NFC (Near Field Communication) – This contactless smart card, which has transformed the mobile into an electronic wallet, transit pass or loyalty card, – is still much awaited in Europe. During this time, its Japanese equivalent, Mobile FeliCa, has been a great success and has changed distribution chain practices.
One of the announcements that has marked the Japanese mobile market these last few years was the alliance between NTT DoCoMo and McDonald’s. In July 2007, these two companies set up a joint-company, “The JV”, to exploit the potential marketing of the FeliCa chip. Today, each and every McDonald’s restaurants in Japan is equipped with FeliCa readers. Its use of the mobile for communication and coupon distribution earned The JV the Grand Prix at the Mobile Ad Awards 2009 in Japan.
McDonald’s Japan has been active in mobile communication since 2002. The brand launched its official site for coupon distribution “Tokusuru Keitai Site (tokusuru = avantageous, keitai = mobile)” in July 2003. At that time the downloadable coupon was a very classic coupon, all customers had to do was show the pertinent mobile site page when ordering to obtain a discount. This was one of the first mobile sites with registered members in Japan, and by the end of August 2009 the number of registered members had grown to 14 million.
According to a study conducted by McDonald’s Japan in March 2009, one out of four mobile users used McDonald’s mobile site, making it the number one institutional mobile site in Japan. Regarding the profile of those registered. Women are very active, notably between 15 – 19 years old (40%), and those in their thirties (35%). In the long run, the objective of McDonald’s is to communicate on the mobile with its potential 80 million clients on the archipelago.
In May 2008, McDonald’s launched “Kazasu Coupon (kazasu = pass over)”, in order to convert the millions of members already registered on the McDonald’s mobile site. This service consists of distributing discount coupons via the mobile, using the contactless smart card, which will speed up the flux at the check out counter. Today, it is possible to download discount coupons your mobile, prepare your order with your mobile then swipe it in front of a reader to place your order and swipe it one more time to pay.
Since its launch this service has been a huge success. At the end of summer 2009, all McDonald’s restaurants accepted the Kazasu Coupon, and 4.5 million mobile users were signed up for this programme by the end of August 2009, whereas it was only available in then in 22 out of 47 departments.
For McDonald’s, prominent user of discount coupons and special offers, the mobile couponing system allows it to make savings in this area, all the while developing its activity thanks to a higher use of mobile coupons compared to paper ones. According to the restaurant chain, which has 3,800 restaurants and serves 1.4 billion consumers per year in Japan, its coupon production requires the printing of 30 million paper documents per year. In addition, all of these paper promotional offers involve graphic design costs and take at least a month to prepare. Therefore, McDonald’s is enthusiastically welcoming this new support, which is more efficient, less expensive and faster (it only takes 3 days to mount a new discount campaign), and which also allows it to incorporate exploitable marketing data: the contactless smart card mobile.
The first phase of the Kazasu Coupon, its launch in restaurants, has been achieved. The next step is the exploitation of its behavioural data history of each user. Since August 2009, Mobile FeliCa has become the support for McDonald’s to collect loyalty points when purchasing promotion related products. In relation to the purchase frequency of these related products, McDonald’s offers coupons for a free meal, or even digital content as gifts. This loyalty customization could be further Advanced and combined with various elements on the future: the location, the time, personal tastes and, of course, purchase history.
In the end, over the course of two years, Mc Donald’s Japan recruited 4.5 millions members for its mobile loyalty programme, reduced its costs, refined its marketing and CRM data. Who said that mobile marketing was just a gadget?
Philippe Le Fessant,
Associate Director, Jap’Presse / InnovAsia Research