BJ Penn.com Learns that Web 2.0 is Much More Powerful Than Traditional Marketing

BJ Penn, like all other brands serious about reaching their customers through relevant channels, are searching for tools to help get their messaging out to the masses. This past weekend, the BJ Penn camp became the first Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) team to leverage a real-time customer loyalty program via the Internet. They did it with Qmania.

Now that BJPenn.com has a profile on Qmania, their biggest fans can get exclusive up-to-the-minute deals, promotions, exclusives, etc... literally. A deal driven website, all companies have to do to begin fully utilizing Qmania is to simply create a deal/discount/coupon for their loyal fans. They then sent a short email notifying them that there are exclusive deals simply waiting for them.

It doesn't stop there. BJPenn.com and other businesses are able to have direct email and/or SMS text communication with their "Insiders". That means that when a business posts an exclusive deal to their Qmania profile, their Insiders (opt-in service) will receive a text message, email or both.

Once an Insider learns of exclusive deals, they can post it to their Facebook, Twitter and other favorite social media sites. These Insiders then become a driving force spreading the word about the deal. Added value all around.

The Qmania platform is designed to be equally functional for a multi-national brand or a local spot. The good news is that not only does Qmania connect to consumers in more effective ways, but it also seamlessly links businesses to each other. Let's take for example: RVCA and BJPenn.com . Through Qmania's 1 Click system, these two brands can connect on the Qmamia platform and make their respective deals/promotions/coupons available to one anothers core users. Digest that for a second. It's even more powerful than most can imagine at first glance.

Good thing that BJPenn.com picked up on this and is taking it to the next level! We're honored to be part of this.

Learn more about Qmania here.

Facebook Driving More Traffic than Google (for Some)

Social media is becoming a more powerful driver of traffic than Google for many high authority sites on the web. It seems surprising at first, since web users go to search engines like Google to decide where visit next, while they usually head to Social Media sites like Facebook to hang out and share photos, videos, and thoughts. It's even more surprising considering that Facebook receives about a third of Google's traffic (50 million vs. 149 million in January, per ComScore).

Some of the big name sites receiving more traffic from Facebook than from Google include PerezHiltion.com, Evite.com, Tagged.com and even Twitter.com!

Although it's still early in the development of this trend, it's clear that Social Media has become a serious platform for growing your a website's traffic and providing real value to web users.

If you're looking to increase traffic to your website, enabling and encouraging people to share your content with their networks is key. Boiled down, if you give web users a great thing to share, and tools to share it, they will likely share it.

Keeping that in mind, we've ensured all deals posted on Qmania can easily be shared on Social Media sites like Facebook and Twitter. As Social Media continues to find its place in the online world, we'll be there to continue providing you tools to get the word out on your most buzzworthy deals.

Thanks for reading. We'll be sure to keep you updated on this trend and how Qmania is adapting to it as the trend evolves.

2009 - The Year of Mobile Local

Mobile search has been an increasingly hot topic over the past couple years. Local search, too. And for good reason.


Recently, the Kelsey Group held a great webinar called “The Mobile Local Opportunity” which highlighted recent developments in these spaces and forecasted the future of the movements. The web presentations cover a slew of useful things (including mobile usage and ad revenues) but its focus was on Local Search. The Kelsey group underscored the real beauty of mobile advertising: that it allows businesses to get in the pockets of their consumers and transmit messages to them more easily and frequently.

Timely and useful information, especially as the world is going through it's current economic palpitation. Local businesses need mobile and local advertising to save costs and reach their consumer how their consumer wants to be reached. 2009. Big year for us all. Let's embrace and lead the change!

Qmania Company Profile - Behind the Scenes

An interview with Doug Kato, Co-Founder and CEO of Qmania. A glimpse behind the scenes of the Qmania office. If you or someone you know owns or manages a business; a must watch.

Enjoy an insiders view of Qmania and its staff:



Update:

Thanks for all the positive feedback on the Company Profile! Great to hear from fans and users of Qmania!
Answers to some of your common questions:

Is it really free for businesses to use Qmania?

Yes. Businesses can use Qmania for absolutely free. People who want to use the offers and deals on Qmania can use it for free, too. More Details.

What's up with all the vinyl record labels on the wall?

The founders of Qmania, Kikuo Nishi, Kenny Ong, and Doug Kato also built Up Above Records (Visionaries, Look Daggers, Camile Velasco, LMNO, Kev Brown, 2MEX, Supernatural, Jurassic 5). The record sleeves on the wall are a snippet of Up Above's catalog.

What's up with all the iPhones?

90% of our office are avid iPhone users. Just can't be helped! (But when will un-jailbroken iPhones have copy/paste! - Update: Copy/Paste is here! Thanks Apple! :)

What's Alltop (around 02:42)?

Qmania is as much about saving paper (trees) as it is about saving paper (money). Please use our send-to-mobile options for deal downloads to keep the world a greener place! Alltop is a place for all today's top stories. In this case, a window for Green.Alltop is open. I must have been reading a bit of news on green technology - Good eye!

KHON - Qmania on Tech Buzz

Qmania CEO, Doug Kato, and Hawaiian Buzz Generating Extraordinaire, Jansen Tanaka, were recently featured on Tech Buzz (no pun intended) seen on Hawaii's News Channel, KHON.

Click to watch, and be sure to subscribe to us on Facebook or via RSS for future updates. Enjoy:

Hotels Removing Printed Yellow Pages from Rooms

Hotel families including Omni, Starwood and Hyatt are removing yellow pages from the drawers of their rooms for good. In an effort to stay green and save green, hotels around the country are moving from away from tradition and toward Internet based services. Via USA Today:

Omni Hotels, citing environmental concerns, announced Wednesday that it will eliminate phone books in its 45 hotels. The current stock of 30,000 phone books will be recycled. [...]

Along with the Bible, phone books have been staples at hotels for years. But citing environmental and cost concerns, the industry has been more aggressive about eliminating certain items and services that may not be needed daily, if at all.

Prepare for a likely move to provide more reliable, possibly cheaper high-speed Internet access at these chains. At present, access is a relatively pricey commodity, though BusinessWeek reports that “respondents ranked high-speed Internet access as the second most important attribute they consider in making a hotel selection decision.” Coupled with Gartner Group noting that “there are 36 million business travelers in the U.S., 75% of whom carry laptops,” it seems the green paradigm shift from paper to digital is beginning to gain serious momentum.