mobile marketing Archives - Page 3 of 10

Developing A Mobile Strategy

May 17, 2013/0 Comments/in mobile marketing, mobile strategy /by Brett Gordon

So you’ve decided you’re going to enact a mobile strategy. Now what? Sometimes developing a mobile strategy can be a lot to take in at once considering all the different decisions you will have to make. To help you with this, we have put together this handy guide to assist you while you are developing your strategy.

The first thing you want to do is research and plan your mobile strategy. During this stage you will want to:

Establish objectives.
Maximize opportunities.
Identify considerations.
Understand limitations.

Of course, you can take a number of routes to accomplish these tasks. However, you will probably want to incorporate at least some, if not all, of the following things into your mobile strategy development process.

Analyze Any Existing Data or Statistics

If you are using analytics tools for your website, then you can use that data to get a good idea of who your audience or target demographic is. You should know your end users’ common devices, resolutions, and patterns of behavior with your content. You can usually identify your content’s strengths and weaknesses based on this information, but you may also have a problem if your current content is weak and you are getting a low rate of interaction on your site. This means your site’s content is not engaging your audience like it should be. Fix this first, then you can focus on creating content for your mobile strategy. You usually will pull content for your mobile content from your website’s content.

Define Your User Objectives

You can interact with current customers to find out more information that could help you identify additional usage scenarios. This will help you add more value to your content. If you create content without establishing what your users are wanting to do when engaging with your company, then you are setting yourself up for inevitable failure. Take into account your current customers’ questions, comments, and concerns and your content will be much more valuable to your users.

Plan Content

Once you have poured over all your existing data and information and then defined your end user objectives, then you can start mapping out your content. You will have to determine whether you are going to work off of already existing content you have, or if you are going to build your content from the ground up. You can also do both. Defining your new content and identifying content that needs to be created is a primary element of your mobile strategy. If you are planning on using content from your website for mobile, keep in mind that it is not going to be in the same format, so you will probably want to repurpose that content. The content used for you mobile strategy should be “mobile first” and beneficial to mobile users, not just copied content from your site.

Define Your Budget and Time Limitations

This is simple, but VERY important. If you haven’t set definitive parameters for your mobile strategy, then you are going to end up with a mess on your hands that is probably going to take more work to fix than the work you actually put into developing it in the first place.

Research Your Competitors

You will want to research and analyze your competitors for a number of reasons. You can identify what successful strategies they are using and incorporate it into your own strategy, or you could identify what they’re doing wrong and leverage it in your favor to help your company stand out among the rest. Either way, if you don’t research and understand your competitors, then you are fighting a faceless opponent. When that happens, you are essentially taking shots in the dark with your strategy.

Set Benchmarks, Goals, and Establish Metrics

You want to establish a definitive set of metrics to measure your success with. If you don’t, you will have no idea how good, or bad, your mobile strategy is doing. Not only will this help you understand how your strategy is doing, you can also take this information into account when furthering your mobile strategy.

These desriptions are somewhat vague for each step, but that is because it will depend on what you choose to do specifically with your campaign. With so many mobile software applications and options, you can virtually do anything you want with your mobile strategy. The point of all the above steps is to help you identify exactly what you want to do with your strategy. Some of the options you will have are:

Mobile Websites
Mobile Apps
Native Apps
Text to Win
Text to Vote
Text to Poll
QR Codes
Mobile Coupons
Social Media Integration
Mobile Landing Pages
SMS Marketing
And many more…

One of the biggest decisions mobile marketers experience is whether to go with a mobile app or a mobile website. We actually have an entire blog devoted to just this debate. The most important thing to remember when developing your mobile strategy is to create something that makes your end users’ mobile experiences easier, more efficient, and more engaging. You are not developing a strategy for you, you are designing a strategy for your users.

