Publicity leads to sales. Why? Because getting people to notice you is half the battle. If you can get a customer’s attention you can sell him the benefits of your product.

GPS mapping software for your Symbian phone

Sometimes in the morning I have the radio on. Occasionally I hear Pat Kenny, not because I particularly like his show, but because he comes after whoever preceded him.

Yesterday morning there was a very interesting interview with a guy from OSI (Ordinance Survey Ireland). They’re the people who produce the maps of our country.

The discussion was about a new GPS mapping application that lets users view OSI maps of Dublin on their mobile phones. The benefits were spelt out in a very compelling manner. Tourists, it was mentioned, could guide themselves with the mapping software, while Dublin’s residents could use the maps to find unknown streets and locations. And if you use a Nokia GPS phone the mapping software will even guide you to your destination. Pretty cool, and definitely the way of the future.

Buy on-line

Users can purchase and download the GPS mapping software for €29.99 from the OSI website, and the product comes complete with 500 POIs (Points Of Interest) for many of Dublin’s top attractions and locations.

It sounds like a really fantastic product, and I was quite surprised that an Irish company (and a publicly mandated body at that) was actually at the cutting-edge of this type of technology.

Great exposure, dreadful follow-through

This morning I got a chance to visit the OSI website to learn more:

Hmm.. not much to go on there. I expected there to be some emphasis on this new cutting edge mobile phone GPS mapping software. Well I’m honestly none the wiser so I select ‘Browse our mapping products and services’:

I’m really not making much progress here. I cant see any mention of mobile phone GPS mapping software. Maybe ‘digital products’?

Not there, so back to the homepage and this time I try ‘GPS services’. The guy on the radio did mention that this works with GPS. Nothing there either. To be honest at this stage I’m beginning to wonder if this is just some big joke. So I try ‘OSi Trail Master’:

Well this might be it. Unfortunately there’s no real reference material here to tell me what I’m looking at. Alas, it’s another false hope. Only two more options on the homepage left, and next up is ‘OSi StreetSmart’:

Bingo. With hindsight the name makes sense, but without any pointers figuring this out is far from trivial. Anyhow, now that I’ve finally found what I came here for I’d like to find out more. I suppose I should click the image – it is an anchor after all:

How to burn great publicity

Now most people couldn’t buy the publicity gained from a nationwide radio interview. That type of broadcast is just marketing gold-dust. Businesses have flourished on the attention garnered from radio mentions…

Yesterday morning the OSI gave us a text book example of how to burn through fantastic publicity with poor follow-through.

What’s the lesson? When you do get great exposure make sure you’re ready and waiting to fully leverage it.