Strategy
3 mobile advertising segments
On a basic level the online advertising market can be divided into three different segments of advertising that have specific ad formats, characteristics and publishers.Generally, as can be seen in table 1, the main three online advertising segments are search, premium display and non-premium display. There are also other segments with other forms of advertising like affiliate programs that shall not be considered here. The table also shows the specific differences in targeting, pricing and the roles of the publishers and advertisers.
Four key areas of focus for mobile strategy
A survey from Adobe uncovered four key areas of focus for businesses’ mobile strategies: promotions, commerce, product information and branding. Seventy-five percent of respondents named promotions as the core of their mobile strategy, validating the mobile channel as an important method to drive traffic and support multi-channel commerce.
“Multi-channel shoppers tend to purchase more; therefore, companies must effectively engage customers by delivering consistent, rich experiences across all channels – including mobile – to maintain and fuel current double-digit e-commerce industry growth rates,” said Sheila Dahlgren, senior director of product marketing at Adobe. “The survey results demonstrate the opportunities that exist for companies to fully leverage rich visualization features to improve their emerging mobile presences and drive cross-channel sales.” Here’s some other interesting tidbits from the survey:
- More than 55 percent of respondents cited full-screen image zoom and videos as indispensable viewing features for driving conversion
- In addition, 96 percent of respondents asserted the most effective visual merchandising features were catalogs & brochures, alternative images, and zoom & pan
- While only 18 percent of respondents currently utilize rich visual merchandising features for mobile commerce, up to 81 percent of respondents cited plans to deploy these features, thus implying richer mobile experiences will be created and offered over the next 12 months.
Mobile blueprint for luxury brands
Why Mobile for Luxury
- The audience is on mobile devices
- One out of two mobile phones in use by next year projected to be Web- and application-enabled smartphones
- Consumers don’t simply talk and text on mobile phones – they browse, shop and buy
- Mobile devices give what consumers seek in the relationship with brands – control
- More content consumption on mobile – news, in particular – offers opportunity for contextual advertising
- Part of the multichannel experience
- Steve Jobs – the No. 1 influencer today of product design, marketing, commerce and customer experience
What Consumers Want from Mobile
- Ease of communication with friends, family, coworkers and brands
- Ability to search, shop and buy on the device
- Receive SMS-based offers, updates and retail traffic drivers when opted into mobile CRM programs
- Browse mobile Web sites and applications for product information, store location, pricing, inventory availability and in-store merchandise reference
- Same experience as online
- Rich media experiences on tablets such as the iPad
Crafting a Mobile Strategy for Luxury Brands
- Study audience habits – buying and media-consumption patterns
- Is the product or service suited to mobile marketing or mobile commerce?
- Discuss channel conflict issues internally
- What have you done on the traditional Web?
- Will the luxury experience and brand values translate well to mobile?
- Marketing or sales, or both – make objective clear
- Mobile is a medium comprising many channels, but it also serves well as a traffic driver to retail or online experiences
- Dedicate the resources – HR, budgets, time and patience
Luxury Marketing with Mobile
- Establish a mobile-friendly Web site, even if it’s a simple landing page and a couple of other pages reflecting the brand values and core information
- Apply for a common short code to begin SMS marketing that ties in with the brand’s overall loyalty marketing efforts
- Run targeted mobile advertising on reputed publisher sites and across mobile ad networks with banner ads, rich media units and video
- Mobile search optimization – work with Google, Microsoft and Yahoo
- Deep pockets? Build a full-fledged mobile site and application with shopping and transactional capability
- Use retail stores and catalogs to drive mobile database buildup
- Employ SMS to opted-in consumers to push traffic to stores
- Promote short code signup and application downloads in print, television, mail, online and catalog ads
- Repurpose runway material on mobile to extend the luxury experience
Brands That Get Mobile
Tiffany & Co. marries mobile with interactive to sell engagement rings
Ferrari Maserati dealership taps mobile for added customer touch point
Chanel taps iPad’s unique capabilities to showcase watch collection
Jimmy Choo taps mobile to make print ad more interactive
Rolex taps mobile to make rint ad more interactive
Rogers & Hollands Jewelers mobile program drives repeat business
Gilt Groupe iPad app comprises 3 percent of sales in first 2 days
Mobile is a wrap for Diane von Furstenberg
Bergdorf Goodman enters mobile commerce
Nordstrom, kate spade, T-Mobile use mobile to boost in-store traffic
Waterford Crystal extends brand to mobile with new app
Gucci enters mobile commerce arena with one-of-a-kind app
Bloomingdale’s fall fashion campaign taps mobile to engage customers in-store
Tiffany & Co. targets luxurious ladies via smartphones
Dolce & Gabbana dresses marketing strategy with mobile
from: Mickey Alam Khan Mobile Marketer, June 28, 2010
From Alerts to Engagement: The Value Dimensions of SMS Text Messaging
Author: Gib Bassett
A lot has been written about difficulties businesses face in approaching the mobile channel, from simply not knowing how to start, to developing a strategy that aligns with company goals. Mobile marketing practitioners and providers have not done a very good job helping marketers understand the mobile landscape, such that only the most sophisticated are truly taking advantage of mobile, experiencing great success, and are on track to dominate their respective markets.
