Shameless self-promotion

Mobile marketing failures in 2011 were arguably less about campaigns going horribly wrong, and more about missed opportunity, too little integration of mobile into overall marketing tactics, and the need to be much more strategic about using mobile marketing.

Some of the areas mobile marketing has room for improvement in include:

1. Closing the loop with CRM

Mobile marketing is a great way to engage with customers at the point of sale when they have your product in their hands. From something as simple as an SMS to a shortcode to get a discount, to QR codes providing links to unique content, to the customer winning a prize for sharing a picture of them using the product, mobile marketing gives brands a chance to connect with their customers immediately, on the go and via a favoured device: their mobile phone.

Unfortunately all too often the very crucial next step doesn’t happen. Companies seldom use the opportunity to further engage with these customers, either by mobile, or by other channels such as social media, email or even a voice call. This wastes an opportunity to build on a positive initial encounter between the brand and the customer, where the customer has already volunteered certain pieces of information.

2. Real, ongoing engagement via mobile

As well as being a useful stepping-stone to ongoing engagement on other channels, mobile needs to be seen as primary customer engagement channel especially for the many people for whom a mobile device is their only internet device. And even if it isn’t, in some cases the mobile channel just makes more sense. For instance, towards the end of the year retailers will often send out discounts vouchers to say thanks to their loyal customers (and of course to encourage customers to spend money with them during the holiday season).

It’s one thing to email a statement to a customer, but it makes no sense to email a voucher to a customer, hope the customer hasn’t already gone on holiday and actually receives it in time, and then expect the customer to print it out (especially when the you’ve just sold them the idea of email statements as being environmentally friendly) and remember to take it along to the shops with them. Far better to send a mobile voucher that can be redeemed via the mobile phone – a device that the customer will definitely be checking all through the holidays and will definitely have with them when doing their shopping.

Likewise physically posting reward vouchers is problematic: it’s costly, not very green, you risk the customer only receiving the voucher after the expiry date.

3. Clever use of new technology

QR codes, augmented reality and location-based mobile technology have been derided as a waste of time in some quarters. It can also be argued though that we just haven’t seen these technologies being used in compelling ways that capture people’s imaginations and get them talking about it. Nine times out of ten, the cleverest use of a technology is also the simplest. Hopefully in 2012 we’ll see some interesting uses for QR codes, AR and LBS.

4. Spam

Unscrupulous and possibly sometimes just careless companies risk turning people off mobile marketing by spamming them. Email spam is one thing, but SMS and other types of mobile spam are so much more invasive, taking place on such a personal device people carry with them 24/7. For the ongoing success of the medium, opt-in needs to be the cornerstone of all mobile communication.

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• 

Mobile, schmobile. Mobile marketing’s just another buzzword thrown around by your agency, marketing department or publications like this one. Rather than being the next evolution in marketing, it’s just a distraction from getting the basics right, and another way for your agency to charge you more.

Well, obviously here at Vomo we don’t share this view, but it’s easy to see how mobile marketing could be dismissed as a load of hot air.

Firstly it’s still pretty hard to measure the impact of mobile marketing, and industry initiatives around the world are still scratching their heads trying to work this one out. Then there are the over-hyped stats, like the number of iPhones in the market. When you do the maths, you realise that contrary to the headlines, this is a very small number indeed in the grand scheme of things.

There’s also the issue of desktop web-based practices simply being transplanted lock, stock and barrel onto the mobile device. Take banner ads – pesky on the desktop web, but downright infuriating on the mobile web, taking up valuable real estate. (And not to mention pointing you to an iPhone app, even though you are using an Android handset.)

And probably the final nail in the coffin for mobile marketing is that the characteristic of the mobile phone – that fact that it is both personal and portable – that makes it potentially such a good marketing channel, is also its biggest weakness. Get it wrong, and you’re screwing up on the device that matters the most to people.

Then there’s the list of killer apps that was going to transform mobile marketing forever. From QR codes to augmented reality to location-based services, for now, these all seem like damp squibs.

Respectfully we’d disagree that mobile marketing is just a bunch of hokum. Firstly the numbers speak for themselves – with more SIM cards than people in South Africa, if you want to reach someone, the surefire way to get to them is via mobile. Add into the mix that for many South Africans mobile is the primary, and often only, way of accessing the internet.

