Vibes Media

Press

Mobile Outperforming Online in Multichannel Campaigns

By Dan Butcher for Mobile Marketer April 2, 2009

LAS VEGAS — Mobile campaigns are consistently outperforming online and other channels, according to a panel at the CTIA Wireless 2009: Mobile Life conference.

Some of the biggest brands in the world have embraced mobile marketing to compliment other traditional forms of advertising and the best marketers have integrated mobile into plans that for decades have included traditional mass media and are reaping the rewards. However, their mobile spend is still relatively small compared to their total budgets.

“Mobile is not all that much more complicated than what’s happening on the PC, and in many ways carriers behave like publishers: They have inventory and they want to make money,“ said David Katz, vice president of mobile advertising and publishing for Yahoo. “The challenge at Yahoo—because we’re a publisher, we’re an advertiser and we’re an ad network—the ad models are still unstable.

“We haven’t figured out ways to deliver great value to the user that also deliver great value to the advertiser,“ he said. “You don’t want to piss off consumers by disrupting their experience, but seamless ads that they don’t notice don’t see ROI.

“Providing an engaging user experience is key, buy you have to balance that with the advertiser’s wants and needs.“

Mr. Katz said that ad campaigns are achieving higher CTRs on mobile than PC, and the time spent engaging with brands tends to be more robust on mobile as well.

“Mobile will deliver highly customized experiences that are different from online over time, but today, brands tend to be really happy when they compare the metrics of mobile campaigns to other media,“ Mr. Katz said. “Brands are looking for something more robust to impregnate themselves in the psyche of consumers.“

Mobile subscribers make up one-third of the world’s population, whereas only 4 or 5 percent are broadband Internet subscribers.

There are 3 billion mobile ad impressions in the U.S., according to the panel, mobile marketing is a $4 billion industry, which is not a lot of money considering its reach and the fact that most consumers carry a phone with them wherever they go. However, that number continues to grow.

“Our sub-sector of the industry, mobile display advertising, generated between $130 to $160 million in revenue last year, up from $30 or $40 million the year before, and this year we could double market size in mobile advertising,“ said Paul Palmieri, president/CEO of Millennial Media. “It’s very exciting what’s going on here in the space.

“There is substantial proof that mobile works and works better than online, and brands can’t get enough of it,“ he said. “The reach isn’t quite there, but it’s performing so much better than other channels, and there’s real evidence of that.

“Nielsen released a study about the unduplicated reach in mobile, and found that, for example, if you spend on weather sites online, you have to spend in mobile.“

Some panelists were more focused on mobile advertising, while others were more focused on mobile marketing.

“Consumers say, ‘If I lose my mobile phone, it’s like losing an arm,’” said Eric Bader, president of BrandInHand. “However, you still have to shepherd money into mobile from big CPG companies and big box retailers and show you can measure favorably against other channels.”

“A promise we make to advertisers is that we’re going to be able to show the same dollars that could’ve been invested in other channels perform better in mobile,“ he said.

BrandInHand claims that its campaigns see twice as many interactions from mobile compared with online from the same spend.

“We use mobile for eight different business objectives, not just brand awareness,“ Mr. Bader said. “We’re also very active in trial, sampling, putting names in a database, getting people to join text clubs, improve productivity of stores by connecting with consumers in the aisles, dynamic shopping lists promoted by brands and loyalty CRM programs enhanced by mobile.

“Yes, CTR and the individual performance of mobile ads have outperformed online, but there’s a whole another world of mobile marketing that many people aren’t aware of,“ he said. “Brands should pick a business problem and then apply mobile to it to find a solution provided by mobile or complemented by mobile.

“Using the cultural currency of mobile to solve a business problem impacts brands’ revenue stream, and that’s the stuff that matters.“

While mobile advertising can be an invaluable part of a larger campaign, it is less effective when it stands alone. Marketers that come up with multi-platform strategies are having the most success.

“It’s less about impression-based ads and more about integrated campaigns across multiple channels matching objectives to solutions,“ said Jack Philbin, cofounder/president of Vibes Media. “Subway put calls-to-action in two video games to connect with teens in a different intimate, valuable way, asking them to send a message to a short code to get cheats to get further in the game.“

Subway followed up by delivering mobile coupons to create an ongoing interaction with the teens.

The campaign was deemed a success, but it was very hard to calculate Subway’s exact return on investment, in part because of the chaotic mobile coupon redemption process.

“Tracking coupon redemption varies widely by retailer, which is why couponing hasn’t taken off yet,“ Mr. Philbin said. “Redemption is a huge issue right now.

“To have accountable media, we want to measure conversions, but that means different things to different people—clicking on an ad, taking a test drive or actually buying something?“ he said. “It’s different for every brand depending on its objectives.“

Now that the mobile phone is an entertainment and content device, with compelling applications and mobile Web experiences, it’s an even more attractive platform for marketers.

“I’m bullish about mobile marketing, because if you look at a mobile campaign we did for Deal or No Deal with an on-air call-to-action, they got 100 million interactions, and the average age was 37-year-old women,“ said Jon Vlassopulos, CEO of Moderati. “There is a mass audience of millions and millions of people interacting via mobile and online during each show, generally women, who are also heavily into casual mobile gaming.“

Originally published by Mobile Marketer