This article was originally posted In RE Advisor, Issue II February 2017.

For 2020, the number of mobile users worldwide is forecast to grow to 7.26 billion, according to Pew Research, and now cell phones outnumber the world’s population Businesses, particularly public retail spaces such as malls and shopping center, need to answer the demand for connectivity in their spaces to attract and retain visitors. Wi-Fi connectivity in physical spaces is the necessary conduit to provide the demand. Visitors to commercial spaces look for Wi-Fi not just due to a lack of signal from inside a large building, for example, but also for speed and data usage concerns. It is not surprising that Wi-Fi is the most requested guest amenity because people expect connectivity almost as a right. Connectivity has become as necessary an amenity as a bathroom or a parking space, reflecting directly on the overall quality of experience in your space for visitors.

“Retailers that have been around for a long time get set in little ways, and what happens? Competitors pass them by. They don’t realize it until they’re shutting stores down that it’s too late and they didn’t change quickly enough.”- Jonas Stillman, Director of Retail Systems and Omni Channel Initiatives, Office Depot

At SocialSign.in we’re always striving to improve and update our software to provide the best experience for both our clients and their customers. We’re proud to announce a brand-new integration with the IBM Watson Campaign Automation and an integration update with Tessitura.

1. IBM Watson Campaign Automation Integration

Watson Campaign Automation is a SaaS-based digital marketing automation platform that puts the power of data insights in the hands of the marketer to design smarter campaigns that exceed your customer expectations. Use behavioral data from any source to create consistent campaigns across email, web, mobile push, SMS, social, group messaging and more.

IBM Watson Campaign Automation is now fully integrated with SocialSign.in. What we’ve done is make it possible for the SocialSign.in software to capture and send profile details - think names, emails, etc. – to the IBM Campaign Automation system. Prior to the data push, the SocialSign.in software validates the captured email addresses, including bounce detection. Once the data is verified, that information is passed through to the client’s IBM Watson Campaign Automation system. If the customer is looking for specific information for specific fields, SocialSign.in, has the ability to customize the data feed. A few examples would be to inject user attributes to custom data fields - and that could be anything from custom demographic information like zip codes, gender, marital status, etc. The software can also lookup existing users within the IBM Campaign Automation system and update existing records with new attributes.

2. Tessitura Integration – Phase 2

Tessitura is an enterprise CRM system that powers all key business functions for museums, performing arts organizations, and other cultural, educational, and media entities. From fundraising and memberships to ticketing, marketing, education, analytics, and more, Tessitura’s unified platform enables a seamless, 360-degree view of all donors, members, and volunteers with a single database. I

SocialSign.in and Tessitura have had a working integration for about a year, but over the last few months we’ve finalized the second phase. The first phase of integration included the ability to push basic details like names and addresses, add new constituents, add campus visits and update attributes within the Tessitura CRM. The SocialSign.in software validates the email addresses, including bounce detection, prior to the data push, so the CRM is only capturing accurate data. Phase 2 includes the ability to recognize existing constituents (profiles) who are first-time WiFi users and gives venues the ability to push customized content based on existing profile attributes. An example of that would be to push a digital content experience about an upcoming Jazz concert to a constituent who has purchased Jazz tickets in the past.

At SocialSign.in we’re passionate about WiFi Marketing, the capabilities of the software and what it can do for businesses. If you’re a interested and want to learn more - you can contact us @ info@socialsign.in.

Last week we were part of a panel at the TriTix Forum in New York City, titled, "Who Ya Gonna Call." Which means, as opposed to the infamous supernatural crime-fighting team - they called us - but we're pretty close to being Ghostbusters - so it made sense.

Not the most famous of Chicago's hit songs, but we were inspired when we arrived in town last week for the TLCC, Tessitura Network’s annual user conference in Chicago. Tessitura Network was created after the Metropolitan Opera invested in and developed an integrated customer relationship management (CRM) system, tailor-made for an arts and cultural organization - which has now expanded to include other customers throughout the country and world. 

A few weeks ago we attended the SEAT conference down in Daytona. SEAT – which stands for Sports & Entertainment Alliance in Technology – holds an annual peer-to-peer driven conference for executives in the sports and entertainment industries. This is always an educational event for us, we have many clients within the sector and although we check in with them frequently, it’s always good to get the 411 on the industry as a whole.

As marketers we all struggle with how to connect to our customers. How do we get them to hear our message through the noise and the clutter of their already overcrowded inboxes? The first step to a better connection - is knowing as much as possible about our customers - so we know what to say that will resonate, hit home and more importantly - get them to buy.

We talk a lot about WiFi Marketing – but for WiFi Marketing to work – you need a Guest WiFi network.

Entrance into Game 3 of the NBA Finals last night may have seemed like the golden ticket to Golden State and Raptors fans - but the real success was what happened for the Warriors marketing team as fans poured into Oracle Arena and signed into the Guest WiFi, enabling them to collect first-party data on their fans through a WiFi Marketing solution.

WiFi Marketing and Location Analytics are two separate technologies that both leverage existing guest WiFi. WiFi Marketing builds digital relationships with onsite foot-traffic, collecting qualified, low-cost first-party data. Location analytics is a visual depiction using real-time geographical and historical data that identifies footfall, high dwell areas and bottle necks, within a physical space.