Mobile Commons

As many of you know, T-Mobile has always required a double opt-in to subscribe to a recurring SMS program.  While this probably made a lot of sense when signing up for recurring horoscopes or ringtones, it never seemed to make much sense for the types of programs our customers run.

For example, customers would sign up to recieve vaccination reminders or to do election protection and be greeted with a “reply Y to confirm you want to opt-in. Other charges may apply.”  This cumbersome step resulted in a huge drop-off of completed subscriptions, but was required to stay in compliance.

We are pleased to announce that effective immediately, T-Mobile no longer requires a double opt-in!  Additionally, the confusing “other charges may apply” can be removed too (note: you still must indicate that “standard charges apply”).  We have updated the Mobile Commons platform and the changes are already in effect.

This is very exciting news for Mobile Commons and all our customers.  You can expect to see higher response rates and an overall better user experience for all T-Mobile subscribers!

We just launched a new mData that we are very proud of.  In partnership with Credo Mobile and the New Organizing Institute, we are now providing polling place locations via txt message.

text pp then your street address and zip to 69866 (eg: pp 101 market st 94105)

Our system will respond with the appropriate polling place for your address, or the number for the Election Protection Coalition if we can’t find a match. Please feel free to promote this service any way you like and share it with people looking lost on Election Day.

Some of our customers will also be using this tool in conjunction with their election day txt message voting reminders. We think that this will be a particularly powerful tool for canvassers in the field who need to provide information to voters on the fly.  If SMS isn’t your thing, you can also look up your polling place on the web at GoVote.org.

Other Mobile Commons customers are also using txt messaging to help distribute early voting information.  In North Carolina, the State Democratic Party is using an mData to allow their constituents to txt ‘EARLY’ and the name of their county to 69866 to get the address of their early voting location.

The team here at Mobile Commons will be using these services to get ourselves to the polls  - we hope you do too.

The engineers at Mobile Commons have been working very hard on our latest release and they’ve done a great job!   I just wanted to take a minute to highlight some of the exciting new under-the-hood improvements.

Usage of the Mobile Commons platform has been growing tremendously this year.  As with many software applications, as they grow, some parts don’t scale as well as others.  This fall, we took a hard look at all the bottlenecks in our software and made some great across the board performance improvements.

• Inbox: due to the popularity of mData and mCast, the number of incoming messages in our inboxes has gone through the roof!  Unfortunately, that made large inboxes load slowly.  With this new release, we have an upgraded database so your inbox will load much faster!
• Importing and Exporting CSVs: When we started this business, mobile lists were relatively small. This year we’ve seen the size of mobile lists double, triple, and quintuple due to increased SMS usage by consumers, not to mention full data integration with CRM partners like Convio and GetActive.  We’ve sped up the process of importing and exporting CSV files, allowing users to upload 10x larger files and we now process them much more quickly.
• Messaging: Part of our secret sauce is how well we are able to handle incoming text messages on a shared shortcode.  We’re constantly tweaking our algorithms to ensure that incoming messages are correctly classified.  We statistically analyzed a full year’s worth of text messages looking for false positives and other misclassifications.  Based on this research, we’re pleased to release the latest version of our text processing algorithms, increasing our lead as the best in the business!
• Security: Mobile Commons is built on the fantastic Ruby on Rails framework and we’ve upgraded to the latest version (and all our server software too).  While this won’t affect our end-users much, it’s extremely important for us stay very up-to-date with all the latest security patches.  Our engineers work really hard to keep your data safe and secure, so we just wanted to mention it.

Finally, we want to thank all of our great customers out there for running such innovative and successful programs and pushing so hard on our technology.  You’ve really forced us to work hard and make our products better and better!  It’s really exciting for engineers to see their hard work out in the real world, used in all sorts of creative ways they never intended.  Never hesitate to let us know other ways we can improve!

Oh, and speaking of algorithms and scaling databases, Mobile Commons is hiring engineers.  We’re looking for full time Ruby/Rails developers in NYC.  If you think what we’re doing sounds like fun, please drop me a line!  I’d love to hear from you.

First of all, I would like to introduce myself; I’m Nathan Woodhull. I joined the Mobile Commons team as a Software Developer a month and a half ago, and have been busy adding features and working to improve the performance of the platform ever since. I came here to New York from the Boston area where I worked as a consultant to organizations including ActBlue, The Public Radio Exchange, and MoveOn.

One of the great things about working at Mobile Commons is seeing how our amazing customers use our platform. Credo Wireless, an early Mobile Commons customer,  in partnership with the Student PIRGS New Voters Project and the University of Notre Dame just released a study testing txt messaging as a voter turnout tool. On Super Tuesday, during the 2008 primary season they sent out reminder messages to a group of mostly young voters and compared their turnout to a control group of similar voters. The findings indicate that sending a voter a txt message reminder on election day increases their likelihood of voting by 4.6% - numbers that are consistent with an earlier 2006 study.