Then consider that people do actually want to be communicated with via their mobile phones – if companies make it worth their while. According to Google’s mobile stats for South Africa, 54% of South Africans don’t mind receiving ads on their smartphones if they get rewards or freebies in return.

What we would say, however, is that it’s still early days. We need to move past just transplanting desktop-based practices onto a smaller and more mobile screen. Then we need to work out how to best measure the impact of these activities. And we need to stop treating mobile like tactical lego blocks, tacking them onto a marketing strategy at the last minute, and instead look at mobile strategically at the outset of any campaign.

Then let’s talk again about whether mobile marketing is over-hyped or not.

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• 

I regularly receive SMS alerts from an independent fishmonger that I support. They’re owner-run, only support sustainable fishing, affordable, and the fish is far fresher than the supermarkets with their elaborate cold-chains. The problem is that they are located in a part of Cape Town that I don’t often go to, and am unlikely to go to just to buy fresh fish, irrespective of how enticing their offers are.

Sure their regular SMSs keep them front of mind for when I am in the area, but how much more effective would it be for them to send me personalised offers when I am in the area, perhaps based on what I have previously purchased (tuna, yes please; hake, not so much, thanks)? Or, if I have driven past the shop three times and not popped in, a super-duper offer to entice me, once a loyal customer, back into the store?

Done well, this geo-targetted mobile marketing could make me feel valued as a customer, get me back in the shop to see new products, increase sales for the fishmonger, and make me a loyal customer once again. Who knows, I may drive past just to see what specials pop up on my smartphone.

Done badly, this could be a super-creepy, very annoying service that at best makes me unsubscribe from the service, and at worst makes me find a new fish shop, complain bitterly and publicly in person and online, as well as taking the shop to task for spamming me.

So the devil is in the detail and as with all marketing, the detail starts with getting your customer to opt in, making it very clear what they are opting in to, and then making it very easy to opt out. When it comes to personalisation, there is a fine line between creating a connection with a customer and coming across as a downright stalker. (What do you mean you hope I enjoyed my leftover tuna mayo sarnies for lunch today?!?)

From the point of view of the marketer, clever processes need to be put in place to make it appear that they are sending me a suitably personalised message, when in fact it’s the same message sent to a group of customers with a similar profile.

So that’s the deal with the devil that mobile marketers have to make. On the one hand, the very personal, “take it with you wherever you go” mobile device unlocks the ultimate in customer targetting and personalisation: geo-targetting. But, the flipside is that a badly implemented campaign has a similar potential to anger and alienate customers like never before.

Of course in my example above, a mechanism would have had to be put in place for my fish shop to pick up my location when I was in the neighbourhood. First prize for them would be for me to agree that they locate me automatically as soon as I enter a certain pre-defined area – this way they don’t have to rely on me checking in to know where I am. Personally I would need to have a very trusted relationship with a company or brand to do this, and the benefits to me had better be pretty good. I can see this working well for extremely aspirational lifestyle brands, but also even mom ‘n pop shops, like my fishmonger, where a personal, off-line relationship already exists.

Other options are for companies to tap into existing social media location services such as Foursquare, Gowalla and Facebook Places. While the element of personalisation might be slightly less in these instances, savvy marketers should know enough about their customers to pinpoint what deals will entice them to their business.

Finally, as mobile advertising and mobile ad networks become more sophisticated, it will be increasingly possible to target advertising by location. For instance, you could do a search on Google for a plumber in central Johannesburg and have a web ad for a plumber pop up on your screen. Add time into the mix and things get more targeted: searching for a restaurant at 7 am in the morning and you’re probably looking for a breakfast venue, while the same search at 5.30 pm implies you are probably looking for a dinner deal.

So, while I would argue that geo-targetting as a mobile marketing tactic is still approaching the runway, it is poised for take-off, and done right can up the rev count of most marketing campaigns.

First published on Vomo.

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Africa and mobile technology are a match made in heaven. Mobile technology has allowed hundreds of thousands of people to leapfrog traditional, and poorly implemented, wired telecommunications to be able to communicate over vast distances. Add in to the mix the necessity to find innovative ways to get around constraints, plus the MacGyver-ish ability to take bits and pieces of one thing and build something else, and it’s not surprising that so many mobile inventions have come out of the continent.

