Ashmore’s Mobile Digital finds target with Sniper program

THINK MMS is dead? Think again says the owner of this clever Gold Coast start-up that is starting to make serious money.

Eibhlis Stuckey is the founder of Mobile Digital which sells and supports a unique software platform and connectivity solutions.

ONE Gold Coast start-up is doing a lot to prove that the rumours of the death of MMS (multimedia messaging service) have been greatly exaggerated.

Mobile Digital was launched by Eibhlis Stuckey as a patented process of personalising and building an animated GIF or static PNG for delivery as an MMS.

The company launched its platform — Sniper — in November, 2017, with 20 enterprise clients on board, and is looking to add staff to cope with increased demand.

Ms Stuckey was running a company called Gift Digital — which produced and delivered digital gift cards.

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However, the business faced industry opposition ­because it relies on breakage — consumers not using the cards — to produce a profit.

However, one client — Dean Taylor of Cracker Wines — asked them to send an MMS with a gift card to his clients as a one-off in 2015.

“Rather than people buying the gift cards he wanted to send some out as a thank you to customers. He said: ‘I love your product it never fails. Can send 40 to my top clients’?”

They did and he had a redemption rate of 42 per cent — a very high rate.

They next trialled a promotional offer for Valentine’s Day in 2016, sending 12,000 visual MMS messages.

“We had a redemption rate of 18 per cent. His regular campaigns were getting less than a one per cent redemption rate through such tools as email. He spent $6000 with us and generated revenue in excess of $250,000 in 12 days. We thought, ‘we’re not charging enough’.”

Ms Stuckey said the next client was Harris Farm Markets, which sent an offer to 11,000 “non-fiscal” customers.

“These customers had filled a cart and never completed it. They were people who had given them their details and said, ‘I like your stuff’, but hadn’t done anything,” she said.

Harris Farm had a redemption rate of about 19 per cent for its offer of $49 free groceries if customers spent $150.

“They didn’t tell us their exact figures but their website did go down.”

Ms Stuckey said there was a perception that Whatsapp, and other messaging services, had killed MMS.

“MMS was the second-highest earner prior to messaging apps such as Whatsapp,” she said. “Everyone was sending pictures to one another. The second Whatsapp came out, they stole the thunder. It was a fight with Telstra to get them to see MMS is not dead. People want to be contacted by text they do not want to be phonecalled.”

Mobile Digital now has a customer base that includes Sydney-based mealkit delivery service HelloFresh.