Many of our customers plan to take advantage of this on November 4th because of the significant cost-per-vote advantages of txt messaging—we’re anticipating the biggest single day use of our platform to date. We are incredibly excited about that, and everything else our customers are doing this election season.

Blue Ocean’s FishPhone program, powered by Mobile Commons and mData, just got mentioned on Cool Hunting!

We’ve always thought that one of the best ways to delight our customers and their constituents is to come up with simple solutions that get the job done—they don’t need to be flashy. FishPhone has been a runaway SMS success and we think it’s due to a couple of factors:

• People care about the information
• It’s easy to show friends how it works
• Using SMS as an input interface is much easier than using the mobile web on most phones

It’s easy to try out by texting fish + species to 30644. As you can see on the example on the right, Cool Hunting texted in FISH salmon to 30644.

Also coming soon is a new Sushi Guide put together by Blue Ocean, Monterey Bay Aquarium, and the Environmental Defense Fund.

The Mobile Future coalition hosted a panel yesterday on mobile and elections at the National Press Club in D.C.  And, yes, it was live on CSPAN .

Michelle Mayorga from Rock The Vote’s Mobile Programs; Casey O’Shea, DCCC National Field Director; and Katie Harbath, former Deputy eCampaign Director, Giuliani for President and I discuss the present and future of mobile and campaigns. Click here to watch.

Thanks to my friend Jonathan Spalter -the Mobile Future coalition chair - for putting it together.

Jordan just put up a great post on the Convio Connection Cafe about Rock the Vote’s results with text messaging. An excerpt and video are below:

Rock the Vote’s Executive Director Heather Smith shared one of the organization’s most effective strategies on a panel earlier this year: fueling the youth movement on the “4th screen” to mobilize youth voters like never before. And though text messaging may sound like an unlikely tactic to get Gen Yers to take action (and rather one that’s primarily used as a social communications tool) Rock the Vote’s results are astounding.

Out of the 1.4 million names they have in their email house file (as of May of 2008), 12% opt in to cell phone messaging. And when texts are sent out on Election Day with a reminder to vote and a link to the voter’s poll location, turnout increases by 4%.

I think one of the main points to be emphasized is the personal nature of text-messaging. Heather says that a text message reminder is as effective as a qualified phone call. This is a point that we’ve made before, but is really the thing about text messaging that’s beginning to get a lot of positive numbers behind it.

Recently, we had a chance to chat with Jim Manis, the Chairman and CEO of the Mobile Giving Foundation.  Mobile Commons has been working with the Mobile Giving Foundation (MGF) to bring mobile donations to our 501(c)3 customers. Mobile Fundraising is new, and has tremendous potential to change the way that microdonations are collected and we’re excited to share the following interview with Jim Manis, the man who made it happen.

Jim, can you tell us a little bit about your background and how you came to start the Mobile Giving Foundation?

Sure, my background is inclusive of being a co-founder of a company called m-Qube. We were one of the first to develop the direct to consumer mobile content market in North America. We really helped pioneer the notion that it’s all about consumer control where the consumer—not the carrier—is deciding what they want, where, when and how they access information, content and entertainment. m-Qube was sold to VeriSign a few years ago who in turn has been a significant contributor to the Mobile Giving Foundation.

I have also been very active across the wireless industry, including serving as the Global Chairman of the Mobile Marketing Association from 2003 to 2006. We worked with application providers, media companies, ad agencies, content providers and the wireless carriers to establish standards for mobile application behavior and consumer protection.

While at m-Qube, I led an effort in partnership with the US wireless carriers and the CTIA, when both Katrina and the Asian Pacific Tsunami occurred to enable emergency relief donations with a 100% pass through using a premium SMS transaction on your mobile device. People’s response to the relief donations was amazing and underscored an empowerment that came with the ability for people to respond immediately – or by impulse – to such an overwhelming need. After m-Qube was acquired by VeriSign, I wanted to take what we’d done for those special events and make it available for all charitable organizations as part of my commitment to give back.

And what did you see as the main barrier to opening up mobile fundraising?

Well, what was missing was the operational layer between carriers and nonprofit organizations so that both parties could have confidence in the system and that the process itself enabled an acceptable rate of pass through to the recipient foundation. We also wanted to do it in such a way that donors and potential donors saw their phone as a viable and trusted way to make micro-donations. The Mobile Giving Foundation, as a 501(c)3, provides this operational layer.

Can you speak a little more about the operational layer and what that entails?

The operational layer facilitates the ability for nonprofits to interact with their donors through the mobile channel, regardless of what phone service donors use. The MGF provides the technical connectivity layer and the business agreements that transmit messages and billing events, and frames the standards and best practices by which money can be raised where a billing event occurs on the carrier bill. The Mobile Giving Foundation extends this operational layer to a broader ecosystem that includes application providers like you [Mobile Commons], the wireless carriers, and the nonprofit organizations. Fundamentally, it’s a way for nonprofits to reach their donors. Those donors are also customers of the wireless carriers.