Here are the top five mobile inventions we recommend you take a look at:

1. M-Pesa

   Even though M-Pesa had a pretty disappointing start in South Africa, with only around 100 000 registrations in its first nine months, it definitely ranks up there as one of Africa’s top mobile inventions, and has been deployed as far afield as Afghanistan and Fiji. M-Pesa was launched by the former CEO of Kenyan mobile operator Safaricom, Michael Joseph, in 2007. Today, 15 million of Safaricom’s 17.5 million subscribers use the system to transfer US$700-million per month, according to Joseph, speaking before the 5th Annual Mobile Banking and Emerging Application Summit.M-Pesa gives people who do not have bank accounts and previously only dealt in cash a way to safely and cost-effectively transfer money via their mobile phones. Safaricom, in partnership with Kenya’s Equity Bank, also allows customers to earn interest on M-Pesa balances.

2. Fundamo

   Mobile banking golden child, Fundamo, announced a cool US$110 million (R750 million) acquisition by Visa this month. The company, founded by Hannes van Rensburg, ex-Sanlam CIO, in Cape Town’s northern suburbs, provides mobile banking infrastructure to mobile operators and financial institutions.Like M-Pesa, Fundamo proves that cellphones are key to providing banking services to the large number of people around the world who don’t qualify for, or have access to, a bank account. Fundamo has more than 50 active mobile financial service deployments in more than 40 countries around the world, including 27 in Africa, Asia and the Middle East. These deployments currently have five million registered subscribers, and have the potential, the company says, to reach in excess of 180 million people.

3.  MXit

   Arguably the bane of many parents’ lives, MXit, founded in Stellenbosch, South Africa in 2003, is the free online instant messenger and social networking platform that allows users to instant message via a cellphone at a fraction of the cost of a text message. For a small fee, as well as your data charges, users can also buy goods such as wallpapers and ringtones, or have conversations in the MXit chat rooms.User numbers are tricky to pin down, but are understood to be in the region of 10 million active unique users and 25 million registered users — primarily in South Africa, but also in Indonesia and other countries around the world. Increasingly marketers, educators and professionals in the healthcare industry are realising that MXit is an effective way of reaching the youth and young adult market. Next on the cards for MXit is a mobile wallet in partnership with wiWallet to allow purchases of larger items such as airtime, electricity and retail goods.

4. Ushahidi

   Ushahidi was born during the Kenyan election riots in 2007, when blogger Juliana Rotich wanted a way to allow people on the ground to report on violence, with the information primarily being captured by cell phone. Since then the Ushahidi team has built a powerful platform that captures information during a crisis, and displays it on a map to allow emergency services and other parties to get a crowdsourced view of what is happening.It was recently used as quickly as two hours after the Japanese earthquake earlier this year to identify locations where people might be trapped, dangerous areas, and the location of food and water supplies. Ushahidi has been used around the world during both political and natural crises in the USA, Haiti, Libya and India, amongst others.

5. JamiiX

   Another messaging platform, JamiiX grew out of a mobile instant messaging service used to counsel teenagers affected by drugs, alcohol addiction, and HIV in the Cape Flats area of Cape Town. The JamiiX platform was developed by South African, Marlon Parker, to effectively manage multiple mobile chat and mobile social networks streams. It allows eight counsellors to have 300 instant messaging (IM) conversations in one hour, massively increasing their ability to assist those who need help.It was released for third party use in 2010, and the WHO (World Health Organisation) has deployed JamiiX, in conjunction with MXit, in Indonesia to aid communications after natural disasters. Deployments are also underway in Nigeria and Malaysia.

First published on Vomo.

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So the sky didn’t fall in after all, nor have we reverted to drawing on the cave walls with charcoal, or sending each other messages with smoke signals since Steve Jobs’ retirement as Apple’s chief executive last month.

Instead, let’s all take a deep breath and start to consider what Jobs’ departure — strictly speaking a change in role, he is now chairman of Apple’s board — means for mobile marketing.

