Mobile wallet

When and in what forms will mobile payments go mainstream? That’s the question that many vendors and companies like Google are asking. Another issue: mobile payments can be defined in various ways to include carrier billing, mobile wallets used at a physical POS and mobile bill paying. A relatively recent survey (n=1,155 US adults) by the Raddon Financial Group indicates that that younger adults (Gen Y) are most interested and most likely to see value in mobile wallets. This survey reflects slightly more and perhaps growing enthusiasm vs. previous consumer surveys. For example, last year Opus Research found (n=1,501) that as a general matter, the majority of US adults weren’t interested in mobile payments. In the survey immediately above (which I generated), those between 25 and 44 were most interested in mobile payments, which is generally consistent with the Raddon findings. Those living in urban areas were also more interested than suburban or rural users. In addition, … [Read more...] about Gen Y Users Most Likely To Be Interested In Mobile Wallets

Most of the major internet companies are either actively in market with mobile payments or flirting with the idea. This includes Google, eBay/PayPal, Amazon and Facebook with Credits (there’s an article to be written about the future of Credits). And there are scores of startups and others also competing for consumer attention and merchant adoption of their mobile payments systems: Square, Intuit, ISIS, Groupon, Visa, FirstData, LevelUp, Jumio, Card.io, Boku, Tabbedout, GoPago and many others. The list grows longer by the week it seems. Joining that list, as of yesterday, is Apple — almost. At the WWDC event yesterday Apple introduced a mobile wallet app called Passbook. It doesn’t have a stored credit card like Google Wallet but it puts airline boarding passes, movie tickets, coupons, loyalty cards and gift cards in one place on the phone so they can later be scanned at the point of sale. According to press materials, any retailer or third party developer will be … [Read more...] about Apple Begins Rollout Of Mobile Wallet Functionality With Passbook App

Mobile engagement provider Urban Airship took another step last week toward making the mobile wallet into a full-fledged marketing channel, by offering a service where loyalty cards can be updated via a single tap with Apple Pay. The Portland, Oregon-based company says it is the first wallet provider to offer this capability, although some brands, such as Walgreens, had offered it in one-off implementations. Previously, Director of Product Marketing Judy Chan told me, a user might have a loyalty card on a smartphone barcode-scanned at the cash register when paying. To join, the user might have filled out a paper form, or entered information letter-by-letter into a form on the screen. Now, her company’s Urban Airship Reach service — which helps brands with loyalty passes, concert tickets and boarding passes for Apple Wallet and Android Pay — is supporting the value-added services industry protocol in Apple Pay. This allows loyalty information to be sent across Apple … [Read more...] about Urban Airship becomes first mobile wallet provider to offer single-tap loyalty rewards with Apple Pay

There is a lot of buzz about mobile wallets — mostly, the challenges facing mass adoption of mobile payments. This has left many marketers to wonder how they will be able to implement innovative mobile payment technologies into their mobile/brand strategies. While the industry focuses its attention on m-payments (and lack thereof), marketers who want to stand out have a unique opportunity to get ahead — with the non-payment side of mobile wallets. It Starts With The Consumer Consumers have made their preferences clear — they want a shopping companion. Mobile wallets eliminate the need for paper items (such as coupons and boarding passes), organize bulky items (such as loyalty cards), and expedite the check-out process at their favorite retailers. This desire and the fast-adoption reveal untapped potential, not necessarily in payments but in the non-payment side of the mobile wallet. We are still in the early days of the mobile wallet transformation. The main landscape … [Read more...] about Opening Mobile Wallet Opportunities For Marketers