This week we’re kicking off Mobile Deep Dive Week – a continuation of our monthly blog series where we choose a topic and post about it the entire week. This week’s topics will include mobile strategy, creative, advertising, usability and web development. We’d love to hear what you think. Join the conversation on twitter via the hashtag #DeepDiveWeek
Can’t imagine being without your mobile phone? Have you ever turned around in a panic to retrieve it when forgotten? You’re not alone. According to some recent research there are 5.3 billion mobile subscribers – 77% of the world’s population. We are ever more dependent on those small but mighty devices to do so much more than keep us connected. Today’s mobile experience connects us in multiple ways (through text messaging, instant messaging, video conferencing, email and even once in a while for a phone call) but the most popular activities include mobile search, email and instant messaging, reading news or accessing sports scores or downloading music and videos. Today’s mobile users downloaded 10.9 billion apps in 2010 and IDC predicts that will climb to 76.9 billion in 2014 – worth more than $35 billion.
Mobile Scale Now Demands Attention
Our phones are growing increasingly smarter but they aren’t the only mobile game in town anymore. Our cars and even our refrigerators are now connected and more tablet and other mobile devices are in-market every week. As the number of utilities that connects us grows, the population with one or multiple mobile devices is growing as well. Our usage is expanding to include more of our dollars through M-Commerce and more of our time through social media, geo-location and game usage via our mobile devices. At the current and projected scale your mobile strategy becomes critical. Think of all the traditional customer touch points you might have by phone if you are a retailer. Using only their smart phone your customer might:
- view emails
- access coupons
- buy from you
- brag about their purchases on social media
- check order status
- find the nearest store via mobile search or by using the store locator function on your mobile friendly website
- find reviews and perform price comparisons in your store aisles
- scan a UPC or QR code for additional info
- and probably much more.
When fitting mobile into your larger digital strategy you need to understand your audience’s (both customers and prospective customers) mobile usage. Benchmark their mobile usage and the trends you see then validate that with your own analytics to see what impact and opportunities you might be missing in mobile. You want to invest in those channels where your customers spend their time if you can deliver a good customer experience in that channel. Increasingly that choice is mobile.
Mobile has unique strengths and properties
It is not effective to try and replicate all interactive experiences in mobile. Rather, you should review how you are meeting your customers’ needs in what is very likely the channel of choice for that need. Any function that ties to geographic location, immediate answers, reviews or recommendation and two way communications are all ripe with mobile opportunity. You should consider mobile a companion strategy to your other digital destinations – one that is optimized for the way mobile is used. Mobile users are task oriented and mobile strategists and developers know how to streamline the user experience to support a rich mobile experience with quick downloads, easy to access information and limited clicks.
Our coming posts will help you to figure out where to go with your mobile strategy and how to get the most impact from your mobile efforts. Stay tuned!
In an effort to fend off FTC regulation on digital privacy, the IAB this week endorsed a symbol to be used in banner ad campaigns as part of an industry endeavor to demonstrate our ability to self regulate. The icon, dubbed the “Power I”, was designed and focus group tested by a consortium of industry players including the IAB, the DMA, the ANA and the AAAAs to alert consumers when behavioral targeting is employed. It is part of a larger consumer education push that will ask “Why did I get this ad?” in smallish type on behavioral banner ads and provide a link to a page with information about privacy in advertising. Major online advertisers are expected to start incorporating the symbol in ads this summer though they are not mandated to do so.