For a start, Jobs is undeniably the great disruptor when it comes to the mobile industry. As Justin Siegel, CEO of MocoSpace said Steve Jobs was responsible for making voice calls a peripheral feature of a mobile phone. And despite the limitations of the iPhone, there is no denying it is a thing of beauty when it comes to usability.

Then enter the iPad. Clearly not a phone, and can do a lot of what you usually use a desktop or laptop computer for, but very definitely a mobile device.

Last year the third piece of the puzzle fell into place. iAds is a closed mobile ad delivery platform that allows iOS developers to monetize their apps, and brands to engage with users of Apple’s mobile devices — in a more exciting way than previously possible with mobile advertising, according to Jobs. The key, apparently, is entrenching mobile advertising into iOS4. Generally the jury appears to still be out when it comes to the success of iAds and how innovative it really is.

According to Jeff Hasen at analysts Mobile Groove: “[iAds] has been a large disappointment for many advertisers and others (like me) who looked at Apple’s move into mobile advertising as a milestone and much needed push to move the industry along.”

Hasen continues to say though that if iPhone is also sold via Sprint and T-mobile in the US, as is expected to happen this year, the critical mass needed for advertisers to see real returns might become a reality. And if we know one thing about Apple fans, they are willing to wait while bugs get worked out of products and service.

So what’s next?

Steve Jobs continues to be involved with Apple as chairman of the board, and industry commentators say he is expected to remain involved in product and strategy development. Tim Cook, former chief operating officer who now takes over the chief executive reins from Jobs, has sometimes been dismissed as an accountant and lacking Jobs’ flair, passion and charisma. However, general consensus seems to be he is a solid pair of hands and can execute the current plan well.

Cook himself said in an email to Apple staff: “I want you to be confident that Apple is not going to change. I cherish and celebrate Apple’s unique principles and values. Steve built a company and culture that is unlike any other in the world and we are going to stay true to that – it is in our DNA. We are going to continue to make the best products in the world that delight our customers and make our employees incredibly proud of what they do.”

The market seems to be calm so far as well, after a few shaky days immediately after Jobs’ resignation announcement. Gartner analyst Van Baker said: “My suspicion is that Apple will do just fine. There are so many talented people there and Steve’s attention to detail is baked into the culture.”

And while it appears to be business as usual at Apple, it is going to be interesting to watch what Apple’s competitors do. Shares in Samsung Electronics, the manufacturer of iPad competitor the Galaxy tablet, rose three percent, while LG Electronics jumped four percent after Jobs’s announcement, reported Memeburn. Samsung certainly seems to be upping the ante in terms of marketing and smartphones sales in recent months, so it wouldn’t be too surprising if it took this opportunity to grab market share from Apple.

As ever, it seems, mobile marketers need to stay nimble and on their toes, ready to respond to a constantly changing, but always growing, market.

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We’re regularly throwing around stats providing evidence for just how much South Africans love their mobile phones, but this latest stat from Nielsen on the size of the South African cell phone market demonstrates a pretty significant shift, and should make marketers sit up and take a lot of notice. And then take a close look at their current marketing mix to make sure they are taking advantage of this new media dynamic.

According to Nielsen’s recently released Mobile Insights study in South Africa, more South Africans (29 million) use mobile phones than listen to the radio (28 million). This is a profound shift, as radio has always been seen as the darling of both South African advertisers and PR folks, thanks to its massive reach and excellent results.

TV comes in third, with 27 million viewers in South Africa. DSTV/M-Net viewers are at 5.5 million and internet users at 5 million. The report doesn’t say, but based on other industry numbers, this is most likely desktop internet users.

Now of course this doesn’t imply advertisers should abandon radio and TV in favour of mobile devices, but it does indicate that savvy advertisers and marketers have the opportunity to up their game and steal the march on their competitors with compelling multi-channel campaigns, leveraging the distinct benefits of mobile.

Speaking at the Mobilize 2011 conference last week, another Nielsen analyst, general manager of digital Jonathan Carson, pointed out that based on their tracking of how people use smartphones and tablets, it becomes very clear that tablets specifically are used while doing other things, especially watching TV. This, said Carson, provides TV companies with both an opportunity and a challenge: while their audiences might be highly distracted, they also have the opportunity to present more of a surrounded environment for their audience and advertisers.

