Solutions for Public Access
Retail centres, hotels, sporting venues, airports and local government are all looking in vast numbers for the next generation hotspot model to offer broadband wireless Internet access to the public. Paid hotspots, increasingly competing with free or 3G networks are expensive to use and maintain, with little revenue earned by the provider. In addition, there is little flexibility in branding and providers have no ability to get a record of users and usage. Moving away from the paid hotspot model to a customer loyalty model where instead of selling minutes, providers concentrate on selling or promoting core products and services is gaining significant market traction. amigopod believes that the framework of this next generation hotspot model should be based on the premise that some or all of the wireless access is FREE. Being free is a differentiator in itself – it demands attention and creates loyalty with repeat use. In return, the user has to provide some information from and about themselves such as facts, opinions, preferences, etc, thus providing valuable visitor intelligence for the provider to use to remain competitive, drive brand loyalty, attract/maintain customers and/or promote new services. Providers may request users submit information about themselves to gain unlimited free access, or over regular periods of time (e.g. every 30 minutes) for continued free access, offer free network access in return for a purchase; while others may still wish to continue with a commercial hotspot model and charge users for access. Whatever the marketing strategy, amigopod enables providers to deploy any business model they wish over existing technology and manage a next generation hotspot offering features including self registration, merchant billing, advertising services, and rich location/brand specific reporting. amigopod provides the gateway to connectivity to the next generation hotspot with a flexible and interactive marketing platform enabling customers to configure a self provisioning, fully customised captive portal for users to gain network connectivity while giving them complete control and management of users. Based on captured information about or from visitors, customers can then deliver a personalised experience for example send birthday greetings and offer premium and value added services to VIP/loyalty customers, so visitors feel they are receiving an excellent and personal customer service. Providers can further leverage visitor intelligence with amigopod, to develop campaigns and promotions with selective marketing to specific visitor groups through a variety of delivery mechanisms including SMS, MMS, banner ad, interactive Flash or video. All of the Public Access environments come with their own individual user experience and management challenges. amigopod plays a central role in simplifying these deployments and reducing the time to market by tightly integrating with either the existing or new wireless infrastructure to provide a fully branded and controlled user experience in Public Access areas. These environments often do not have dedicated IT resources therefore amigopod’s ability to self provision users is critical for the success of Public Access deployments. amigopod enables unified visitor management in the following sectors of Public Access: |
