Compare us today from a decade ago in 2010, and you’ll notice how dependent we’ve all become on our smartphones. If you’re a millennial, you’ve come a long way from using dial-up internet on a computer to streaming live videos on your smartphones via wireless internet.
According to Statista, 4.28 billion unique users accessed the Internet via mobile in April 2019. Mobile devices accounted for 48% of web page views worldwide, with mobile-first markets such as Asia and Africa leading the pack.
The reason why it should matter to marketers is that more and more people are shifting towards using mobile devices for everything from shopping, gaming to streaming movies, and shows. This means that there are plenty of opportunities to capitalize on it.
What is Mobile Marketing?
Mobile Marketing is a segment of digital marketing that mainly focuses on grabbing the attention of smartphone users. Running advertisements and campaigns on Apps like Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube indicates how Mobile Marketing has grown as a popular concept.
The grip that smartphones have on people opens up so many possibilities for Mobile Marketers. If you’ve seen the recent documentary on Netflix called “Social Dilemma”, you would know how unimaginably detailed data these big corporations have on us. Lucky for us greedy capitalists, this makes advertising really efficient.
Mobile Marketing vs Traditional Marketing
Traditional Marketing has everything to do with advertising on TV, Radio, and Newspapers. Even though these methods are still used today, they’ve grown obsolete with time. You must have heard the term “Television is the new radio”. This is becoming more true with time.
Traditional Marketing is fundamentally similar to Mobile Marketing, however, they’re different in terms of implications. Let’s discuss what makes them different from each other:-
Cost
Traditional Marketing is relatively cheaper than before in some ways, but overall, it’s still a very costly option. In the US, advertisers are expected to pay a minimum of $5 per 1,000 viewers for a 30-second commercial. Based on the data provided by Adage in 2019, a 30-second slot to broadcast nationally averages around $115,000.
Mobile Marketing, on the other hand, is extremely specific. You decide how much money you want to spend on it, which would be directly proportional to how much reach you intend to get. As an example, an average PPC cost is $2 per click, which averages at about $9000 – $10000. There are ways to reduce your marketing costs even further if you dig deeper.
Tracking and Measuring Results
In the case of traditional advertising like on TV or newspaper, there’s no way to know how many people saw your advertisement, liked it, and only then they went out to buy your product or service. You cannot accurately measure the Return on Investment (RoI) just by observing your sales.
However, in Mobile Advertising, there are metrics available to help you measure how many people did your advertisement reach, how many of them clicked on it, and how many actually purchased after the click. The best part about all this is the data collected, which you can use in the future to purchase trends.
Degree of Engagement Between Both Parties
When traditional marketing was mainstream, and the product someone ordered was not up to the mark, there was a long and painstaking system they’d have to go through just to be able to communicate that there’s something wrong with the product. Then the seller would analyze and get back to you, if at all they did.
In the case of Mobile Marketing, you can be excited by a product and order it instantly, but more importantly, you can leave feedback on their eCommerce platform, place a return request, or even post on their social media platforms if they don’t respond and there’s no way you won’t get a resolution especially when their reputation is on the line.
On the flip side, traditional advertising doesn’t have a convenient system where people could leave positive feedback. In Mobile Advertising, you’ll find comments and threads talking about the product that will help you understand how effective that product is.
Benefits of Mobile Marketing
52.2% of all website traffic worldwide was generated through mobile phones in 2018, which is also why many companies have started building Mobile-First Websites. Let’s look at some of the benefits of Mobile Marketing:-
Easy Access
According to research from RescueTime, people generally spend 3 hours and 15 minutes on their phones on average every single day. Most of this time wasn’t even spent on calling but on browsing through various apps.
Don’t forget the recent report by the Washington Post on GenZ, (the generation born after the year 2000) where 5 girls, ages 10-13 were interviewed by a consulting firm that evaluates the traits of particular generations.
It was found that they feel it’s reasonable for people to own smartphones by the time they are teenagers and don’t feel the need to have any boundaries on time usage either. When the users have access that easily, Mobile Marketers wouldn’t miss the opportunity to capitalize on it.
Customizable
In the above scenario where I compared Traditional Marketing with Mobile Marketing, I talked about how traditional marketing lacks the ability to target a niche market. Mobile Marketing is a game-changer when it comes to defining a target market.
A great marketer develops an archetype of the target audience where they develop a comprehensive demographic that consists of factors like age, geographic location, preferences, etc. Based on these parameters, an ideal target market is created.
For example, if you decide to market your product on Facebook, you’ll notice that you can target not only based on gender and age group, but also on the basis of personal interests, behaviors and connections as well. Based on your defined marketing budget, you can see how many people will see your promoted content.
Cost-Effective
Even though traditional marketing has become cheaper than before, which is because of a lack of demand, it still isn’t cost-effective because you don’t have enough parameters based on which you can target a high niche market.
Mobile Marketing is an entirely different space. Back in the day, when advertising on Television, Radio, or in Newspapers, you would compete for a spot with the corporate giants, or you wouldn’t be able to target your niche (which wasn’t too specific anyway) unless you were bagging high profits.
The forces of demand and supply operate differently in the Digital Space. Because there are several channels (which means less competition) and you can customize the degree of reach you want to achieve, you can market your product or service efficiently.
Real-Time Transactions
In traditional marketing, where you would see an advertisement on Television, and if something were to make you interested, you’d have to go out and buy it, which you could delay at any time. In Mobile Marketing, there’s a call to action in front of you and if you need anything, just buy it instantly.
That level of convenience is what enables your target market to take action immediately. Moreover, since people have so many options to choose from, it just becomes another entertaining activity for them to which they get hooked. As long as you’re placing your product properly, you will get immediate results.
Potential Of Blowing Up on The Internet
What that means is that your product or service has the potential to go viral on the internet. Word of mouth works a lot faster on the internet than if there weren’t any. People love sharing what they had an amazing experience with, on social media.
This is what happened with so many businesses. One of the examples of this was the Chinese Smartphone manufacturer OnePlus. In fact, their first smartphone only came out in 2013 and made $1 billion dollars just within 2 years of its inception.
But what baffles me is the fact that OnePlus relied on invitations that it sent out to only a few people to buy their smartphone. When these people liked their product, they started reviewing them and it became popular on the internet. That method became a foundation for other smartphone companies to market their products in a similar way as well.
What’s Unique to Mobile Marketing?
All our points above mostly compare traditional marketing with Mobile Marketing. Let’s talk about how Mobile Marketing is Different from Web Marketing.
Research also suggests that traditional eCommerce marketing is already obsolete and mobile sales are 3 times faster than Web eCommerce sales. Not only that, but 82% of online shoppers rely on their smartphones to decide which products to buy.
Online shoppers spend 66% of their total shopping time on their mobile phones, compared to accessing the web from computers. If all of this wasn’t enough, then just know that mobile marketing is only going to rise with time (GenZ is going to make sure of that).
Conclusion
All in all, mobile marketing proves itself to be a worthy candidate for you to pay attention to. If you have a business where you’re just starting out, and you don’t have enough budget, you can always rely on mobile marketing techniques that will help you scale up your business.
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