If you’re searching for a reliable yet low-cost marketing strategy that can help you promote your business and boost your sales, look no further. The solution you’re looking for is just in the palm of your hands—your powerful smartphone.
Yes, you can use your smartphone as an efficient marketing tool—this is called mobile marketing. Sounds interesting, right? After all, what else could be better than advertising your brand through a simple smartphone?
Not only are smartphones easy to use, straightforward, and reliable, but they’re also inexpensive. In short, a smartphone is an all-in-one package that can fully satisfy the marketing needs of your business. The future of marketing lies in mobile devices.
Nevertheless, did you know that you can make it even better? You can do this with the help of software solutions developed by companies like Drop Cowboy Ringless Voicemail. With these applications, you’ll be able to do more than send promotional SMS messages to strengthen your campaign efforts.
But before that, it’s best to understand what mobile marketing (or using smartphones as marketing tools) is. This article will educate you on everything you need to know about this marketing strategy. Scroll your buttons down if you’re ready.
What Is Mobile Marketing?
Mobile marketing is a powerful digital marketing strategy that uses multiple media to interact with customers through smartphones and tablets. Such media may include the following:
- SMS (short message service)
- MMS (multimedia service)
- Emails
- Content marketing
- Social media
- Mobile-friendly web platforms
- Push notifications
On top of that, call centers can also utilize mobile marketing. All they need to do is integrate powerful software applications offered by many companies, like Power Dialer. Some software solutions include auto-dialers, ringless voicemails, etc.
Aside from that, this also provides customers with relevant, personalized, targeted, and precisely-timed information using smartphones. Also, it allows them to receive what they need when they need it, as well as how they can achieve their goals and address their pain points.
What Do Statistics Say About Mobile Marketing?
The use of smartphones and other mobile devices is constantly increasing. Statistics show that in 2018, the use of mobile devices—particularly smartphones and tablets—over desktops will grow to 55 million by the end of 2022.
Today, the number of mobile devices (around eight billion) is higher than that of all people worldwide (seven billion). That is because people continuously crave new and modern technologies. To use this opportunity, you should focus on meeting your customer’s expectations by providing them with relevant experience.
In addition, you want your messages to be intended only for smartphone users. It will make them feel special, unique, and appreciated, thus encouraging them to take the necessary action by responding to your messages.
Mobile Marketing vs. Traditional Marketing
Mobile marketing may be uniquely different from traditional marketing strategies. However, using them both synchronously leads to better results not even one of them can provide alone.
The thing is that mobile marketing connects the dots that bridge online and offline channels. Mobile is one of the most powerful tools ever invented, especially when used in tandem with traditional media. It acts like rubber cement, gluing them all together.
Traditional marketing may be outdated, but its presence and visibility still appeal to consumers, whether the product is low-end or high-end. A good example would be a TV ad about cars. But buying TV airtime is much costlier and more challenging to track than buying smartphones and other mobile devices.
On the other hand, mobile marketing takes advantage of how people use their mobile devices. It helps location-based services gather data and then deliver promotional messages to customers based on their store visits and proximity to a shop.
These mobile marketing messages may target or be more specific to an individual. For example, a customer often receives a discount coupon from a book shop whenever they come a kilometer closer to the shop.
On top of that, mobile marketing has a better reach than traditional marketing strategies. It can connect with customers anytime, anywhere—on public transportation, at home, at work, or in baths.
Although traditional marketing is a vital part of an integrated marketing strategy, it’s slowly fading away from the light. Therefore, mobile marketing should move forward and be the primary focus of your marketing efforts.
What Are The Components Of Mobile Marketing?
Mobile marketing isn’t just for sending text messages or advertising through smartphone applications. Here are other components linked to mobile marketing:
- Mobile-Friendly Websites
These allow customers to view specific information that is readily available on their mobile devices without constant lagging, technical errors and zooming. Aside from these aspects, you must also ensure an engaging and consistent UX or user experience. If your website isn’t fit for mobile usage, you’ll lose your customers to your competitors.
- SMS And MMS Messaging
Customers can receive both SMS and MMS conversations and interactions. It’s crucial to use them in the best way possible. If that’s the case, make sure to learn the most effective customer communication strategies and the rules for creating campaigns through alerts, reminders, and videos.
- Applications
Smartphone applications may help you foster positive and relevant conversations with your clients. However, it may not always be effective for all businesses. So, review every app available to find out if it’s the best way to reach your conversion goals, achieve better engagement, and increase your acquisition rates.
- Responsive Designs
It is often associated with mobile-friendly websites and is a crucial part of mobile marketing. It facilitates optimal viewing by consistently transforming web content that fits any smartphone device. With responsive designs, customers can view your content on their smartphones without a problem.
- Landing Pages
A landing page is another crucial element of successful mobile marketing. If you redirect a customer to a not-so-responsive landing page, they might get annoyed and leave immediately. As a result, you’ll lose your precious customers, and you’ll probably have a hard time bringing them back again.
