It is a big election year and many political candidates will be using our voice broadcast, or “robocalls,” to reach voters. The question came up as to how the Telephone Consumer Protection Act of 1991 fits in with political candidates. You probably know that political candidates are given more leeway when it comes to outbound telemarketing without a bonafied opt-in.

Under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act of 1991, politicians and campaign volunteers may call voters on their landline or wireless phones. But when a campaign uses an auto dialer to leave a “robocall” (precorded message), calls to wireless phones are prohibited. In short, it is:

• legal for a campaign to call voters on their landline phones using an auto dialer to leave a robocall without the “prior express consent of the called party.”
• illegal for a campaign to contact voters using to use auto dialers and robocalls to their cellphones without prior express consent.

The same rules apply to text messages. It is:

• legal for campaign workers to send texts to voters’ cellphones. For this service, political candidates can use text message marketing services such as 84444.com.

To learn more about TCPA, please visit the FCC’s websites on telemarketing and SPAM texts.

Please do not consider this legal advice. You should consult your own attorneys to get your own legal opinion.

1 in 5 restaurant visitors want to receive text messages from their favorite restaurants.

No matter how bad the economy may appear to be, Americans are eating out more often.  According to the National Restaurant Association, sales at restaurants are projected to grow by 3.5% in 2012 to reach a record $632 billion.

And, restaurants create jobs–lots of them.  Overall employment in the restaurant industry will reach 12.9 million this year, accounting for 10% of the total US workforce, according to the National Restaurant Association.

Technology is part of the trend.  Nearly 40% of restaurant customers said that they would like to order on tablets.  The same percentage indicated a desire to use smartphone apps to look at menus and order delivery from an app.

Text message marketing is also gaining momentum with restaurants.  While 30% would like to receive an email with daily specials, 20% now say that they would prefer to receive daily specials via text message marketing.

Here is the direct quote from the National Restaurant Association:
What’s more is that in today’s über-connected society, email and text messaging are proving to be an effective way for restaurant operators to reach their consumers. Roughly 3 in 10 of adults said they would like to receive an email with daily specials, while about 1 in 5 prefer text messages with similar information. If a restaurant’s specials were available on Facebook or Twitter, nearly one-third of consumers say they’d be likely to sign up, indicating that social media continues to be a powerful marketing tool.

Wayne, Pennsylvania – For the second consecutive year, Laurie Schaub, wife of Houston Texans’ quarterback Matt Schaub, has been named as “Football’s Hottest Wife” by the readers of fantasy sports websites Fantasy Football Sideline and Fantasy Baseball Dugout.

Voting by text message helped earn Laurie Schaub the title of Football's Hottest Wife.

Buoyed by promotion from Philadelphia rock station WMMR and her appearance on the Spadora on Sports radio show, the beautiful Julie Dorenbos, wife of Eagles long-snapper Jon Dorenbos, was the very deserving and early leader in the competition.  But, as the competition moved into the second half of the season, Schaub began making her move and ultimately became the repeat winner in the second year competition.

Third place was awarded to supermodel Gisele Bundchen, wife of Patriots’ quarterback Tom Brady.  Gisele was clearly the most famous of the finalists, but football fans tended to lean toward the less well-known candidates Schaub and Dorenbos.

Laurie Flynn Schaub is an ex-cheerleader from Auburn University.  She parlayed that experience with the Tigers to become a cheerleader for the Atlanta Falcons.  While in Atlanta, she met Matt who was then the back-up QB and holder for the placekicker.  The couple married in February 2008.

Football’s Hottest Wives, patterned after the highly successful Baseball’s Hottest Wives that is now entering its fifth year, began early in 2011 when several nominees were named by the fantasy football website.  Based on visits by readers, the final 17 finalists were selected by the publishers of the website.  Voting began early in the NFL season and continued through Super Bowl Sunday.  Fans were permitted to vote once per hour.  Voting was provided through the website and through text message voting provided by mobile marketing site 84444.com.

