Why Mobile Marketing Is A Must For Your Business?

This article is contributed by Alexandra Nicola. She is the Chief Content Writer at Squirrly.co. She enjoys helping people with their SEO problems and loves reading S.F. novels.

Smart-phones, tablets and laptops! That’s what people use nowadays in researching interesting topics, checking their email and deciding what brand of beverage they want to buy. It’s clear that in digital marketing word of mouth is one aspect you always need to keep in mind. Now we’re actually taking one step forward with mobile marketing. Not only can we make the message available on-line, but we can also find out how the users receive the message by taking a look at the device they use.

Why is mobile marketing important?

If you are going to take an afternoon to study the average person’s behaviour in your community, you will see the following: people using their phones in their cars, not just for talking over Bluetooth, but also for searching the internet to find nearby specific locations.Moms check their grocery list on their IPhone. Teenagers surf the web on their smartphone trying to find the best deals online for that product found at the mall which their parents won’t buy them.

[ Credits: Julian Bleecker ]

These are most probably the habits of your targeted audience as well. So, how can you determine them to stay focused on your message while all of this is happening? Simple, through mobile marketing.

You need to take the message where they are. You are probably going to tell me you already are there. Most of this devices are used on the internet and you are already there. But that isn’t enough. Because users are usually highly critical. If it’s not convenient for them to use your site, they will probably leave and find an app for the same task; an app one of your competitors has made, one that enables them to digest content easily on their 7″ or less screen.

How you can adapt for mobile marketing benefits?

The great part is that you don’t actually need to start from scratch if you have a standing digital marketing strategy. But you need to take into consideration two aspects :

• How user experience feels on a mobile device
• The behaviour pattern when getting in contact with mobile marketing strategy

How user experience feels on a mobile device?

The first observation is linked to the screen size. The elements of your site need to adapt to that. There is the viewport meta tag that will make your site take over the full width of the device and nothing more. This simple fix might actually be all the work you need done, if you have a very simple design on your site.

Most times that isn’t the case. That’s where responsive design comes into mobile marketing. In this type of design, not just the width taken up by the page is changed, but also each element of design adapts. This means columns, banners, images, pop-ups, and any other element you might think of.

Making sure that the font size is appropriate and that the spacing gives the user the chance to skim and scan your content is also important.

However, there is another aspect of the user experience you need to consider. Mobile devices are used differently. You don’t simply open pages on the web and read their content as you usually do on a laptop. Users want to be engaged by content, so they choose to use apps. This is a solution for your site that needs to be at least taken into discussion.

The advantages of an app is that you can keep the user more to yourself, offer more personalised content and have more appealing design elements that determine them to return more often than a bookmark does. Plus, you can easily collect feedback and see whether the user is engaged by your content. Apps demand more calls to action and buttons to click, which is in your best interest, in the end.

The behaviour pattern when getting in contact with mobile marketing strategy

Now you decided what you are going to do to make it more appealing. The next step is to consider in which way the content you’ve created especially for mobile is different.  People that are looking through your content from mobile devices are not necessarily sitting on a chair in front of the device.  They might be pushing a cart, in a bus or walking down the street.

Research or consider the most frequent scenarios in which your user is checking your app. If he/she is checking products, consider that he/she would want to compare prices while in a store, or to get more details on the item than the label offers.

My advice is to make sure that the mobile marketing content is actionable. Tell your user what to do in that particular situation. If there is an offer just that day, make him/her aware of it. Have a short and clear purpose for each piece. The question “Why am I here ?” should be answered at any given time.

Also remind him/her to come back to your app. Email marketing might be efficient, but Facebook’s app showing the latest updates on the icon is more convincing in mobile marketing.

Going the extra mile pays off

It always does. When you’ve invested in digital marketing, you saw the same thing. People mention you or your product on social media, to their friends. They share your relevant content, comment and ask for your opinion because they trust you. The same behaviour will come with mobile marketing.

Your audience will turn into loyal users, who incorporate your app in their daily lives. Checking for your information not just when they need to, but also when they have spare time as well. Why? Because you give them valuable information and, more so, you make it easier for them to access it.

So take the time to consider investing in mobile marketing. There are products out there that can give you a preview of how your site looks at this moment on different devices. Contentlook can also tell you if you have any improvements to make and how to implement them.  Take the step forward and implement the strategy for the benefit of your customers as well as your business.