Text to Screen Works! | Key Benefits

May 9, 2013/0 Comments/in bulk sms, mobile marketing, sms marketing, text to screen /by Brett Gordon

There are so many different ways you can implement mobile or SMS marketing to benefit you and your company. One of these ways is text to win. Text to win is one of the more fun ways to market using SMS since it involves a high amount of interaction and engagement from your end users. In fact, if you do it correctly, your end users will end up doing most of the work and you will be the one who ends up benefiting. Of course, so will your end users, so it’s really a win-win.

If you’re looking to create a truly interactive experience for your customers and prospects using SMS, then text to win is exactly what you’re looking for. It involves people communicating in real-time, texting their messages to a screen at an events and venues such as concerts, monster truck rallies, sports games, clubs, bars, etc. It is a way for your end users to communicate both with you as well as with other end users. The beauty of it is that it can essentially become anything you want it to be.

Text to screen is a feature of SMS marketing that allows people to send a text message to a phone number, then that message will be displayed on some type of a screen (projection, TV, etc.) The screen is in an area where a lot of people can see it, so they can read and react to what’s being said by others. By running text to screen, you are essentially giving a voice to your customers and prospects, and they absolutely love this.

There are several ways you can implement text to screen at your next next event. Here are some ideas that have worked very well in the past.

Promotions

This works especially well if you are a venue owner, or are going to use a venue for an event. You can send messages to the screen promoting various different sales, specials, or events you and your company have going on at the time. Since everyone at the venue can see the screen, you are marketing to all of these people.

Text to Screen Chat

You can create an on-screen conversation between all of your end users using screen chat. This is where people will communicate on your screen using text messages. To put it simply, it’s like an online chat room on your screen, except way more cool.

Sporting Events

You can use the stadium’s jumbotron or big screen to allow fans to text messages to their team, cheer them to victory, or interact with other fans.

Clubs and Bars

If you have a club or bar with a large screen that everyone can see, then you can use it to unify everyone in your establishment. Imagine that the place is stuffed with people, and you see a pretty girl dancing on the other side of the room and you want to meet her, but you don’t feel like shoving your way through a sea of people to get to her. Using text to screen, you can simply text her a message via the in-club screen and invite her over for some drinks. You can also use this to promote drink and food specials within the bar or club.

User Feedback

You can get feedback from everyone at your event, venue, or establishment and find out what people want and are feeling. You can simply post a question or poll and have users respond with a number or phrase. You could literally initiate a special on the spot using the feedback from your users, which would only make them love you more.

Of course, there are some users who like to stir things up and post inappropriate content on your screen. To prevent this, we can build in a filter for your text to screen campaign so that everything that goes up on your screen is pre-approved by you.

Besides the benefits we have already mentioned, you will also be collecting your users’ phone numbers to put into your database as they text in to your screen. Using our software, this will happen automatically. Once you have a database built up from your text to screen campaign(s), you can then mass text those numbers and promote any sales, discounts, or specials your company is currently offering. The best part is that your users know that they’ve opted into your service, so they will be receptive to your texts.

So the question now is, what are you waiting for? Launch your text to screen campaign today and start to generate interaction among your users and customers while at the same time creating a fun and engaging atmosphere around your brand.

Why SMS Marketing Trumps EVERY Other Marketing Medium

May 8, 2013/0 Comments/in mobile marketing, sms marketing /by Brett Gordon

To put it in its most subtle terms, SMS marketing has exploded over the last few years and is showing absolutely zero signs of slowing down. Industry experts are even forecasting astounding rates of growth in the coming months and years. Since we now are officially in the digital age, and everything and anything is available right here and right now, SMS marketing has risen to the forefront of establishing and maintaining loyal relationships with end users and customers. No other medium allows you the ability to communicate with your customers and prospects in real time and establish an ongoing dialogue with them.

Let’s take a look at the social and technological landscape right now. There are more mobile phones than televisions and desktop computers COMBINED in the United States, there are OVER 5 BILLION mobile subscriptions, and virtually EVERYONE with a cell phone has the ability to text. Simply take a look at any public gathering place and you will see a good amount of people on their phones, a majority of them probably texting. Look at your office, restaurants, schools, universities, the street, and anywhere else you can possibly think of. EVERYONE is on their phones. By leveraging SMS marketing, you would be reaching all of these people!

