ReveNews
Peevertising?!?
No, you did not read this wrong. In reality this has been around for a while, if you count the screens in the urinals, but this new one covers everyone. MizPee is a new advertising supported service to help you find a restroom nearby. Their idea is that local advertisers will be able to reaach highly targeted (and quite distracted) customers. I did not happen to find any ads on the pages I searched, but the process was described in a Clickz story:
A search for public toilets near the intersection of Geary and Market streets in San Francisco, for instance, identifies the closest 45 toilets sorted by the approximate number of feet from a user’s location. A text ad below the first page of results states “Free coffee, 870 feet away.” A click through to the ad tells the location, and instructs users to show the screen and “tell them that MizPee sent you!” to redeem the coupon.
If you really have to go that bad, are you thinking that you want more coffee? And who wants coffee bad enough to go up to the counter and tell them that MizPee sent them for a free coffee?
They have grandiose plans for dayparting and active advertising by restaurants trying to fill a few empty tables as needed. If this really took off and became as popular as Facebook, it might work, but this needs a massive reach and salesforce (as noted by the CEO in the story).
Maybe their next genius idea will be a finding service for good ribeye or t-bone, MizSteak.
I do see some merit in the idea, but someone with maps and local ad data (G) will trump them with the local finder thang, allowing us to type in (or say or think) pizza, bathroom, car repair, bus stop, parking space, etc. Mobile computing is on the verge of entering the reality realm that we’ve been dreaming of for a long time, a very exciting time to be in marketing!
After true mobility matures, I’m hoping that my third grade teacher’s predictions will come true… and the robots will do all the work and we’ll only work a day or two a month… hey, a guy’s gotta dream. Thanks Mrs. Baker, dream seeding is the best gift any teacher ever gave me. Yes, it does bring us things like Peevertising, but every now and then, the aim is true and it hits the mark and actually does change the world.