While web advertising was once considered the cutting edge of advertising, marketers now find themselves grasping for evidence of ROI and sweeping up cookie crumbs. But there’s an alternative: mobile. With mobile, marketers have the opportunity to pull mobile data and create targeted messaging – not to be confused with an overstatement about location targeting – but true, useful data based on the fact that we now know the mobile user.
Looking back at web, it was really hard to get segmentation, but that’s changed now as well. Now it’s mobile’s turn, and there are some clear leaders in the game.
Facebook recently announced their numbers and the standouts were definitely around mobile, revenue and profits – which all went up. Revenue from advertising went up 72% to $2.5 billion. And mobile ads account for 59% of that revenue.
Consumers are turning to mobile more and Facebook knows it. Marketers know it, too, which is why mobile advertising revenue skyrocketed beyond where analysts thought they’d go.
Does this mean everyone should pull the plug on general advertising and run to mobile? Not necessarily. But it’s definitely worth running the numbers to see if a jump over web and straight into mobile is a viable option.
Know your industry. If you’re in TV or entertainment, mobile is a consumption vehicle. If you’re in retail, it’s a shopping aid. So it’s important to consider the customers, the segment and the channel – people who are buying on mobile tend to be different than people who don’t use mobile. So what do you want to do with that? Optimize and message differently. And that will all have an effect on what you want to do in that channel.
So is it important to segment into the channel or is it important to reorient your marketing mix around that? You want to consider the customers, the segment and the channel when developing your offer matrix because those will all have an effect on what you want to do in that channel. And reconsider the web dollars – maybe they are the new “brand messaging” platform, versus TV or radio.