The same can be said about mobile’s surging ahead of radio and TV in South Africa. It is highly, highly likely that very often cell phones are being used while people are listening to the radio and watching TV. So if brands aren’t considering digital and especially mobile at the outset of any campaign, these stats should be a big wake up call. While your consumers are listening to and watching your beautifully crafted traditional advertising, they are holding in their hands and engaging with a cell phone – the ideal time to get them to take the next step and deepen their brand engagement via a device they love.

Or if, as a brand or agency, you are thinking mobile from the outset, what are you doing to use the platform to make this most of this multi-tasking media dynamic in new, clever and appropriate ways? SMS shortcodes are still one of the easiest and most effective (when done right) ways to bridge the gap between traditional media and more interactive, digital media. But depending on your brand and your customers, the sky is the limit when it comes to gaming, augmented reality, QR codes and user-generated content, to name a few.

Mobile is also the bridge to social media. Nielsen says 11 percent of South Africans use their mobiles to go online, and consumers aged 25-34 are the heaviest users. Facebook is the most popular social media platform, used by 85 percent of mobile subscribers and half of all users of Facebook in South Africa access the site via their mobiles.

No doubt in a few years time we are not even going to be having this discussion: mobile, social and digital are going to be just another line item in a multi-channel campaign, rather than an afterthought or a crazy new idea we’re “just trying out”. Until then, though, forward-thinking brands have the chance to break new ground – it’s where your customers already are, after all.

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South Africa is well-known as a global leader in the mobile space — within our borders in any case – and we have been credited with a number of world-wide firsts including pre-paid mobile accounts, and SMS banking alerts. Indeed, some of our best-known, local-global success stories are mobile related — think Fundamo, MXit and Clickatell.

Unfortunately, I’d argue, we aren’t always the best at shouting our successes from the rooftops, and I am concerned that I am seeing the same thing happen in the mobile marketing space. By rights, we should be setting the standard for real results-orientated, broad-based mobile marketing campaigns. Let’s ignore, for the minute, the fact that headline writers all to often favour the sexy, yet very niche iPhone, over more bread ‘n butter stuff that is actually reaching a target audience in a highly effective way. I’m still not seeing awesome case studies coming from South African companies and agencies, with real results and ROI data attached to them.

I did a brief round up of how others in the industry would summarise the state of mobile marketing in South Africa today:

BulkSMS’s Pieter Streicher reminds us that permission-based marketing is here to stay, especially when it comes to mobile marketing:

By now, most companies should have woken up to the fact that if they want to stay in business for any length of time, permission-based marketing is the order of the day. In other words, get permission from customers and potential customers before marketing to them. What companies might not yet realise, is that SMS can be key to gaining this permission.

But, all too often the ball is dropped after the first engagement, making the customer database worthless. Once a company has started an SMS conversation with a customer – whether via an in-store promotion, on-package competition, TV ad or at an event – the engagement needs to be extended via a subscription to a VIP club, offer discounts and vouchers, provision of useful information or any number of other value-based offerings via a range of communication channels, including SMS.

An upbeat Mike Stopforth from Cerebra says:

It’s been an extremely exciting second-half of 2011 so far for mobile marketing. The sale of MXit to World of Avatar promises the continued growth and development of the mammoth instant messaging platform, while other homegrown applications like Motribe.com continue to achieve maturity and attract key clients and brands. The days of mobile marketing being limited to an SMS campaign and a mobisite are long gone, with agencies and clients alike looking to integrate mobile into marketing campaigns and online community management. In some cases we’re even seeing mobile lead marketing efforts. It’s an exciting time to be in mobile and I look forward to what 2012 will reveal!

Speaking of MXit, the mobile messaging company’s new owner and boss, Alan Knott-Craig feels we’re only at the beginning of what is to come:

Brands are only now awaking to the marketing opportunities presented by mobile phones…. Vodacom sends over 20 million Please Call Me’s every day. Each message ends with a short paid-for advert. They are sold out months in advance! At MXit we have over R1 billion of advertising inventory this year. Ten million people engage with MXit on a daily basis, spending an average of 45 hours a month on the platform. Show me another property like that and I’ll eat my hat.

