As part of their integrated campaign in support of the company’s 2012 Versa Seda model, Nissan is leveraging a previously widely unexploited Apple iAd feature to help deliver the campaigns’ young, tech savvy target consumer.
The Versa iAd utilizes gyro technology–offered on the iPad and iPhone–to allow the user to take in a 360-degree view of the car as they pan their device to the left or right while viewing the ad. True to its name, the iAd also offers elements of jazzy interaction to the experience: when a viewer shakes their phone, for example, the people in the ad will put on different hats.
With Hotels.com’s smartphone application, on-the-go travelers can book a hotel room from almost anywhere—even at the very last minute. In their latest digital video piece, Hotels.com tapped professional stuntman and skydiver JT Holmes to illustrate–in extreme fashion–just how easy it is to book a room while ‘on the fly’…literally.
“The Hotels.com mobile booking application is so fast,” shouts Holmes from the relative safety of a small plane flying above the beautiful, resort-studded shores of Lake Tahoe, CA, “you can even book in a free-fall!” Equipped only with a parachute and and iPhone, the stuntman leaps into a 15,000 foot free-fall and sets to the process of booking a hotel room while flying at over 115 miles per hour towards his ultimate destination: the Hyatt Regency Lake Tahoe Resort, Spa & Casino.
The stunt is actually a live-action version of Hotels.com’s most recent animated television commercial, in which the brands’ clay-animated spokesman, Smart, also books a hotel room while on a skydiving vacation.
The Hotels.com mobile booking app, available for iPhone and Android, features specialized offers, including exclusive mobile deals and over 20,000 last minute deals. It’s a great tool, and we wouldn’t recommend traveling (or skydiving ) without it! So why don’t you join the million+ smartphone users who are already using it by downloading the application for yourself at www.thesmarterapp.com.
Yesterday Google revealed a new product that entices users through convenience: Google Wallet.
Wallet combines the phone and the credit card–two necessities that few, if any, leave the house without–into one tidy package.
The idea is to link credit cards virtually to phones, so that the phone becomes the only thing you need to grab before heading out of the house. To make purchases, the user simply taps the phone against a machine to pay. Google’s goal is not to eradicate credit cards but to eliminate their physical presence, making it more convenient for the user who has one less item to carry around. (It is more eco-friendly, too!) There is no transaction fee for now, so what does Google get out of this? Insight into consumer behavior and choices that can be used to inform other products like Google Offers. Offers suggests relevant deals, coupons, and vouchers to users à la Groupon, the behemoth daily-deals site that Google failed to acquire last year.
To encourage greater participation and usage, Google stresses that Wallet is an open platform. A wise move considering Wallet is currently limited to one bank, one type of credit card, one mobile service provider, and one phone at launch this summer. If you do not meet all those requirements, you are stuck with carrying around your, well, wallet for now.
Once again Google is thinking big, but let’s see if it will widen its network enough for Wallet to truly take off.
This morning, Verizon Wireless announced its plans to release the iPhone 4. The Verizon iPhone will be available on February 10th and for pre-order on February 3rd for existing Verizon customers.
While Verizon has not yet disclosed data plan cost details, they did share costs for the new smartphones: $199 for a 16 GB and $299 for the 32 GB.
With the addition of Verizon as an iPhone carrier, Apple has the opportunity to potentially double the number of iPhone users.