Where were we? Oh yes, numbers. Email has an open rate of less than 20%, Foursquare is only used by 4% of people in the U.S., and tweets are read by LESS THAN 1% of your followers. On the other hand, text messages have a ridiculous 95% open rate! On top of that, those SMS messages are read WITHIN 4 minutes! Why is this? Because people carry their phones with them EVERYWHERE they go. So by going mobile with your marketing campaign, you would be moving with your customers, instead of having to go and find them.

If you are using other forms of marketing, but are ignoring mobile marketing, then you are missing out on HUGE groups of people. As a result of missing out on those groups, you also miss out on all the traffic, sales, and revenue those groups would create for you and your company. The beauty of SMS is that it is low-risk and high-reward. SMS literally provides the lowest cost and the highest ROI of any marketing medium.

So if you’re looking to market effectively, but you don’t want to break the bank while doing so, then SMS marketing is your most logical option. This is why SMS trumps EVERYTHING. It is the ONLY marketing medium with the ability to reach such vasts amounts of people at such a low cost. You can launch an SMS campaign for pennies per text and almost immediately start to see the results. With today’s uncertain economy and companies and businesses nationwide tightening their wallets and purse strings, now is as good of a time as ever to launch an SMS marketing campaign for YOUR business. Don’t just sit there while all your potential prospects go about their lives not knowing who you are. Jump on the SMS bandwagon and bring those prospects through onto your website and through your doors!

Social Media and Mobile Marketing for Moms

May 6, 2013/0 Comments/in mobile marketing, social media, social media marketing /by Brett Gordon

Recently, overwhelming evidence has been uncovered regarding mothers’ and their use of mobile devices and social media. More specifically speaking, they are 20% more likely to use social media than the general population, and a whopping 91% admit to using social media on a regular basis. That is a 20% increase from 2 years ago in 2010. This, however, is just scraping the surface of what appears to be a much larger demographic than previously thought by mobile and social media marketers.

The study, which was conducted by BabyCenter and comScore, focused on measuring mothers’ social media patterns and habits. The findings displayed a landscape where mothers are not only becoming extremely social themselves, but they also expect their friends, family members, and colleagues to be social as well. Statistically speaking, 22% of mothers claim that if their family or friends aren’t engaging in social media, then those family and friends are not as big a part of their lives as the ones who ARE active in social media. This might sound a little harsh up front, but as a marketer, you should be looking at these numbers with eyes wide as saucers.

Let’s take a look a a visual representation of how mother’s are overtaking the social media landscape.

You’ll notice that not only are moms 14% more likely to be on Facebook than the general population, but they are also 260 times more likely to be engaging with Facebook via a mobile device. Need a little more? They are also more likely to online shop and more likely to own a smartphone than people in the general population.

Their reach doesn’t just centralize on Facebook, however. They also have a strong reach across YouTube, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, and even Google+. Most notably, 61% of all mothers have used Pinterest within the last 6 months, which is almost double the 30% usage rate of the general population.

In the infographic below, you’ll notice that mothers are literally using social media more than any other demographic. In fact, it’s not even close.

Oh, and by the way, mother’s are also starting to dominate the mobile landscape as well. They are 49% more likely than the general population to own smartphones, 45% claim they are emailing less due to increased communication on social media, smartphone ownership is up 25% among moms while tablet ownership is up 79%, and an astounding 89% of moms with smartphones access Facebook via those smartphones.

As you can see, mothers have obviously gone social and mobile. So naturally, this affects their shopping habits. Now moms are starting to take to the internet for their shopping wants and needs as opposed to walking into brick and mortar stores. Despite only making up 18% of internet users, mothers still accounted for 32% of online spending in the last business quarter, 78% follow brands for discounts and coupons (compared to 55% of the general population), and 73% depend on online social media recommendations concerning parenting. They also admitted that posts from friends of theirs are 16% more likely to influence them than a post from a brand, and posts from other mothers are 55% more influential than any brands’ post.