Google’s head of mobile for SA, Brett St Clair pinpoints 2012 as the year of the smartphone in SA, as well as the opportunity that exists for shopping and mobile. He also points out that perhaps I haven’t been paying attention, with SA agencies winning international mobile marketing awards:

South Africa lead the way early in 2009 with Mobile Web Marketing, ranking in top 3 countries in the world for traffic volumes. Things have evolved and with around 6.7 million smartphones in the Market and this is on a rapid growth path as low cost Android handsets enter the market so we are seeing South Africa top the charts once again with mobile marketing audience engagement. This time consumers are engaging with search on mobile smartphones, using apps and HTML5.

Already 1 in 3 searches have a location element in them, consumers are using their phones as shopping companions on the go. 2012 will definitely be the year of the smartphone in South Africa, this will allow marketers to engage with audiences using rich media, contextually relevant targeting features and complete end to end tracking on phones. It is great to be working in one of the most innovating countries in the world when it comes to Mobile Marketing, last year South African marketing agencies won 3 out of the 5 international MMA Awards (Mobile Marketing Association), I am looking forward to this year’s event.

While all of these are great points, notice what’s missing from the industry at large? Real-life examples of effective campaigns, whether stand alone or as part of a multi-channel campaign, with actual results and outcomes. Instead, unfortunately, we are being fed and/or are resorting to case studies from abroad, typically more suited to a US or European, iPhone-wielding market.

First published on Vomo.

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Unlike any other digital device, mobile phones – especially smartphones – have entrenched themselves in so many parts of our lives, both online and offline. This is perhaps unsurprising, given we take our mobile phones everywhere with us, and typically have a pretty close relationship with them.

Recent statistics show to what extent the smartphone is already impacting our on- and offline shopping experiences, and this provides retailers and mobile marketers potentially very fertile ground for driving customer engagement via mobile.

According to Google’s Our Mobile Planet data, 28% of South African smartphones users say they take their smartphones along with them to compare prices and inform themselves about products while shopping. 26% have changed their mind about buying a product or service while in-store, based on the information they discovered using their smartphones. And, this behaviour extends to online shopping as well: 27% of South African smartphone users have changed their mind about buying a product or service online as a result of info they have gathered using their smartphone.

Only 15% of South African smartphone users have used mobile coupons for shopping in-store however, so it seems we have a long way to go when it comes to proactively engaging with customers via their smartphones.

Here are five suggestions for driving customer engagement via mobile:

1. Go online

Far too many retailers in South Africa barely have an adequate desktop internet site, not to mention mobile site (a PDF of a brochure does not constitute an adequate online presence). Not only should product or service information be easily available online, with pricing and contact information, the site should be mobile optimised for the smartphone users searching for product and pricing information on-the-fly (take a look at how Gap tripled its conversion rates with its m-commerce site). Based on the data above, it is clear that consumers are going to walk out your store, or pick up a competitor product off the shelf, if they can get better information online, via their smartphone, from your rival.

2. Be clever about QR codes

QR codes have received a fair bit of bad press recently, but I am tending to agree with the opinion that this is because they have been poorly implemented, rather than the lack of any intrinsic marketing value in the technology itself. The concept is still relatively new, with best practices and comparative data still emerging, but used right could be a very powerful way of driving customer engagement via a mobile device. Marketers need to think through their QR code campaigns a bit better for this to happen, including how the campaigns are constructed, the content provided by the barcode, and the follow-ups and calls to action.

3. Build a mobile community

We’ve been all about online communities for the last few years, but it’s obvious that with so many “mobile-first” and “mobile-only” internet users out there, mobile communities are going to be crucial to engaging with customers. Brands such as Guinness are doing interesting things with mobile communities in Nigeria via Motribe – and it would be fascinating to see how this has impacted Guinness’s customer engagement in that market.

4. Don’t forget about the feature phones

It’s definitely not all about smartphones, especially in South Africa, where more basic phones still comprise 85% of the market. This will change, with more affordable smartphones coming online, but feature phone users are unlikely to ever disappear completely. Here, the humble SMS can be very effective in driving customer engagement, as long as your campaign – as with QR codes – is well-planned, shares interesting and diverse information, and has a strong and clear call to action.

