Irvine-based Boost Mobile LLC credits a marketing push for helping it gain more than 2 million customers this year through September.
Boost, which has 4.3 million customers and markets prepaid cell phones from parent Sprint Nextel Corp., started pushing a $50 per month unlimited service plan in January. It allows for unlimited calling, text messaging, wireless Web access and walkie-talkie service.
At the time, it was the only $50 monthly prepaid plan available.
“The nature of our business is that the recession has actually worked to our advantage,” said Peiti Feng, manager of media and advertising at Boost Mobile.
2009 marked a number of advertising switches for Boost.
Boost bought TV network time in bulk instead of picking up leftover spots on the fly, according to Feng.
The company used the time for its “Unwronged” commercials, which took shots at cell phone contracts.
With businesses cutting back on advertising, media companies offered deals to any advertiser looking to commit to blocks of time.
“We participated upfront this year for the first time to capitalize on locking in premium inventory at a low price,” Feng said.
Boost also marketed the $50 flat-rate deal on radio, billboards, online and in print. For the first time, it used direct response ads that prompted viewers to respond to the company.
“This was the first year we used (direct response) as our workhorse,” Feng said.
Boost is looking to keep up its marketing next year.
“We are projecting a forecast of 20% growth next year, so our marketing initiatives have to be just as aggressive to support that,” Feng said.
Magazine Publisher Moves
Magazine publisher Transworld Media’s editorial office in Tustin is moving to the company’s new headquarters in Carlsbad.
Transworld puts out seven magazines, including Transworld Business, a magazine catering to Orange County’s makers of clothes inspired by surfing. The Tustin office—with about 25 workers—put out three of Transworld’s “dirt” magazines, including Ride BMX and Quad Magazine.
The move was “something that should have been done years ago,” according to Liam Ferguson, group publisher for Transworld.
“Administration in the past lived closer to the Tustin office and it was probably a little more convenient,” Ferguson said. “But with all the creative talents we have, it was a shame to continue to separate them as we have.”
The Tustin staff is moving to the 30,700-square-foot Carlsbad office, which the company moved to in February.
Transworld left its Oceanside office after nearly 24 years to a larger facility in Carlsbad, which has an indoor skate park that the company hopes will aid in its testing of skate products.
There’s also a photo and video studio to help produce content for the print magazines and Internet.
“We’re building the studios right now to help these magazines enter the new media venues that our other magazines already enjoy,” Ferguson said.
Transworld Motocross will be getting a “do-it-yourself” Web series where editors from the magazine will show viewers how to properly put on and adjust parts.
Transworld’s magazines are published monthly or every other month. Teen boys looking to spend money on surfboards, skateboards, clothes and other gear are key readers. Circulation for all of Transworld’s magazines is up from a year ago with subscribers averaging about 65,000 and newsstand sales at around 25,000.
“I think niche publications are really going to be the future of where media is going to go,” Ferguson said. “If we were able to be profitable in the second worst economy in U.S. history, imagine what we’ll do once it starts to improve.”
The surf- and skate-related magazines still are feeling the downturn, he said.
Many of the clothing and sports gear makers that fill the pages of Transworld’s magazines are coping with a downturn in sales amid the slower economy by cutting ad budgets. Transworld scaled back the number of issues for Ride BMX publication and Quad last year in response to the slowing ad sales.
Two years ago, Sweden’s Bonnier AB bought Transworld from Time Warner Inc.’s Time division for about $200 million. The deal also included other publications.
PR Firm Adds Clients
Lake Forest-based public relations firm Echo Media Group has added three clients.
The firm landed Irvine-based industrial equipment maker Toyota Material Handling U.S.A Inc., the forklift arm of Toyota Motor Corp.; Honolulu-based natural water bottler Hawaiian Springs LLC; and Santa Ana-based restaurant chain Wahoo’s Fish Taco.
Echo Media has worked with each of the companies before on projects.
“We have really had the fortune of working with these clients over the years and developing these relationships,” said Kim Long, Echo Media’s president.
Toyota Material Handling tapped Echo Media to help create a brand positioning campaign for the company’s lift trucks and other industrial equipment.
Hawaiian Springs brought Echo Media on to expand its brand and store presence in the U.S. and in Asia.
Santa Ana-based Wahoo’s Fish Taco hired the shop to help with the restaurant chain’s social media and marketing programs.
“We’re going to help take that further through exposure in the media,” Long said.
The restaurant chain has more than 50 locations throughout California, Colorado, Texas and Hawaii.