Here are the final statistics for Football’s Hottest Wives 2011-12.

1. Laurie Schaub (Matt) – 24.8%
2. Julie Dorenbos (Jon) – 20.4%
3. Gisele Bundchen (Tom Brady) – 7.8%
4. Kristin Cavallari (Jay Cutler) – 4.6%
5. Sasha Dindayal (Antonio Gates) – 4.5%
6. Alicia Jammer (Quentin) – 4.1%
7. Candice Crawford (Tony Romo) – 3.6%
8. Evelyn Lozada (Chad Ochocinco) – 3.5%
9. Heather Mitts (A.J. Feeley) – 3.5%
10. Katina Taylor (Jason) – 3.3%
11. Amanda Brown (Peyton Hillis) – 3.3%
12. Carrie Prejean (Kyle Boller) – 3.2%
13. Christy Oglevee (Chris Cooley) – 2.9%
14. Brittany Koehl (Stephen McGee) – 2.6%
15. Sanya Richards (Aaron Moss) – 2.5%
16. Kim Zolciak (Kroy Bierman) – 2.1%
17. Betina Driver (Donald) – 2.0%
18. Others – 1.4%

We comb the write-in vote in the hopes of finding a hot wife that we may have missed in the competition.  The leading write-in candidate was Susie Celek, boxer and wife of Eagles’ tight end Brent Celek and also the business partner and good friend of Julie Dorenbos.  Susie is also a regular on WMMR radio in Philadelphia.  Nicole Jennings, wife of Packers’ wide receiver Greg Jennings, was also listed on numerous write-in ballots.

Kendra Wilkinson, wife of Hank Baskett was also named on several ballots, but Kendra was not eligible this year due to Baskett not being on a regular NFL roster.  Lingerie Football League stars Amber Seyer and Jenny Kaus also received votes, but that’s for another contest that the company will sponsor soon – Hottest Stars of the LFL.

Eli Manning at Super Bowl 46

Not everybody was a winner at Super Bowl 46, but AT&T Mobile certainly was.  In a post from John Donovan, senior executive vice president, he reported what happened at Lucas Oil Stadium, in addition to the Giants 21-17 victory.

AT&T customers attending the Super Bowl made a lot of phone calls — 75, 204 to be exact.  But, the number of calls was a small fraction of the total text messages that were sent and received by the fans at Lucas Oil Stadium.  Super Bowl fans attending the event sent and received 722,296 text messages during the game.  And, that’s in addition to all of the mobile marketing events at the Super Bowl.

No doubt, a lot of fans at the stadium wanted to share this event with as many friends and family as possible.  The numbers tell the story of just how integral sending and receiving a text message has become in our lives.  And, the importance of mobile in general.

Total customer usage of data was equally impressive: 215 GB were used–the highest data usage ever seen from a single sporting event.  Fants were posting lots of video and sending pictures to those of us watching in our family rooms instead of in Indianapolis.

AT&T’s efforts to enhance the user experience in Indianapolis were impressive.  It launched a Wi-Fi Hot Zone with 15 access points and added capacity to 200 cell sites throughout the Indy market.  It also deployed 9 COWs (Cells on Wheels) around the stadium.

Text Message SPAM

At 84444.com, and Advanced Telecom Services, we hate SPAM text messages as much as you do.  A business or organization that sends SPAM text messages is not only violating the law, but also making text message marketing in general much less effective.

Therefore, as a public service to our readers, we are providing an easy online method for contacting the FCC about unwanted text message SPAM.  Please click here to report text message SPAM to the proper authorities in the United States.

You will be doing all of us a favor.

Super Bowl Sunday requires some serious flour power at pizza restaurants across America.

The National Restaurant Association said that 55% of Super Bowl viewers order food from restaurants and 65% of them pick pizza.  For most pizza restaurants, that means that Super Bowl Sunday will mean twice as many pizzas as their next biggest day of the year.