- Push Notifications
A push notification, also known as in-app messaging, is the practice of sending messages, promotions, offers, and reminders to your customer’s lock or home screen, whether they use the app or not. When done correctly, push notifications will be one of your most helpful mobile marketing tactics.
- Mobile-Friendly Email Marketing
Email marketing is not made for mobile devices. However, as mobile users continue to access most of their emails through their smartphones, it’s best to ensure that it’s optimized and designed for mobile devices. It should make it easy for your customers to visit the link you provided to their mobile emails and take the necessary actions.
What Are The Best Practices For Effective Mobile Marketing?
Below are some of the best practices you might want to implement for effective mobile marketing. In addition, these tips will help you maximize the use of smartphones as a marketing tool in today’s time.
- Create Content Fit For Smartphones
Produce content that your mobile audiences might need at any time, anywhere. If you’ve been writing online using your desktop all this time, you’ll probably think all your links, pages, and tabs are crucial and relevant. But in this generation, they’re not.
You must take into account that smartphones present content on a small screen. Therefore, you should be mindful of your headlines, particularly how long they are.
When producing content for a mobile audience, you might lack a large screen to display lengthy headlines. So, you want to ensure that your headlines are short yet persuasive and interesting to encourage readers to visit your site as soon as possible.
Here’s an example: if the headline is, ‘What Are The Things You Need So You Can Produce Great Content?’ The mobile version could be, ‘What You Need To Produce Great Content.’
Also, don’t forget to optimize your content for SEO purposes. One way to achieve this is by using the right keywords that your audience will be familiar with.
For instance, if you’re a chef giving reviews about kitchen tools and equipment, avoid writing headlines like this one: ‘The Best Dutch Oven Review.’ Instead, be more specific and include the brand, such as this one: ‘The Best Le Creuset Dutch Oven Review.’ That is because most mobile users know what they need before searching the internet.
- Use SMS Marketing
SMS marketing is one of the most effective marketing strategies. Not only is it easy to execute and low-cost, but it also has near-perfect open rates (around 98%) compared to emails and other mobile marketing techniques.
It’s also ideal for sending precisely-timed offers that create a sense of urgency. Around 90% of text campaigns are opened in just three minutes after being sent. And 99% of campaigns are opened within the first 20 minutes of being sent.
To get the most out of your SMS marketing, make sure to use opt-ins and opt-outs as well as coupons, such as discount codes, exclusive links, bar or QR codes, and digital coupons. Here’s an example of a text message for SMS marketing campaigns:
‘At The Zenith: Merry Clearance! Only for tonight, up to 70% off on all items that MUST GO! Click this link to proceed: http://bit.ly/y7R64dFq2. Reply STOP to cancel or HELP for further assistance.’
- Use Paid Ads On Social Media
Social media is one of the leading platforms for marketing purposes, making it a crucial aspect of mobile marketing. One way to maximize the power of social media is by launching paid ads. With these, you’ll be able to reach your target mobile users as soon as possible.
Here are some tips for effective social media advertising:
- Know Your Target Audience: Who will benefit most from your products and services? If you know who they are, then be sure to create content that best suits them. If not, you may use the custom audience tool, which defines the audience based on location, profession, age, gender, preference, relationship status, etc.
- Launch Four Content Variations: Launching different ad campaigns is one way to reach different audiences effectively. Make sure they have different call-to-actions and creativity to increase your chances of connecting to your target audience and improve your sales.
- Analyze Data: During the campaigns, check the analytics provided by the social media platform. It will show how many people have engaged with your ads in the past few days. It’ll also inform you of the things that need improvement.
But before you launch your paid social ads, you want to have them A/B tested first. It will help you understand if your ads will be effective or not. Also, this will prevent you from wasting resources on things that won’t work.
- Improve Your Navigation
Navigation is a user interface that may help you boost your conversion rates. You want your footer, header, menu, and other essential options to be navigable as much as possible. These parts have to be smooth-running regardless of the smartphone people use.
Otherwise, users will have difficulty browsing through your website to find the information they need. They’ll feel stuck in a maze where the only way out is to exit the platform. Failed navigation will force users to leave, losing them to your competitors.
Here are some tips to optimize your navigation (if you haven’t worked it out yet):
- Make Your Links Obvious: If your visitors can’t discern your hypertext from the body of your content, then you’re doing it wrong. To make it obvious, you can make it bold, highlight it, or change its color to a contrasting one.
- Separate Your Sidebars: Don’t make your sidebars like the rest of your content. It’s nothing but an eyesore. To prevent this, use white spaces—be generous with them. It is an effective way to keep your sidebars separated and easy to read.
- Make Everything Simple: Your website isn’t the right place for clever tricks. Make sure your website has the simplest design. In this way, mobile users will know what you mean right away.
Final Words
Smartphones are one of the most powerful marketing tools and a great way to boost your customer reach and increase sales. Consider following the tips discussed above to improve your mobile marketing. Don’t forget to test your campaigns before launching them to avoid wasting your time and effort on something that won’t produce the results you need.
