An upstart mobile-marketing company recently launched a completely customizable quick-service iPhone app, providing a new method for chains to distribute coupons to customers.
The “In UR Face” iPhone application software, released by parent company Cables Media, offers quick-serves the ability to create their own coupon-distributing iPhone apps that alert consumers of promotions by sending them notifications similar to text messages.
“I don’t like calling it an iPhone application because it’s so much more,” says Jon Krutchik, president of Cables Media. “It’s really a mobile-marketing platform that happens to be disguised as an iPhone application.”
Krutchik says that members of the Cables Media team collaborate with quick-serves to create the apps, designing them to the company’s exact specifications.
“It’s really software as a service, and that’s exactly what we’re providing,” Krutchik says. “We handle everything from the customization to the deployment to even the campaign management itself. It’s hands-off for them because, again, let them focus on selling their food and doing what they do.”
After a three- to four-week creation process, Cables Media makes the app available on the iPhone application online store. The apps are never advertised publicly under the In UR Face label, instead they carry the name and logo of the individual quick-serve. From there, quick-serves pass along their coupon deals to Cables Media, which turns the deals around quickly and distributes them to app users—with no fee required from the consumer, unlike most text messaging systems.
The coupon messages, using patent-pending technology from Cables Media, delete themselves from each user’s device after they are redeemed or expire, leaving the customer with no responsibility aside from opting in to use the coupon.
Krutchik says the In UR Face system is a beneficial mobile-marketing platform because advertisement splash pages precede each coupon sent to consumers, allowing quick-serves space to promote new products. He also says that the In UR Face apps can complement any pre-existing or company-designed iPhone apps.
“Games get old,” he says, “but in today’s economy, nobody gets tired of saving money.”
By Sam Oches