The numbers are there. Mothers have become the quintessential demographic for mobile, social, and online marketers. If you are an online marketer, and you are not marketing with mothers in mind, then you are fighting a losing battle. With a majority of social, mobile, and online engagement coming from mothers, it should be obvious to marketers where their spending should be allocated. Don’t delay! Use this information to your benefit and watch the mothers of America grow your bottom line!

(Infographics pulled from marketingprofs.com)

Is Text to Win Effective?

May 2, 2013/1 Comment/in mobile marketing, sms marketing, text to win /by Brett Gordon

Text to win is one of the basic facets of mobile marketing. It involves getting people to text your short code with your selected keyword to win a particular prize or reward. The concept is actually very simple, but the real question is whether it works or not.

Text to win is ultimately designed to get people to opt-in to your SMS database, which is a list of all the numbers of people who have texted your short code (i.e. 57545). This is important because you are not legally allowed to text anyone who hasn’t opted into your database. This is a good thing though, since these people have given you permission to text them while also giving the implication that they are interested in what you and your company have to offer. Once they have texted your short code with a keyword (i.e. CAR), you are now free to text them whenever you want. They also have the option to opt-out at any time so you don’t run the risk of texting the wrong people.

Of course, text to win centers around your subscribers wanting to win a particular prize or reward. There are two ways you can do this. You can use the double opt-in method, or the single opt-in method. Both have proven to be successful measures to get people to opt-in to your database, but they work differently. Let us explain.

Double Opt-In: Your customers opt-in to your SMS campaign through a promotion, discount, or giveaway. In this case, using the keyword SKINNY WATER. Then you ask them via text message to opt-in to receive future text message promotions from your company. This is what it will look like:

Single Opt-In: You notify your subscribers immediately that they have subscribed to your database and will be receiving future SMS promotions from your company. The signage will look something like this:

With double opt-in, you are first getting the customer to enter your contest, then with a subsequent message, you ask them to actually opt-in to your database. Single opt-in puts the subscriber in your database immediately, just be sure that you text them notifying them of this as soon as they’ve opted-in. You also need to give subscribers the option to opt-out at any time. This goes for both double and single opt-in campaigns.

As we mentioned earlier, both of these are effective at growing your subscriber database, but which one is better? Of course, it will depend on what type of campaign you plan on running and what works best for your company, but there are numbers out there that display the types of conversion text to win can create.

The following graphs were created based on the assumption that there is a 37% average double opt-in rate after the subscriber enters the contest. The 37% comes from seven SMS campaigns that were done using text to win and double opt-in. The X axis is based on a text to win growth factor over 1,000 subscribers who used single opt-in.

The next graph represents text to win’s growth rate using single opt-in. You’ll notice that the text to win campaign would have to get a 3 times higher participation rate compared to single opt-in campaigns to get more subscribers.

Of course, cost needs to be factored into both of these options. SMS messaging costs will be higher for text to win campaigns since you will be sending more messages. You will also have to factor in the cost of the product you are offering as part of the promotion.

The bottom line is there really is no way to say one text to win method is better than the other. Your selection will depend on your company’s goals and what you want to accomplish with your SMS campaign. The two methods are essentially the same except that double opt-in requires the subscriber to take two actions to subscribe to your database while single opt-in requires the subscriber to take one action.

(Graphs and statistics pulled from Tatango.com)

Is SMS Marketing Too Invasive?

April 26, 2013/0 Comments/in mobile marketing, SMS, sms marketing /by Brett Gordon

Mobile and SMS marketing have been around for awhile now, so obviously marketers have been learning how to implement them more efficiently into their overall marketing campaign. However, it still seems to be unclear whether SMS marketing is too invasive, or not invasive enough. Looking at companies who have enacted SMS campaigns, it is apparent that some of them are sending way too many text messages to their subscribers, while others are clearly not sending enough. SMS marketing can be your most effective marketing tool, but marketers are going to have to learn how to find a happy medium between too much, and not enough.

