Ideas

somethin like
http://www.mkhoj.com/

at present they hav not expanded outside a city in India!

Well it certainly looks like it has the some of the building blocks and infrastructure that could be leveraged. I love India, mobile minutes, data plans are so reasonable there in comparison to North America!!!! I wanted to take it to the next level though... Picture this...

Annievee walks into Mall A and she initiates some "action" on her cell/smartphone/wireless PDA to indicate "I am here" without actually entering any data (shortcut key, icon push/click). This fires off the lat long, matches up the deals with preferences so she only receives relevant matches and SHAZAM! She get the deals for Mall A sent to her device. She shouldn't have to tell "the system" that she is in Mall A, it should figure this out based on her Lat/long.

Ideally I'd like to see this as NOT a user initiated action, but this involves alot of network traffic and possibly privacy issues in that your device would have to keep polling where I am, sending out lat and long periodically and you AUTOMAGICALLY receiving the deals vs. user initiative.

If we go the later route, the user experience would be:

Annievee walks into Mall A, here's a little bloboopeedoop from her device, check the device who shows her that Store X is having a sale on Fancydancyitemofinterest, as a subscriber of Mobile Deals 4 U, present your handset with this message and YOU get an additional 10% off!

Thoughts?

That would really mean "hear a little blobpoopeedoop" sound... its early...need coffee...

i believe the united states is a bit behind when it comes to GPS location. some carriers have some phones which offer some of these services, but it's not ubiquitous as web access.

Sounds like the "Minority Report" location based targeted ads system. I love the idea and offer my help if you require it.

Nice
Tommy

If you can make this happen without a lot of network traffic, I believe this would really be huge!

I would love to help with this.

nice idea.

This idea is something I considered for the CommunityWalk project. As the website essentially focuses as a network for local businesses and communities, having the ability to "sign in" to a physical location would allow local retailers to attract near-by clients. The problem was always: How?

As I mentioned previously, I believe the American market is just beginning to uncover the commercial uses of GPS; but the carriers are limited, and the services are not opened (which is ironic considering that every phone on the network has the capabilities to triangulate its coords). Who knows, maybe the iPhone will do something to accelerate the trend.

The alternative we devised was to offer a Dodgeball.com service where people could "sign in" to the coffeeshop (for example) to see which of their friends were "signed in" nearby. This would trigger the server to send them local offers which were relevant to their interests. (example: "Here's a five dollar coupon for your next sandwich at the Deli.")

However, I'd much rather be wrong and have the GPS alternative working on everybody's phone!

You've convinced me and I'm not a shopper.

LBS seems to be big on here at them moment. This has many features in common with OGGTours and I think shared development would be an idea.

annievee WILL AGREE WITH U!

Mihgt work in specific countries via a good marketing partnership with Netrwork provider.

after spending a week in a large US city, looking to find deals on items of interest, I'm sold!

would be great to be able to key in the Postal Code or ZIP of a location you'll be visiting ahead of time and get the gizmo to upload location for various items of interest.

annievee, I'd agree this would be a viable service. But I think as soon as the ability to make such a service happen exists, it will happen. Its seems a bit too obvious to be overlooked by the carriers.

How can you/we actually DO this without the inherent advantages of being a carrier, or being Google? Some things lend themselves to crowdsourcing and startups. I don't think this is such an idea.

Hate to be a downer, personally this isn't for me. Appreciate the creativity, I could see this being warped into something that gets delivered to everyone by ambitious marketers ...

This has been done! It is just not implemented very much in the US.

For example instead of waiting in line to bay your coffee bill you can simple text on you phone to the number posted on the sign then bam! Your order is paid, the staff make the coffee and the recent is printed automatically.

Also, there are catalogs that let you use your mobile phone to pay and order.

This certainly sounds like an idea I've come across before, but perhaps it's being implemented differently.

annievee,
I had this idea about a year ago and began the research for developing this kind of advertising. Unfortunatly the fedral government in the US will not allow citizen to have the technology nessisary to begin this kind of advertising. Cell phones are still considered a private number and the feds won't allow those numbers to get out. Some people got one illiegaly and the feds tracked them down and busted them. It is a really good idea though!

This sounds like an excellent idea, especially for someone such as I, who hates shopping.

I would love to arrive at a department store and have a Gizmo advise me that what I am seeking is not in stock, thereby allowing me the luxury of not wasting my time. However it would please me much more if the gizmo advised me before I left the house.

I like it. I can just see shopping at Gap or somewhere, and having them offer me $10 off my purchase today if I sign up for mobile advertising. If I recieved another offer on my phone I would save it and use it next time I shopped there. If done like a coupon, it could include a unique code to be entered at the register at the time of check out. I would not like unsolicited messages, but ones I signed up for that had incentives - heck yeah.

nice idea and I like your emphasis on user controlled. I would hate this service if I could not control it.

Fantastic idea