What is mobile marketing

Mobile devices, such as smartphones and tablets, are now a part of our lives.

Data shows a very high percentage of time spent during the day on the internet accessed via tablets and/or PCs: more than 80%.

Moreover, the audience of users who use mobile devices every day is over 20 million, with an average of 2 hours per day of usage!

In short, mobile marketing has truly become an indispensable tool for businesses and activities of any size and across all sectors!

What is mobile marketing

Mobile marketing encompasses all promotional activities for your product done through mobile supports (smartphones, tablets, and wearable accessories of wearable technology).

The great advantage of mobile marketing is the diversity of the audience and the breaking down of spatial, geographic and temporal limits.

In simple terms, so many, really so many potential customers use smartphones and tablets at all hours of the day and night!

Mobile Marketing Strategies and Tools

When you think about mobile marketing, apps immediately come to mind.

Mobile applications are adaptations of your website (web apps), or are created specifically for mobile devices (native mobile apps).

The advantage of having an app is the ability to insert advertising through the AdSense network and exploit the high percentage (much higher compared to desktop) of possible user clicks to monetize via mobile marketing.

The latest technologies allow an even more advanced use of these tools.

An example of this is the implementation of automatic bots: virtual assistants that automate the product purchasing paths and the acquisition of potential customers up to the standardized management of basic support.

Unfortunately, these software are still too cumbersome, but their massive use in the immediate future is foreseeable.

Indeed, when bots will be able to communicate effectively with users in a "human" manner, a lot of time will be saved during the most laborious phases of customer contact.

In mobile marketing, there is also the possibility to sell one's products online.

In fact, we speak of mobile commerce to define those platforms that allow online product purchases and that are created exclusively for these devices.

Both classic websites and e-commerce have evolved with the advent of mobile marketing.

Indeed, for a site to be defined as complete and modern, it must be responsive or have a responsive layout.

A website is considered responsive when it adjusts to the dimensions of monitors and develops a specific structure for each mobile device.

In addition to these well-established mobile marketing strategies, there are other more advanced or simply somewhat underestimated forms:

• QR code marketing: this type of mobile marketing leverages the technology of smartphone and tablet software that allows the display of websites, social pages, or applications linked to your company, by using a "barcode" which the smartphone reads through its camera. This tool is truly excellent for launching new products.
• SMS mobile marketing: we are talking about advanced technologies and yet we're looking at SMS? This form of mobile marketing, however, is anything but outdated. In fact, companies that use SMS to retain their customers for discounts and promotions (by using their own lists), remain surprised by the effectiveness of this tool.

SMS marketing has, for example, a higher content opening and reading percentage compared to e-mail marketing, which inherits the major disadvantage of spam filters (while SMS are devoid of them).

If contact lists are segmented to create highly personalized promotions and offers, this tool can yield great surprises!

• Augmented reality and proximity marketing: we have already discussed proximity marketing, defining it as an excellent tool for customer loyalty and acquiring useful data for push notifications and highly customized promotions. Augmented reality is also an excellent alternative for mobile marketing. It involves the use of applications that, through the camera, allow users to see how a product would look in their own context (trying out an Ikea sofa directly in their living room, or seeing how a designer garment fits before buying it)

Examples of mobile marketing

McDonald's and Nivea are great examples of how to leverage smartphone sensors and geolocation for mobile marketing.

McDonald's and the Fry Defender: we have already discussed how McDonald's uses smartphones to build customer loyalty. The latest fun gimmick from the fast-food giant is called Fry Defender and involves an app that sends an alert, via the smartphone's motion sensor, to warn the user when a "fry theft" occurs. An ironic twist but one that uses mobile marketing as a strategy for building loyalty.

Nivea: leveraging geolocation in mobile marketing: the German company Nivea, specialized in creams and sun protection products, has launched an interesting advertising campaign in Brazil that takes advantage of the power of """ geo-localization applied to mobile marketing.

To retain its customers, it has created a branded bracelet that allows real-time tracking of the child playing on the beach in summer but who strays too far from their parents, who are alerted of the unusual movement.

Also Starbucks uses mobile marketing to retain customers and make the shopping experience more "smart". In the app of the American coffee chain, it is possible to download the gift card. This card allows for its scanning directly at the register and the subsequent deduction of the coffee cost from your account, making the purchase process faster and more streamlined.

The potential of mobile marketing is still unexplored and offers truly varied possibilities. A well-thought-out marketing strategy now includes a chapter dedicated to this new form of marketing.