By now you've no doubt heard the hype: The mobile phone is the most ubiquitous and personal digital device in the history of the world. According to the CTIA, there are more than two billion mobile accounts globally and U.S. consumers are sending over 10 billion text messages on their phones a month.
Has your head stopped spinning yet? Most brands I talk to ask the same question: What can we do now with mobile marketing to advance our interactive advertising plans?
To answer the question, it's helpful to review the three campaign mechanics used today in mobile marketing and how each supports typical marketing objectives. The three campaign types are (1) text messaging ("SMS," which is short for short messaging service), (2) picture messaging ("MMS," which is short for multimedia messaging service), and (3) mobile internet advertising ("WAP," which is short for Wireless Application Protocol, and refers to special formatting of internet content for mobile browsers).
But before delving into the mechanics, let's take a look at the size and demographics of the audience using their phones for more than voice calls. According to findings from the latest Enpocket and Harris Interactive quarterly Mobile Media Monitor, while there are almost a quarter of a billion wireless subscribers in the United States today, only about 71 million or 33 percent currently use some form of mobile media, beyond messaging. Twenty nine percent of female subscribers and 36 percent of male subscribers have accessed some form of mobile content in the past three months. Demographically, mobile data usage skews high in youth (18 to 24) and ethnic groups, such as African American, Asian American and Latin American. Users of media services tend to be higher income, with 38 percent of mobile web users earning more than $75K and users of advanced-features consistently using more multimedia services.
Text Messaging (SMS or Short Message Service)
Text messaging, hugely popular in Europe and Asia, is on a serious upswing in the United States. Ninety million Americans have sent or received a text message, with a high usage rate among younger Americans (up to age 24 more than 80 percent regularly text message), according Mobile Media Monitor findings.
The majority of those messages are person-to-person, but increasingly Americans are using SMS to interact with brands for such activities as interacting with TV shows (voting on "American Idol", trivia contests about program content on CNBC, program alerts for History Channel shows), on-pack promotions (texting an under-cap code on a Pepsi bottle for a chance to win an instant prize), driving buyers to retail outlets with mobile coupons (discount vouchers for Dunkin Donuts Lattes and EA games) and so on. Think of text messaging as the email -- sans graphics -- of the mobile world. Like the early days of the internet when email drove online activity, text messaging is the on-ramp to the mobile media world.
However, marketers can't just blast out promotional text messages to consumers without an opt-in. To secure consumer permission for push messaging, a brand invites the consumer to engage via mobile by texting into a five-digit number, called a short code. The mobile call-to-action is typically promoted in other media: TV or radio, a website, on a billboard, print ads or product packaging. This opens a world of push/pull interaction where the brand entices the consumer to engage, and the consumer then uses his/her mobile to get more information, express an opinion, download promotional content like a screen saver or a ring tone, purchase something, opt-in to receive alerts as part of a continuing push campaign or respond in some other form. It allows the interactivity of the internet wherever and whenever the consumer wants to engage with a brand, and not just during PC-face time.
Like an email, once a text message is received, it is stored on the phone until the user deletes it. This makes SMS useful for tactics like couponing where the deliverable needs to persist on the handset even when the network is not available. Text messaging's Achilles heal is that it is limited to160 characters, and does not support graphics. But when it comes to reach, there is no better way to engage with consumers on the most personal of devices.
Response rates depend on the program, but expect generic opt-in rates to range from one to five percent, with focused compelling programs (e.g., in-venue, on-pack promotions, affecting the outcome of a broadcast) to attain rates of 10 percent or higher. For example, a recent on-pack promotion that we ran for Pepsi drove almost one million text entries in the first couple months of the promotion.
In another example, Panasonic wanted to target the digital generation when launching its new state-of-the-art Oxyride battery designed for digital cameras.
To reach college-aged consumers, Panasonic sponsored the Jason Mraz concert series in 15 different venues last fall and invited attendees to text the word "POWER" to 69973 (OXYRD) for a chance to win a Panasonic prize package including a digital camera. The response rates to the Oxyride mobile campaign averaged 10 percent and were as high as 14 percent.
Next: Learn about MMS and WAP advertising capabilities.