5. Make mobile coupons easy and worthwhile

Our Mobile Planet says 54% of SA smartphone users wouldn’t mind receiving ads if they received rewards or freebies. But only 15% have used a coupon to buy a product in-store. Now while South Africa doesn’t have as strong a coupon culture as America does, it has been my experience that all too often mobile coupons are too complicated, have too many catches or are just not easy to use. But the stats seem to indicate that some work here could go a long way to driving customer engagement.

First published on Vomo.

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There is no denying that science is getting more popular, and perhaps even sexier. Just take a look at the success of TV show, The Big Bang Theory, or how many times Professor Stephen Hawkings has appeared on The Simpsons. (It’s five, and he’s been mentioned another two times.) But the near infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) community are concerned they might be getting left behind.

At NIR 2011, the 15th international conference on NIRS, held in Cape Town in May this year, the community gathered to discuss ways to popularise their field. On face value, it appears that NIR is playing second fiddle to related technologies such as microwaves and x-rays, both household names thanks to applications that people encounter in their daily lives.  Digging a bit deeper, there are however some pretty interesting applications of NIR that could raise awareness of the field and be the key to popularising the technology. As Professor Heinz Siesler of the University of Duisberg-Essen said: ‘We don’t know how to communicate in a popular way and transfer knowledge on a more popular basis.’

It turns out that NIRS is fairly widely used in South Africa, from studying fossils, to measuring the alcohol and sugar content in wine, protein, fat and moisture during the food production process.

Dr Marena Manley, of the Food Science Department at the University of Stellenbosch, is on a drive to increase local uptake of the technology and also adapt the implementation to better suit local requirements.

‘While NIR technology is used in South Africa, we are lagging behind in terms of research to find optimal applications for unique South African products and conditions,’ she said. ‘We also need to develop more people with skills who are able to correctly calibrate NIR instrumentation for specific, local needs.’

NIRS has some compelling advantages over previous wet chemical processes used for food testing: it does not require harsh chemicals so is safer, quicker, cheaper and has less of an impact on the environment. Several constituents can be measured at the same time, further saving time. The process does not harm or destroy the item being tested, and can easily be implemented during the production process, allowing manufacturers to correct errors on the fly, rather than having entire batches being spoiled.

Ongoing checking during production also means that producers can be confident about the quality of their entire output because all items are checked, rather than merely a sample.

‘Because you can measure the entire spectrum, NIRS gives you a fingerprint of the entire sample, not just one parameter,’ said Manley.

It appears that if the equipment is correctly calibrated, and the sample correctly handled, accurate results can be achieved relatively easily – with the push of a button. The tests can even be run remotely, ethernet access to NIR spectrometers allow for remote control and diagnostics via a company intranet or the internet – truly processing in the dark, said Tony Blakeney from Australia’s Cereal Solutions.

Manley maintained that the initial investment in equipment and specialised skills to calibrate the instrumentation is recovered within three to five years. On the skills development front, Manley said that between virtual learning, visiting international trainers, or students studying abroad, the required skills are being created locally.

Low levels

Despite the benefits mentioned above, and the ease of use, it does appear that NIRS has some limitations and struggles with low levels, said Manley. In addition, NIRS can’t measure minerals but can measure the changes they cause.

NIRS has applications in the entire food production process, from measuring protein, fat or moisture in raw materials, such as wheat, rice or milk; through to the testing of constituent elements and their combination; to testing a final product to verify quality, origin, ripeness and that the product is what it says it is.

Although it is still early days, a discussion around miniaturisation showed the potential for NIR to enter our daily lives, particularly with regards to food consumption. Personal NIRS devices could help people with food intolerances – such as lactose and gluten – determine which food is safe for them to eat. Professor Hideo Itozaki, from Osaka University is exploring how NIRS can be used to scan water and other liquids at airports to uncover explosives (and to save the rest of us from having to buy expensive airport water once we are through customs!)

