3 Reasons Why You Need Start Taking Mobile Marketing Seriously

Gone are the days portrayed in AMC’s popular TV show Mad Men where print, billboards and other traditional mediums commanded the attention of consumers. These once mighty giants are now on ‘borrowed time’ thanks to the emergence of the internet and other technological innovations that feed our need for immediate updates and instant access to just about everything a person could want. The shortcut to this buffet of information comes in the form of mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets. Businesses that realize the need for this kind of instant gratification can turn a TV dinner into a five-star meal, metaphorically speaking, through strategic mobile marketing.

What is mobile marketing?

Simply put, it is marketing on or with a mobile device. Mobile devices include smartphones, tablets, smartwatches or generally anything with a glowing screen that can travel with you. Mobile marketing allows a business to promote its goods or services through personalized experiences based on a variety of factors from time and location to shopping habits and online browsing activity. Here are three reasons to employ mobile in your marketing strategy!

Reason 1: More People Own Mobile Devices than Toothbrushes

It’s true! Mobile device usage is continuing to grow and according to Socialnomics’ author Erik Qualman, there are more people who own a mobile device than those who own a toothbrush. Unfortunately for dentists, this trend does not look like it will change anytime soon. Here are a few other fast facts to digest:

• 91 percent of U.S. adults now own a mobile phone. 61 percent of those are smartphones. (Heidi Cohen)
• 25 percent of smartphone owners ages 18–44 say they “can’t recall the last time their smartphone wasn’t next to them.” (Fast Company)
• Mobile subscribers worldwide will reach 7.5 billion by the end of 2014 and 8.5 billion by the end of 2016. (Mobile Factbook)
• In the United States, people spend an average of 194 minutes per day using smartphones and tablets (Quartz)
• In 2014, sales of smartphones to end users worldwide totaled 1.2 billion units, up 28.4 percent from 2013 and represented two-thirds of global mobile phone sales (com)

Reason 2: Staying Relevant in the Information Age

One of the fundamental goals for any business owner is to attract and retain customers. In the information age, one of the best ways to accomplish this is through a mobile marketing strategy. In fact, more than $500 billion in sales is now influenced by mobile content, according to Deloitte, so acting now is a great way to help secure your company’s place in the market.

If your business has a website, a blog and a presence on social media then you are off to a solid start. However, websites and blogs that are not optimized for mobile consumption are falling behind the competition. Since consumers in the U.S. spend an average of more than three hours per day on smartphones, they are looking for information quickly and efficiently. This means that consumers have almost no patience for websites that require them to compress and expand text or wait for content to load.

Fun fact: The average person has a seven-second attention span, a second less than a goldfish (OurSocialTimes.com)

The first major step toward building a mobile marketing strategy is making sure your business has a mobile-friendly website. Think of it this way: Websites are the online home for your business. If the lawn is unkempt or there are noticeable structural issues, no one will want to visit.

Image courtesy of RealEstateRenegade.org and thought bubble is from KCD PR.

Reason 3: Improved Customer Experiences through Data-Driven Decisions

Another benefit to mobile marketing is the ability businesses have to improve customer experiences and foster brand loyalty. In addition to building a mobile-friendly website, businesses can also achieve this by developing an app or creating mobile-specific advertising campaigns.

Starbucks is an excellent example of a brand capitalizing on the popularity of mobile devices and getting ahead of the competition by focusing on the shopping experience using an app. It utilizes specific consumer-approved tracking mechanisms that monitor user shopping habits, location and a handful of other useful bits of information. With this data, Starbucks is able to generate profiles for each app user and provide discounts. It can also help the franchises monitor product supply based on demand.

Thanks in large part to its mobile strategy, the coffee and tea juggernaut is projecting revenue of $30 billion by 2019 and it recently launched a new mobile offering called “Mobile Order & Pay.”

Much like the Starbucks app, websites optimized for mobile devices and mobile advertising campaigns provide opportunities for businesses to collect consumer data, allowing for improved experiences.