The mobile marketer’s new focus

Mobile marketing has been widely discussed as a channel for achieving a wide variety of marketing goals. And this is indeed true– the mobile channel has great potential to be a game changer for marketers. Mobile can be used to drive awareness, increase brand loyalty, improve or build a database of potential clients. With location services, marketers are now able to tell exactly where customers are and at which times of the day. Instant feedback tools such as QR codes are allowing marketers to tweak their marketing campaigns in real time and with great results. With a tool that can achieve so much, and is so powerful it is easy to get lost in all the possibilities and try to do too much. But one thing that marketers should keep in mind is that all their efforts should be directed towards solely one thing, and that is to increase engagement.

Much has also been said about mobile being the only channel that can successfully integrate all other marketing tools and help to create a unified campaign for a brand, creating even more impact from traditional media. We know that consumers’ media consumption habits are changing and that they spend more and more time in front of their mobile devices than in front of their televisions or personal computers. The great design, functionality and portability of these today’s mobile devices means that consumers have begun to prefer their smartphones and tablets. A recent study conducted in June by O2 showed that voice, or making phone calls, now ranks as the 5th most frequent use of mobile devices, instead of being the primary function. Browsing the internet, checking social networks, playing games, and listening to music all take up a greater proportion of user time on smartphones. By focusing on creating content that increases engagement, marketers will be able ensure that a portion of the consumer time spent on mobile is devoted to their brand.

Let’s take a look at an example where mobile marketing has been successful. The retail sector has been able to take advantage of mobile-based tools beautifully. Retail chains have begun to place QR codes next to merchandise, allowing customers to access more information regarding the product. Supermarkets and grocery stores have developed online stores that allow consumers to shop while on the move, and have their selections delivered home. While consumers are making their purchases at these online stores, data from their past shopping history is used to suggest possible items to customers. All these initiatives have made shopping easier and less of a chore, providing customers with an enhanced customer experience. What’s more, these have given customers a chance to interact with the brand, improving engagement and giving the brand an edge over its competitors.

Today, customers have a great deal of choices and are becoming more and more discerning and fickle. Customer loyalty can be lost in the blink of an eye and once disappointed, consumers tend not to re-consider the same brand again. Higher engagement levels are the only way to make consumers feel invested in their relationship with a particular merchant, service provider, brand, or product. Therefore, by focusing on engagement marketers will be able to focus on retaining a greater number of their customers while continuing to acquire new ones.

As with any other marketing tool, marketers that center campaigns around mobile also need to be able to demonstrate ROI on their media choices. All the tools in the mobile marketers tool-chest, such as SMS, MMS, apps, location-based marketing, QR codes, banner ads etc., need some degree of engagement and involvement from consumers in order to be successful. Therefore, by making applications, websites, stores etc. functional, interesting and easy to use marketers can help to boost ROI even further.