The technology itself has only been commercially implemented for less than 30 years, with the first commercial NIR spectroscope being deployed in 1972 in the Canadian wheat industry. As well as the food industry, NIR is being used in space exploration, the pharmaceutical industry and agriculture amongst others. The future could hold a device that measures the exact mix of petrol in your car and adjusts your engine to improve fuel efficiency, fridges that tell you which if your food has gone bad, and three-dimensional imaging for greater visibility over what you are measuring.

NIRS basics

NIR = near infrared. This refers to electromagnetic radiation with a wavelength longer than visible light, so to the human eye, located just adjacent to red in the spectrum. Infrared is divided into three bands, with NIR being the closest to visible light, between around 0.7 micrometres and 300 micrometres (there is no hard and fast rule on the ranges).

NIRS – Near infrared spectroscopy. Using NIR as a measurement tool.

How NIRS works

A beam of infrared light is passed through a sample, which could be gas, liquid or solid, or a combination of states, for instance yoghurt with chocolate chips. Once the light beam passes through the sample it is examined to see how much of it was absorbed or transmitted, and which wavelengths were absorbed or transmitted. Each chemical bond vibrates at a characteristic frequency, and most of these frequencies correspond to a frequency of infrared light. Where the frequencies match the light is absorbed. So an analysis of the light absorbed or transmitted tells you about the composition of the sample.

Typically a NIR spectroscope would be carefully calibrated according to how it was going to be used, and the results analysed accordingly.

First published on South African Food Review.

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The packaging industry should not rest on its laurels, even though according to the recent WWF Dairy Lifecycle Analysis report, packaging only contributes 4-6% of the total carbon footprint of the milk production lifecycle. According to the report’s author, The Green House’s Dr Philippa Notten, packaging has the highest influence on the rest on the rest of the lifecycle compared to any other stage from the farm to the consumer.

For instance, the carbon footprint of a container is equivalent to that of 1.5 tablespoons of milk inside the container. In addition, wastage that takes place later in the lifecycle of milk has a higher carbon footprint: wasting one litre of milk at home is equivalent to wasting two litres at the farm. So, in the context of this report, it is vital for packaging companies to concentrate on extending the life of milk both in the supply chain and once it reaches the consumer, to make sure every litre is used. This is more important than other sustainability concerns and debunks some assumed sustainability practices, such as the benefits of larger packaging.

Long-life milk is one solution, reducing refrigeration requirements, allowing consumers to buy more milk at once, cutting down on trips to the supermarket and extending the life of the milk at home. Tetrapak has recently launched what it says is the world’s first aseptic carton bottle, the Tetra Evero Aseptic one-litre carton bottle, which combines the features of a bottle, such as ease of pouring and storing, with the benefits of a carton, including being lighter to transport with less additional packaging required than some other containers. The carton bottle is made from FSC-approved renewable paperboard and uses half the electricity than other aseptic bottling lines.

From milk to wine, Backsberg has been shaking up the vino packaging market with the use of PET bottles in its eco-friendly Tread Lightly range of wines. The polyethylene terephthalate bottles weigh 50g compared to the 400g a glass wine bottle weighs; have a carbon footprint of 29% to 52% less than glass bottles; use 40% to 50% less energy in manufacturing and the supply chain; and have allowed Backsberg to reduce its deliveries by a quarter.

Retailers can use less shelf-space to display, refrigerate or store the bottles, which don’t break if dropped. These benefits continue on the to consumer and it is intended that consumer choose the lightweight bottles for outdoor activities where glass is not allowed or appropriate.

The PET bottles are produced by Mondipak Plastics and consist of a dual layer of PET with an oxygen barrier layer sandwiched in between to prevent oxidation. According to Mondipak this ensures the wine has a shelf life of up to two years.

Recently Mondipak has released a 187 ml version of the bottle for the airline industry, with the U.S.-based JetBlue using them. Other wineries to jump on board are Simonsvlei, which is using a light green version of the bottles for its Lifestyle range; and Boland Cellar for its eco-friendly Flutterby range. Woolworths uses the bottle for its white One Off wine.

Sticking with the wine industry, Rhebokskloof is claiming a first in the South African wine industry with the tree-free labels since the end of last year. The labels are produced from 100% renewable sugar cane fibre. The 110 gramme uncoated paper allows for all the usual value-added printing features, and apparently stays put when wet, even in an ice bucket.

First published on South African Food Review.

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