Your Marketing and Design Reading for The Weekend
Maybe the only thing increasing faster than the use of mobile devices to research and purchase merchandise is the number of articles about this topic. We are definitely follow the trends at Affinity Express because we not only support major retail clients, we also provide mobile ad and mobile website design for smaller retailers through our publishing and marketing service clients. Here is some of the coverage from this week that I found interesting from both the retail marketing perspective and the consumer standpoint.
Your Company Needs a Mobile Strategy Yesterday--And These Numbers Prove It
Since I'm writing this post as a representative of Affinity Express, I'm not going to quote the first line of this article but it basically notes what one third of us would rather give up than our mobile phones. That pretty much reinforced what I already knew--it's time to marketers get serious about mobile if they haven't already!
Yet few big brands are doing it (mobile marketing, not the other thing). Mobile advertising accounted for less than 1% of worldwide ad spending in 2011 (eMarketer). This is despite the evidence that it works well. For example, a mobile-based loyalty program for Maurices (a chain of women's clothing stores) was directly responsible for $1 million in sales in four months.
The article lays out several reasons why mobile should be part of any company's marketing plans:
- Mobile interaction is the internet 3.0--mobile platforms and apps are driving more and more online traffic and customized user experiences and there will be huge increases of mobile-only internet users in the next few years.
- Mobile goes beyond Google--last year, 14 million mobile users scanned a QR code with their devices.
- Email is going the way of the fax--open rates for emails are at about 11% but they are at 95% for mobile phone texts.
- Social media is going mobile--U.S. mobile social media users grew by 37% and Twitter and LinkedIn mobile usage doubled in 2011.
- Moms are more mobile than everybody else--moms are more likely to own a smartphone than anyone else and, in 2011, 25% of moms were using mobile devices to hunt down discounts and to find coupons, while 20% were actually shopping online with smartphones.
As the article notes, "The trends are clear." I can't get over that 95% open rate for mobile phone texts!
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