6 Ways to Make Your Company More Mobile-Minded
Today, the mobile marketplace has such a huge impact on businesses that organizations need to develop mobile strategies in order to stay competitive. With Gartner predicting the sale of more than 1 billion mobile devices worldwide this year, ignoring mobile audiences can be an extremely costly mistake. Fortunately, most companies want and need a mobile marketing strategy but just don’t know how to begin. To help marketers develop a mobile-minded culture in their organizations, MarketingProfs.com offered the following suggestions.
1. Understand Your Mobile Options – Mobile access is generally divided into the mobile Web and mobile apps. The mobile Web involves browser-based Internet access and Web-based applications through mobile devices, while mobile apps are software applications that are downloaded to smartphones and tablets. Both offer benefits, yet also require time and money for proper development. It’s important to realize that mobile apps often involve more effort and expense to produce and usually need third-party platforms to properly deploy, while mobile Web development often takes less time because companies can easily use their existing website content and infrastructure.
2. Promote Mobile Visits with Commercial Web Services – Commercial Web services provide information in a mobile-friendly form that consumers can easily view and navigate on their digital devices. As a result, many mobile users rely on these services to lead them to interesting and relevant websites. It’s easy to feature your organization on these commercial Web services, but remember that your information and search results pages must be mobile-enabled so they can be viewed on a variety of mobile devices and provide mobile users with an optimal experience.
3. Make Your Move into Mobile with Your Website – Many companies choose to enter the mobile market by first making their website mobile-friendly. There are various website content management systems with responsive-design features that can make Web pages viewable on mobile devices. If the website doesn’t have responsive-design features, there are third-party services that can create mobile-friendly versions of the website. Before making the website mobile, it’s important to select the right content and navigation for your audience, as well as to realize that Adobe’s Flash is not always supported by devices or desired by audiences. Also, decide whether the mobile website will have its own URL or maintain the existing one.
4. Optimize Your Marketing for Mobile Subscribers – Subscribers often read and share communications via mobile devices, so make sure that your marketing messages are formatted for their digital devices. Create your emails, newsletters, subscriber forms, and other messages to be viewable on all kinds of digital devices. After all, they can’t deliver results if they can’t be read.
5. Mobile Metrics Provide Important Information – Today’s technology makes it easy to analyze mobile consumer behavior, so take advantage of these tools to gain a greater understanding of your mobile market. Use this insight when developing future mobile strategies and interacting with customers.
6. Mobile Can Be a Springboard to Other Digital Opportunities – Once companies get started in mobile, they often discover a world of online options that can enhance their marketing and build on their more traditional advertising strategies. These options include QR codes, customer text messaging, and mobile-targeted emails, among others. There’s also the world of mobile advertising, which can greatly increase exposure and awareness for the brand. These mobile ad units require little expense or effort, yet can yield big rewards. Watch for viable and valuable mobile advertising opportunities and then evaluate their performance with campaign metrics.
Mobile is growing faster and larger each day as more consumers embrace mobile convenience and companies follow their lead. As a result, it’s become vital for organizations to develop mobile device strategies to ensure that their marketing reaches the massive mobile market.
Develop a mobile marketing strategy that clicks with consumers. Contact MDG today at 561-338-7797 or visit www.mdgsolutions.com.
MDG is a full-service advertising agency and one of Florida’s top creative ad agencies. With offices in Boca Raton, FL and New York, NY, MDG’s core capabilities include branding, logo design, digital marketing, print advertising, email marketing, media planning and buying, TV and radio, outdoor, newspaper, video marketing, Web design and development, content marketing, mobile marketing, social media marketing, and SEO. To stay on top of the latest trends in marketing and advertising, contact MDG today at 561-338-7797. To learn the basics and benefits of a mobile website vs. mobile app, take a look at MDG’s infographic, “Should You Build a Mobile App or Mobile Website?” which outlines the options and opportunities behind both mobile methods.