We also make sure that all federal and state laws are complied with and donors get receipted. A big part of the operational responsibility is message delivery and the billing that allows the donor to make a $5 or $10 contribution that appears on the carrier phone bill. That donation gets remitted to the Mobile Giving Foundation and then we settle with the partner charity. When you look at the billing process and the messaging systems of each carrier, they’re very different. When you look at it from an operational perspective, we remove those complexities for nonprofits and application providers. We then provide a receipt to the donor for their contribution.

Why did you use the term micro-donations?

By definition, it’s a micro-donation because of the price point ($5 and $10) and means of conveyance on the carrier bill. When you start something new, it’s important to keep it simple. The Mobile Giving Foundation elected to go with a price point that is acceptable to all wireless carriers and try to keep some commonality around those price points as new giving programs go to market. As consumers become more educated, they’ll realize this is a mechanism to make donations and as those consumers become more comfortable, you’ll see more innovation around price points—but, there will always be a cap. This is one of many cost elements that show up on a consumer’s carrier bill.

Why did you decide to make the Mobile Giving Foundation a nonprofit?

There are several reasons. First, my goal is to help the wireless industry apply resources that support worthy causes. Second, I want to help establish a new level of efficiency using wireless resources and try to keep the overhead costs to nonprofits at 10% or less than the amount they raise using the channel. Third, I want this channel to be trusted by donors, charities and carriers. It seemed to me like the best way to provide end-to-end protection and accomplish these goals was to make the Mobile Giving Foundation a 501(c)3 with the MGF serving as an umbrella for the donation, collection, remittance and advisement process.

Can you speak to the direct responsibilities of the Mobile Giving Foundation in the approval process for fundraising programs?

The MGF certifies that a nonprofit meets the established criteria for mobile giving, and reviews and approves that a specific mobile giving campaign meets our standards and those established by other industry organizations such as the MMA. The processes used to create these standards and criteria include representatives from interests across the spectrum. It is important to us that the MGF helps ensure the integrity of mobile giving by focusing on clarity to donors when they are asked to give and transparency for donors when a gift has been made.

What’s the timing like in the approval process?

For the foreseeable future, it’s a manual process with heavy overhead. We are working within a system and with processes developed to support commercial premium transactions. NPO qualifications, campaign approvals, short code provisioning, billing system updates, application testing all currently translate to approximately an 8 week time frame. This will eventually get shorter as our own capabilities improve and our processes are streamlined.

Any Closing Thoughts?

I’m very pleased that we can make available a whole new fundraising channel to nonprofits, and just as importantly, help provide a channel for a new, younger demographic to explore, learn and give to causes of interest to them. I’m particularly delighted that the wireless carriers see the value of supporting this effort, and doing so on a no cost basis. They have been generous in helping pioneer this new channel. Of course, we love the fact that companies like Mobile Commons and others have stepped up and leveraged their technology in the giving space. Our collective efforts will literally help change to face of giving today.

There’s been good coverage of Obama’s Vice Presidential announcement all over the web (particularly GigaOM and the NY Times). While there has been some grumbling about the announcement coming a little late because CNN got the scoop, overall the Obama campaign is being lauded for their marketing savvy. At Mobile Commons, we think they are not being lauded highly enough for what they managed to pull off. Here’s why: the Obama campaign may have just pulled off the most cost-effective Get Out the Vote (GOTV) program in history!

In 2006, Mobile Commons’ platform was used in a study conducted by the New Voter’s Project, Princeton, and the University of Michigan. The results of the study were a wonderful surprise to us. In the table below, you can see cost per vote compared between various media:

Elections pivot on turnout and voter engagement. The main conclusion to be drawn from the table above: the more personal the communication, the more effective. The most personal form of communication, face to face interaction, has the highest mobilization effect. Text messaging is something mainly done with friends and—terse as it is—highly personal. For campaigns, mobile messaging provides one the most cost effective ways of engaging constituents with highly personal and interactive messaging. The Obama Campaign realized this and constructed the VP announcement to help them build critical mass with their mobile list.

Most elections are won by narrow margins and the game is finding the right population to help you swing the election. Mobile messaging has shown its ability to activate large numbers of people and populations that are often unreachable. The Obama Campaign has shown great ability to reach and excite younger voters. If you’ve ever watched young people text message, you know the possibilities for engagement and interaction are very high. Although all ages send mobile messages, the Obama Campaign may be aiming at the youth vote as its swing contingent.

What the Obama Campaign has done is secure a massive Get Out the Vote list that will be a more cost effective solution than anything else. Thus far, I’ve received a few broadcast messages and requests for my zipcode, which they’ve already collected. I’m anticipating locally targeted messages. The unknown is if the Obama Campaign will use their enlarged mobile list to also reach out more personally for increased voter engagement. As more and more campaigns embrace mobile, it will be thrilling to see the effect of even more personal correspondence and conversation that really take advantage of the usage patterns of mobile messaging.

Someone gets it right.