Mobile Commerce Strategies and CROME Triggers

In my research on mobile commerce and mobile consumers' behaviors this year, the need to personalize a user's mobile/digital experiences always comes up as a top priority.  Everyone wants an experience that is relevant. However, as I pondered these studies, it occurred to me that personalization is only a part of the solution. If you received an SMS message on your smartphone about a shoe sales (your favorite brand and style), that ended yesterday, at a location hundreds of miles away, the personalization would be without value.  Yes, it is your preferred brand and style, but not in your location or at a relevant time.  So there is something missing.

We, at Cognizant's Center for the Future of Work, have identified through our research the need for CROME (contextually relevant, opportunities, moments and environments) triggers.  CROME triggers are bits of data that provide context, which can be used to provide relevant personalization at a specific time and place. For example, you buy concert tickets on a mobile app.  When the event ends, the app automatically shows you (based on CROME triggers) available car services and public transportation close to your location with an option to order a pick-up with one click.  The CROME triggers in this example are:

• The purchase of concert tickets
• Known date and time of concert
• Known location and venue
• Recognized distance from your home address
• Your movement which predicts the concert has ended
• Your physical location
• Weather conditions
• Visibility into the locations of available cars

These CROME triggers provided the data that when analyzed, understood and integrated with relevant personalization engines, can optimize the user's experience.

There are at least six challenges when implementing a CROME strategies:

1. Identify the required CROME triggers
2. Understand what specific CROME triggers mean
3. Understand where and how CROME triggers can be placed, collected and transmitted
4. Monitor and analyze CROME triggers in real-time
5. Connect specific CROME triggers to specific personalization options
6. Provide CROME powered personalization in mobile experiences

CROME triggers inform you something different and perhaps significant is happening.  Finding the meaning, and then relating it to a need for personalization is the topic of my next article.

Stay tuned for my new report, Cutting Through Chaos in the Age of "Mobile Me".

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Kevin Benedict

Writer, Speaker, Senior Analyst

The Center for the Future of Work, Cognizant

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***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and digital transformation analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.