The challenge faced by the majority of businesses is relating mobile to something they already understand, such that they can take immediate action that lays the groundwork for using mobile more broadly within their business – just like the examples you read about almost daily in the news. This is arguably more critical than understanding mobile metrics as you must first identify the logical problems mobile can solve within your business before establishing targeted outcomes.
SMS for Mobile CRM
Many would have you believe that marketing is the killer application of SMS text messaging; in fact the real opportunity presented by text is more akin to customer relationship management, inclusive of marketing but also other business processes such as sales, service and support.
Taking on the view of text messaging as a platform for mobile CRM recognizes SMS as a channel of customer interaction – like the web, call center or storefront. Nothing about these channels has anything to do with marketing unless a business decides to employ them to that end – and that’s just the way to view text messaging.
SMS as an interaction channel is what separates text from more “destination” centric tactics such as email and the static web. Like real time recommendations on an e-commerce website or a call with a live contact center operator, SMS presents both the opportunity to communicate as well as engage with customers in two way conversations.
Buyers of text messaging software products and services who embrace this viewpoint are well prepared to begin evaluating their options. The marketplace is saturated with companies offering text messaging services. To the uninitiated it appears they all offer essentially the same service – sending a message to someone for a fee. Many do just that.
Some providers have advanced beyond this point to help businesses leverage text messaging in ways similar to other CRM and marketing technologies such as campaign management. The sending of messages between a business and consumer becomes incidental. Where marketers find value is in the ability to create multi-mobile channel programs that collect customer data, call customers to action and record the outcomes for oversight, segmentation and re-targeting. SMS text, email, mobile web and mobile social media combine in ways to create sales, efficiencies, happy customers and greater knowledge of buyer preferences.
Some businesses such as healthcare organizations have demonstrated tremendous cost savings by employing seemingly simple text message appointment or prescription refill alerts. These applications have little to do with marketing, but everything to do with using mobile to create efficiencies. Similar applications are found in appointment-oriented businesses, such as restaurants taking reservations. Text messaging is also increasingly being used in a real time customer service role in the storefront environment, by allowing customers to communicate their questions, comments and concerns to store staff.
As impressive as some of these results have been, I would argue that marketers need to keep
growth “yin” to the cost savings/efficiencies “yang” offered by text messaging. That’s the theme behind the diagram included in this article.
As marketers in any segment – healthcare, restaurant or otherwise – approach the mobile channel, they have a variety of options for getting started. Many organizations will approach text messaging from a non-marketing perspective, which can yield impressive cost savings and efficiencies among an entire customer base – which tends to be dominated by customers served at a loss or break-even. Thus the utility of text messaging as a cost saver.
Those companies that leverage mobile marketing techniques in a parallel fashion to target the revenue side of business should experience even greater results by increasing the pool of their highest value customers – the 20 or so percent which generate the greatest value, be it profits or revenue. The key to unlocking that added value is employing mobile engagement techniques such as promotions, couponing and others that call consumers to action and spur response, redemption or participation.
