Authored By:
Kelvin Hilton
Academic Lead—Staffordshire University
Mobile Marketplace - Innovation White Paper Series
Version: 1.011A
Copyright WMMW April 2006 – All rights reserved

Tom and Jane emerge from Rags and Co having just procured the dress for their romantic
evening out and re-enter the mall, a floor down they note that Threads have a 20% off
everything promotion and in the window, to their dismay, is the same item.
Kath and Ali have just arrived at TomorrowMall, Kath enters her MallSAS activation PIN
into her mobile phone and as they head from the car Eastern Designs deliver a 10% off sale
notification and, as they enter the mall, Bric-n-Brac alert that they have moved from Level 2
unit 12 to Level 1 unit 19 and to celebrate they are offering the first 50 MallSAS subscribers
two-for-one deals. Kath is a fan of Eastern and makes a note to go browse but first she wants
some shoes, so she sends a request to MallSAS for any stores that have any relevant
promotions running that day, MallSAS responds with a list. Whilst in FeetRU she finds a
suitable pair and again pages MallSAS asking if DrSole has the same shoe in its sale range,
MallSAS responds that it has but only has 1 pair left in stock, she’d better hurry.
Bricks and mortar retailers are heavily dependent on the shop window to attract
customers; the problem is what if that window is in the wrong place at the wrong time?
obile direct marketing is not new but to date success has been limited, figures
show the market to be around €200m across Europe and North America for 2005
(visongain, 06) with analysts predicting major growth year-on-year for the
foreseeable future. However, given that there are over 60 million mobile
subscriptions (ENTER, 06) in the UK alone and that the technology has been capable of
delivering since the turn of the millennium the numbers are not that impressive.
The key to success lies in targeted communication, context sensitive delivery and added
customer service. The purpose of this paper is to define a solution which meets these
challenges and outline an evolutionary path to the next generation of mobile
consumerware.

THE MALLSAS ENGINE
Fundamentally MallSAS is a messaging platform, designed to take input directly from
stores, or mall operators (hereafter generically referred to as the Vendor) and deliver to
subscribers. However, where MallSAS differs from conventional offerings is that it is
location sensitive, context sensitive and designed with the goal of delivering rich content
across a range of broadcast technologies, not just SMS. Further, it will provide vendors
with real-time feedback on subscriber requests and responses to the promotion facilitating
informed post-event analysis.
Figure 1 represents a conceptual model of the MallSAS architecture.
Vendor Subsystem (VSS)
Provides the interface to the Vendor. The VSS contains the entities necessary to register,
validate and verify Vendors.
Vendors send their promotional data via traditional desktop or back-end systems to the
MallSAS system, via the AuB using secure socket transmissions and standards based
protocols. Alternatively, the Vendor can use mobile technology such as SMS, MMS, to
upload data. The Authentication Broker (AuB) validates the source and authenticates the
transaction and generates a promotional transaction unit (PTU). The PTU consists of a
unique vendor code, launch time, a time to live, an enumeration of target locations and
West Midland Mobile and Wireless
Mobile Marketplace - Innovation White Paper Series

Associated tokens such as digital vouchers, images, etc. Vendors can register and
subsequently control their promotions and system data via a browser based Profile Manager
(VPM).
Subscriber Engine (SuE)
Manages Subscriber registration and maintenance. A new subscriber may register using a
desktop via a browser or email ( featured registration ) or via a mobile terminal ( light
registration – service will be limited to a subset of system features until the new
subscriber has completed a full registration application ). Subscribers can register and
subsequently control their preferences and system data via a browser based Profile
Manager (SPM). Post registration Subscriber Authentication consists of a poll/acknowledge
cycle. Once registration has been validated and verified the subscriber’s account is ready
to receive data from MallSAS. A Subscriber entity will consist of individual subscriber data,
their preferences and a Mobile Entity Capability Sets (MECS) consisting of the type of
terminal they are using and its capabilities. Preferences may consist of filters, special
interests etc. and can be edited post-enrollment 1. On arrival at a participating location
the Subscriber pages the location PIN and optionally, a stay duration estimate (or a default
will be applied) to MallSAS to activate alert delivery for that location and to set the
Subscriber’s state to resident via Subscriber Activation. To protect Vendors, a pre-delivery
report may be requested detailing the volume of alerts that will be generated on-post to
allow for pre-launch adjustment. Thereafter, all live and relevant alerts will be delivered
for the duration of a Subscriber’s visit.
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Mobile Marketplace - Innovation White Paper Series
1 It is not the intention of the system to store any financial or personal data beyond the minimum required to
support the system. System is fully compliant with the DPA.

Delivery Manager (DMg)
The PTU is passed to the DMg and for each participating location, the content to be
delivered is registered in the Content Repository (CoR) and the SuE queried for the MECS
for each resident Subscriber. The SuE returns Targeted Subscriber Set (TSS) and the Alert
Delivery Engine (ADE) iterates through the TSS and delivers the content as defined by the
MECS over the appropriate channel 2. The Transaction Log (TL) stores the data of each
Subscriber contacted and the nature of the communication (e.g. initiation, response to
query, etc) for billing and reporting purposes. Vendors will be able to remotely query the
TL and the SuE for real-time analysis of the promotion. The Subscriber may query MallSAS
for information such as “where is the nearest” or “locate the cheapest” the Subscriber
Request Response Unit (SRRU) will parse the request, query the CoR and Remote Resource
Interface (if required, see below), log the transaction and respond.
Billing Engine (BiL)
Vendors will be billed according to the rules defined in the Account Manager (VAM).
Remote Resource Interface (RRI)
Incoming Subscriber queries that cannot be resolved within the CoR will be passed to the
RRI which will use available service partnerships to generate best effort responses.

THE MALLSAS VISION
The MallSAS development team initially intend phase one to deliver text and multimedia
message alerts via mobile channels. Moving forward they envisage MallSAS will incorporate
multimedia delivery, kiosk support, implicit location based identification and a range or
consumerware related information delivered via the most cost effective wireless and/or
mobile technologies. Additional services to facilitate increased subscriber activation and
thus Vendor ROI such as news/sport feeds, support for mobile RSS, etc. are also being
considered.
To the Vendors MallSAS brings a mechanism for delivering real-time, targeted and tailored
promotional marketing direct to the consumer at a specified location and through delivery
of real-time feedback and analysis on their mobile promotional activity, they can adjust
and respond instantly to local market dynamics. Vendors would have access to proximity
data, enabling them to see which Subscribers were in locations where they have stores at
what time, etc.
To the consumer, MallSAS will offer a single mobile portal through which they can enhance
their bricks and mortar retail experience and maximize the potential of the
communications technology at their fingertips. MallSAS will provide consumers with
services they need at the point of need, never again will they miss that bargain, or leave
the money off voucher at home.
REFERENCES
Kaplan, M. (2006) Mobile advertising and marketing: Market analysis and forecasts 2006-
2011 [online]. London, UK, visiongain. Available from:
http://www.visiongainintelligence.com/reportDetail.aspx?reportId=1277&adSelecti
on=Y&industryIdL1=1003 [Accessed 25th April 2006].
ENTER (2006) Mobile 2006 Market Trends Facts and Figures. Madrid, Spain: IDATE, M-5129-
2006.
2 Initially SMS and MMS only.
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Mobile Marketplace - Innovation White Paper Series