What Does It Mean To Be "Mobile First?"

I recently took the plunge and upgraded my shoddy home-internet service to Verizon FiOS. Just one week after cancelling my contract with the old company I had a flyer in my mailbox asking me to sign up. Not to "reconsider and rejoin." Not to learn about exciting upgrades to their network since I left (which I might have been willing to hear). The advertisement was completely generic and lacked any basic understanding of me: the fact that I was a previous customer and that I unsubscribed because I wasn’t happy. This is what I would call “lazy advertising.” As a result, the company's message fell on deaf ears and the mailer went straight to the recycling bin without a moment’s hesitation.

Look, I’m certainly not surprised that the telco giant’s direct mail strategy was far from perfect, but what did surprise me was the frustration I felt. How could something this unintelligent make it’s way into my mailbox, a space that I consider personal? It's where I get handwritten birthday cards from my mom every year; where season’s greetings make their way into my home; and where newborns are welcomed into the world on beautiful DIY postcards. Evidently, it’s also the place where big brands continue to deliver generic, non-personalized mailers en masse. I think I speak for all of us when I say this “one size fits all” approach feels like an intrusion and a violation of our personal space. Sadly, this is often the norm in marketing today, and nowhere is it felt more than in mobile marketing.

Think about it: unlike any other marketing channel in history, mobile phones are extensions of our physical selves. They fit into our palm and our pocket and they greet us when we turn them on. They learn (and remember) our interests, preferences, locations and habits. They are constant collectors and providers of personal data, and whether or not we know it (or like it), they are constantly updating the world - from advertisers to friends - about us. And they’re usually not more than just a few feet away, day or night.

Our utter reliance on our phones is undeniable. According to Apple, iPhone users unlock their device an incredible 80 times each day. And last year Business Insider reported that we touch our phone a whopping 2,617 times every day. This dependency, and the resulting emotional attachment we have with our phones, has created a new kind of relationship between the consumer and the marketing-vehicle itself. As a result, we are experiencing a fundamental shift in what it means to be "personal" and “contextual” in digital media, particularly in mobile.

So, what does this mean for brands?

Based on the nascency and lack of sophistication of most mobile-marketing approaches, the implications of this aren’t as straightforward as this behavior might appear.

Make no mistake, getting onto that personal, user-directed and exceptionally useful tool in most consumers’ hands is an enormously valuable and important proposition to the survival of brands, especially as commerce moves rapidly to digital, on-demand platforms like Amazon Prime and Instacart.

But this challenge is daunting - attention on a phone is divided between utilities, tasks, alerts, gifs being texted, YouTube videos, Spotify streams and Snap stories, not to mention email and calendars. Meanwhile, the adtech and publishing industries have provided a dearth of advertising options that actually work. From obnoxious pop-overs to miniature banner ads, a deluge of low quality impressions dominate the strategies available to a marketer in exploiting mobile behavior.

There is hope. There are many turnkey strategies that work on mobile phones, and exploiting them can be straightforward. As you consider them, keep in mind these three essentials.

Interruptive advertising does not work in mobile.

Because of the intimate nature of the mobile environment, brands that force their way onto the consumer’s screen (through antiquated technology/units, mediocre targeting or generic messaging) will begin to find themselves blocked, hidden, or sent straight to the spam folder. Instead, we should be thinking about mobile strategy through the lens of classical “permission marketing.” The only difference is consent from the consumer now comes in the form of not opting out.

The best way in is through native content.

The most efficient way to ensure your brand gets into the hands of consumers is through native content on the platforms that were designed for the phone. These can be “mobile-first” platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube as well as “mobile-only” platforms such as Snapchat, Uber, and Waze.

Content that is made for these platforms, with well targeted media and tailored messaging, is the best way to create an effective mobile strategy.

Because of limited mobile real estate, format matters more than ever.

Bad ads are always annoying, but when we accidentally click on one and lose our spot, our well of patience quickly dries up. This is what I call “fat finger” syndrome and it’s unique to advertising on smartphones. This means branded messages need to be legible, and they should be big enough so that clicks happen by intent, not by mishap. 

It also means brands must pay attention to the varying design specs across devices, platforms, and operating systems to ensure viewability and proper display formatting.

With the right content and media strategies, brands can find great success adding value to these mobile personal ecosystems through their marketing. But it requires the right approach to content creation and distribution, using mobile platforms and consumption patterns native to mobile environments.

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Glenn Landauer is Head of Client Strategy at Moment Studio. His team leads clients through content and channel strategy to drive impact cross platform.