Marketers who aspire to take advantage of mobile the way many top brands and business are today would be wise to view the mobile channel as an avenue toward managing and developing customer relationships – not conducting one-time campaigns. Aligning the mobile channel to your business in this manner is a sure way of getting started quickly and in a way consistent with your organization’s strategy. The technology now exists to support such an approach and is quickly evolving to accommodate other digital channels with the intent of unifying communications in line with customer preferences.
Tips for Location-Based Marketing
You can use location-based marketing to:
- Deliver a coupon or a message to a mobile phone
- Display local ads to a person visiting a website from a specific location
- Deliver detailed product information when someone is standing in front of the product
- Offer incentives for location-based activities such as visiting a store multiple times
- Make it easy to find nearby things such as stores, ATM’s or even Coke machines
- Provide event, meet-up and social opportunities based on a physical location
- Share location-based information with others in a social network
There are basically only four different types of location-based marketing tactics that allow you to deliver location-relevant message
- You can detect someone’s location using the GPS or triangulation technology built into a mobile device. You can also detect a more general location when someone logs on to a local internet connection using a computer or laptop. For example, a customer who has opted-in to a location-based coupon service is walking by a store and instantly receives a text-message with a coupon that says, “Hi John, come on in and show this text-message for 25 percent off any in-stock item.”
- You can request someone’s location by asking for an address,city, zip code, or other location information when people interact with your website or a search engine. You can also ask people to select a location from a map or a list of locations. For example, a customer on a mobile phone goes to a restaurant chain’s website and the website asks for a zip code in order to display special offers, maps, and contact information from the nearest location.
- You can infer someone’s location when someone searches using location-dependent search terms like “Mexican Restaurant Denver.” You can also infer location when you have location information in your customer database. For example, someone visits a website for the first time and provides location information, and then automatically sees location-relevant information on every repeat visit to the website.
- You can invite interaction by placing interactive messages at points of interest. You can enable interaction with scan-able barcodes, Bluetooth and even keywords that are only known if you’re standing in a specific place. For example, a customer in a retail store uses her mobile phone to text a keyword listed on a product display to receive a link to a mobile website explaining the most current local incentives on the product featured in the display.
The most important thing to keep in mind is that proximity isn’t necessarily an indication of purchase intent. Your location-based marketing will be much more effective if your tactics can also identify impulsive shoppers versus those who are just researching. That way, you can deliver a “buy-it-now” message to impulsive shoppers or a “learn more, buy later” message to researching shoppers.
Also remember that the more invasive your tactics, the more likely you’ll need to build a permission-based strategy. If your plans include interrupting people with messages when they happen to be passively in the vicinity of a buying opportunity, it’s a good idea to ask your customers to opt-in to receiving those types of messages so they aren’t annoyed when the messages come and they aren’t ready to buy. Even if your plans involve responding to customer-initiated activity, it’s a good idea to include opt-in messaging at some point in the process.
According to Forrester Research, the number of in-store sales influenced by web and online research accounted for 42 percent of total retail sales in 2009, and that number is expected to grow to 53 percent by 2014. Make sure your local business has a plan for driving all those online researchers to your local business.
SMS ideas to enhance a social gaming experience and create engagement
SMS ideas to enhance a social gaming experience and create engagement:
- Alerts for adding any new weapons, armor or to change characters
- Alerts to top off virtual currency
- “Take a Break” alerts – a SMS invitation to play a game at random parts of the day.
- Text to get suggestions on similar games (based on which ones you subscribed to or like)
- “Daily Challenge Alerts” – get a daily SMS notification with name of game and score/time to beat. For competitive players, this can be irresistible!
- New game alerts for any new games or updated versions
- Notifications when someone comments on your profile (if applicable) or wants to play with you, or if your rank has changed in game standings
- Game tips and tricks alerts (user gets daily/twice a week tips on how to play a game/win a certain game/secret tricks)
- Play a game via SMS (reply S to shoot at the other player, for example)
- Forward games that players like to other friends through SMS
