all from where they’re standing.
Users download the program from the Vindigo site to a personal computer and then update the entertainment data by connecting their Palm to their PC.
More than 6,000 businesses are listed, according to Vindigo.
The direct mail piece – a postcard – went out to 100,000 owners of Palm Inc. handheld devices registered in a 30-mile radius of New York City. The card’s copy explains what Vindigo offers and that it can be downloaded for free (www.vindigo.com).
Vice president of marketing David Shankman is not surprised by the 20% response because it’s free. And, he says, “it meets a consumer need.
“Everybody wants a cup of coffee, to see a movie or to buy a pair of shoes sometimes,” he adds.
Shankman’s confidence is partly the result of his users’ enthusiasm. Vindigo debuted March 27, but it had already acquired more than 20,000 members for the free service through word of mouth and Web advertising.
Vindigo also allows users to “beam” information to other Palm-compatible devices. This feature sends the movie and restaurant listings so they can be accessed immediately.
Point-of-Interest Ads
Vindigo’s revenue eventually will come from advertisers. At present, the two advertisers are online Palm sellers Handingo and Palm Gear HQ. Tap-through rates (when the user points at an ad) “are in excess of 10%,” Shankman says.
“We call it point-of-interest advertising,” he explains. “We’ll have the ability to target advertising based not only on demographic information, but also serve up advertising based on location, category and time of day.” The idea is for a woman looking for khakis to see an ad for a Gap store across the street.
Members provide data on age, gender, household income and ZIP code.
Plans call for Vindigo to expand to Boston, Washington and the San Francisco Bay area next month.
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