Smartphone possibilities lead to a smart move home

Twelve years after glimpsing the possibility of using mobile phones for marketing, Jayson Herewini has created a business that specialises in just that.

His Mobile Traffic 2.0 business explores the marketing and advertising potential of smartphones. The phones can function like small computers. There are many types and more than four billion in use in the world.

Most people who own them keep them close, day and night, and they become their first place to find local businesses.

A freelance graphic designer, Mr Herewini said most small businesses had websites that didn't view well on a small smartphone screen. His specialty is making websites and apps (applications) that work well on smartphones, for small and medium-sized businesses.

Smartphone users can then be connected to a business with a tap of their finger and, once the connection is established, the business can text them with special offers. Businesses can also sell advertising on their smartphone websites.

Mr Herewini offers them a free 14-day trial, during which he can collate the difference the website or app makes to their bottom line.

He also teaches people how to update their own websites and apps with their business details.

He can do all this from home in suburban Wanganui to anywhere in the world. He communicates by freephone, mobile phone, email, Skype and through his own website, mobiletraffic2.com

Born and raised in Wanganui, he spent some time working for Telecom. As part of that job, he was sent to a communications expo in Spain in 2000 and heard about mobile phone development.

Advertising and marketing are his passion, and an idea started brewing in his mind. He knew the technology for it didn't exist then, but that it would come.

To further his idea, he went to the Wanganui School of Design and graduated in 2005 with a bachelor's degree.

Most recently, he worked in Auckland, supplying the needs of businesses and noticed they would benefit from a smartphone presence.

Specialising in providing that meant he could return to Wanganui, work from home and enjoy the early years of his baby son, Jeremiah.

"There's no need for me to be living in the city, because I'm a passionate country boy."