Verizon’s Connection Day Gives Thanks, Free Stuff To Mobile Users

Ver­i­zon Wire­less hopes to cap­i­tal­ize on the busy hol­i­day trav­el sea­son by offer­ing lots of dig­i­tal free­bies from part­ner brands to mobile con­sumers.

Lisa Lacy By Lisa Lacy. Join the discussion » 0 comments

Ver­i­zon Wire­less has dubbed Novem­ber 26 “Con­nec­tion Day” and is offer­ing mobile users – regard­less of car­ri­er – what it calls “the chance to con­nect with every­thing they love in life,” or “friends, music, books, news, and apps” as they slog through pre-Thanks­giv­ing trav­el.

Not­ing the day before Thanks­giv­ing is one of the busiest trav­el days of the year, Ver­i­zon says Con­nec­tion Day is a “big ‘Thanks’ from Ver­i­zon dur­ing the sea­son of thanks.”

A Ver­i­zon rep says it is too soon to say if Con­nec­tion Day will become an annu­al event, but “response so far has been great.”

To pull off Con­nec­tion Day, Ver­i­zon says it has part­nered with “lead­ing con­tent providers” to “deliv­er excit­ing dig­i­tal treats” to wire­less users. Those part­ners include Ama­zon, Apple, Boin­go Wire­less, Condé Nast, Gogo Tech­nolo­gies, Jet­Blue and Pan­do­ra for offers like movies, TV shows, apps, wifi, audio books, dig­i­tal down­loads and stream­ing music.

When we chose what to offer, we thought about what would we like if we are trav­el­ing dur­ing the hol­i­day,” the rep told Momen­tol­ogy in an email.

Verizon ConnectionDayVer­i­zon want­ed to do some­thing for not just our cus­tomers, but all wire­less users dur­ing the hol­i­days. Con­sid­er­ing that Novem­ber 26th is a day so many peo­ple ‘go mobile’ as they trav­el to con­nect with friends and fam­i­ly, cre­at­ing Con­nec­tion Day was a great fit,” he said. “The offers are designed to make a crazy trav­el day a lit­tle bet­ter for peo­ple.”

In order to par­tic­i­pate, the rep says con­sumers should start on the Con­nec­tion Day web­site. There are dis­tinct offers for Ver­i­zon cus­tomers and all wire­less users. That includes a bonus for Ver­i­zon More Every­thing cus­tomers, who will receive 1 GB of data through the end of their cur­rent bill and anoth­er 1 GB on their next bill if they sign up before Novem­ber 26.

All wire­less cus­tomers, how­ev­er, are eli­gi­ble for oth­er part­ner offers.

Ver­i­zon is accom­plish­ing two things effec­tive­ly with this pro­mo­tion: first, it is help­ing Black Fri­day creep up to the Tues­day before Thanks­giv­ing, and where­as oth­er mar­keters seem blunt­ly ask­ing con­sumers to shop more, Ver­i­zon gives an authen­tic rea­son for this pro­mo­tion – it’s a big trav­el day, and one full of annoy­ances,” said Kristin Kovn­er, pres­i­dent of K‑Squared Strate­gies. “Sec­ond, by not lim­it­ing the cam­paign to cur­rent cus­tomers, it’s tak­ing a shot across the bow at com­peti­tors like T‑Mobile who have been offer­ing more and more val­ue-added ser­vices, data pack­ages, and voice min­utes to woo cus­tomers.”

In addi­tion, Tes­sa Wegert, com­mu­ni­ca­tions direc­tor at Enlight­en, notes it’s a clever way for brands to cap­i­tal­ize on the busy trav­el sea­son.

Even though we know there’s a mar­ket­ing strat­e­gy at the roots, con­sumers like to see that brands rec­og­nize and acknowl­edge what’s going on in their lives – like end­less time spent in cramped air­ports,” she said. “The con­cept seems aimed at recal­i­brat­ing the con­sumer mind­set, such that spend­ing time with mobile media isn’t just a fall­back or con­ve­nience, but excit­ing – an event to look for­ward to.”

Lisa Lacy

Written by Lisa Lacy

Lisa is a senior features writer for Inked. She also previously covered digital marketing for Incisive Media. Her background includes editorial positions at Dow Jones, the Financial Times, the Huffington Post, AOL, Amazon, Hearst, Martha Stewart Living and the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund.

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