Last year, Pizza Hut and Domino’s sold 2 million and 1.2 million pizzas respectively on the day of the biggest game of the year. Papa John’s sold more than 1 million pizzas on Super Bowl Sunday topping its 940,000 that it sold on Super Bowl Sunday in 2010.

Papa John’s Gives Away Free Pizza on Coin Flip

This year, however, Papa John’s has cooked up a new promotion in an attempt to top 2011’s sales.  If you go to the Papa John’s website, you can choose the outcome of the coin toss if you are a member of Papa John’s Rewards.  If the majority of Americans choose the outcome of the coin toss prior to the start of the Super Bowl, Papa John’s will give away one large one-topping pizza plus a two-liter Pepsi MAX to its Papa John’s Rewards members.

If you like to gamble based on historical outcomes, this is not the best place to do so.  In the first 45 Super Bowls, heads holds a slim 23-22 lead so it must be the year for tails, right?  Interestingly, the NFC team has won the coin toss for 14 consecutive years.

A coin flip that matches the choice of the fans is going to mean that Papa John’s employees are going to be flipping a lot more free pizzas in February.  And, Papa John’s hopes that its Rewards members will be flipping out if they win.

Despite the potential cost of the free food, Papa John’s online promotion and television commercials starring Peyton Manning and Jerome “The Bus” Bettis are helping it build its database of email addresses and mobile phone numbers.  A mushrooming database for email and mobile marketing is the result of savvy efforts such as this.

Private Stores Playbook for Pizza Sales

But, it isn’t just the large pizza chains who are trying to earn a larger slice of the super-size Super Bowl pie.  Local pizza restaurants like Main Line Pizza in Wayne, Pennsylvania, are also getting into the act.  Last year, single location store Main Line Pizza offered a Super Bowl party platter via its text message marketing and received an 11% return rate.

“That blew me away,” said Robert Saionz, owner of Main Line Pizza.

“It has been very effective,” said Jennifer Saionz who handles the marketing for Main Line Pizza and creates the text message promotions.

Jennifer said that the 84444.com text message marketing company that it uses has packages as low as $45 per month for up to 1000 text messages, thus making mobile marketing the most inexpensive advertising that it does.

Main Line Pizza builds its database through store-front signage, stickers on its pizza boxes, and by offering an immediate 10% discount for any new customer that opts-in to its database and shows the text message.

Taking Action on Super Bowl Pizza Sales

Super Sunday is the biggest day of the year for many things: hours spent watching television; dollars wagered; pizza sales.  While it’s probably too late for your restaurant to purchase a $3 million spot in the Super Bowl, there’s still time to set up a text message marketing promotion to have a spectacular Super Sunday in pizza pie sales.

8 times more of us will be using mobile coupons by 2016.

The redemption rate for mobile coupons will grow to 8% globally by 2016, according to a study by Juniper Research.

Currently, Europe and North America are trailing Asia in terms of mobile coupon redemption.  By 2016, the study projects that over 600 million people will use mobile coupons.

Mobile coupons play a vital role in bridging the gap between online stores and brick and mortar stores.  Mobile coupons will become an important part of a retail store’s ability to compete with the cheaper costs of online retailers.

Total mobile coupon redemption values for 2016 will be $43 billion globally.  Marketers will become better at targeting and mobile apps will be a major driver of mobile coupon delivery.

A legitimate opt-in is required for all database uploads on 84444.com

We have had to tighten this policy to ensure that all customers that use the shared short code 84444 are adhering to the Mobile Marketing Association Best Practices in regards to what constitutes a legitimate opt-in.  Now, we must first review the methodology used during your opt-in process to ensure that you’ve met all of the necessary guidelines.

So, the first time that you wish to upload a list, we will need to approve it first.  If you have a consistent track record of low complaints and opt-outs from your lists, we will re-instate the ability for you to upload lists directly on the site.

While this may be a bit inconvenient for you, be assured that this is being done to protect the predominantly legitimate users of our text message marketing service and to discourage those spammers looking for a quick hit or willing to stretch the rules of what constitutes a legitimate opt-in.