One of the things delaying more use of mobile marketing coupons is the fact that many, if not most, stores do not yet have the ability to read them.
However, M-Dot Network [1], located in Erie, Pennsylvania, has created a platform which redeems digital coupons in real time, lessening the burden of coupon validation at check-out, speeding up check-out and reducing redemption error rates.
The M-Dot platform is a bridge which connects any number of existing digital consumer touch points, notably the Internet and mobile phone, into a retailer’s point-of-sale system without the expense of additional in-store hardware. It gives retailers the benefit of redeeming offers from any number of digital coupon issuers with only one single point of integration.
“Our real-time processing technology enables retailers to own and manage their own pipeline of digital coupons and offers, safely and securely,” says Bill Catania, CEO of M-Dot.
Further, the M-Dot Network helps retailers and product manufacturers fight coupon fraud as each coupon redemption is aligned with a valid shopper identification and the corresponding purchase at the time a coupon is redeemed.
It works like this: Consumers select and receive digital offers on a participating retailer’s Web site, on a retailer-branded mobile application provided by M-Dot, or directly from the digital coupon issuer. Regardless of coupon issuance, consumers redeem all coupons in real-time by swiping their Retailer Shopper/Club Card or entering their phone number at check-out. All of the shopper’s coupons are redeemed during the same transaction within about one tenth of a second.
M-Dot Network’s patent pending message broker software controls all coupon redemption messages between the retailer POS and M-Dot Network’s central servers. M-Dot Network’s compression technology recognizes what has been purchased by the shopper and immediately sends a message to its central server for validation of eligible coupons for the purchase. A message is then immediately sent back to the retailer where the purchase price is adjusted for the shopper based on the sum of their valid coupons. .
“There has been great progress in the development of mobile and location based technologies with very little success in converting those technologies into real-time point-of-sale based redemption,” says Catania. “M-Dot Network has addressed those challenges with our secure high speed transaction network and the stage is now set for real-time actionable media.”
The company has, to date, booked a very large national retailer but cannot release the name until its program is launched in Jan., 2010.