SMS marketing has always been a great way for marketers, companies, and agencies to create ongoing dialogue with their end users. However, the industry is still learning how to use it more efficiently. “The SMS industry has come a long way in diminishing spam and improving relevancy,” said Shuli Lowy, Marketing Director at Ping Mobile. “However, we all still bare the scars of a dark past time when unsolicited and intrusive text messages were rampant in the kingdom of mobile.”

This has obviously changed over the years. Mobile and SMS marketers now need to follow strict guidelines when it comes to the opt-in and opt-out process. “Marketers engaging in SMS marketing now have to begin their consumer dialogue with clear instructions on how to opt out,” continued Lowy. “As well as information about message charges, frequency of messages, and information on how to get further assistance. Opt-in consent that is received via non-mobile portals need to be confirmed via mobile and premium SMS campaigns need to exercise a double opt-in process.”

Since there is a clearly defined opt-in process, end users can choose which brands and companies they want to receive messages from. Best practices say for businesses to text their subscribers around 3-4 messages a month. Many companies, however, are exceeding this rate or not even meeting it. Too many messages will only annoy and irritate your end users, but not enough messages will cause your end users to forget about you, completely defeating the entire point of an SMS campaign.

“Marketers must remember that the goal is not to dangle a piece of candy in front of consumers and then trap them into a mobile relationship prison,” Ms. Lowy said. “Instead the goal is to invite consumers in to engage with your brand through mobile and make sure to offer compelling content to keep the consumer interested and strengthen that relationship, but always leave the door open should they wish to leave.”

Lowy also said that it is important to exercise a double opt-in process for normal campaigns. This isn’t required, but it is highly recommended. She also recommended closing messages with a restatement of how to opt-out.

“The second most important strategy tip to create a powerful SMS experience is to ensure that your text messages don’t repeat information that consumers already know,” she continued. “Do not send consumers the same content via email, social media, and mobile. Your marketing channels should work together and weave into a multi-faceted brand relationship.”

Since 97% of all SMS messages are read within minutes of being received, we are starting to see smaller businesses adopt SMS into their marketing campaigns. “SMS marketing has already been used by large brands for years,” Lowy said. “Those brands are already moving on to more complex forms of mobile marketing which are propelling the smartphone era. However, small businesses are still very new to mobile and SMS is the most sensible place for them to dip their toes in the mobile marketing pool. Small B2C facing businesses have a lot to gain from SMS and we will see them starting to adopt it as a marketing tool in 2013.”

The general consensus among marketers is to take into account several factors when deciding when and when not to text their subscribers. Time, location, and interaction all need to be considered before sending messages, and agencies need to think about when and where their subscribers will be when they receive their messages. Determining whether or not you are sending enough or not enough is tricky, but keeping these factors in mind can help make that determination much easier.

Alex Campbell, Co-founder and Chief Innovation officer at Vibes, commented, “People text with their friends, and if you as a marketer are let into that circle, you’ve really earned someone’s trust. Once you build trusting relationships, that’s a powerful – and winning – connection for you and your customer, which often leads to brand loyalty.”

Remember that SMS messaging is a real-time marketing channel that works most efficiently with ongoing messaging. However, if you are doing it too much, or even worse, not providing value to your subscribers with your messages, you are fighting a losing battle. Keep your messages to 3-4 a month, only going over if you feel you have real value to offer the customer. Include multimedia in your texts, brand logos, product images, or even how-to videos. All of these have been proven to increase returns on SMS marketing. You also want to promote your SMS campaign anywhere and everywhere. SMS marketing success increases as your database gets bigger. The more people that are receiving your texts, the higher chance you have of one of those subscribers coming to you for business.

SMS marketing can be your best and most efficient tool if you use it right. The funny thing is that it’s not that hard. Companies who use SMS inefficiently simply did not educate themselves properly or didn’t even take the time to educate themselves. Follow SMS marketing’s best practices, and what you’ve read in this article, and you are sure to have a very strong and effective SMS campaign.

Political SMS Marketing

April 24, 2013/0 Comments/in mobile marketing, sms marketing, sms marketing for politics /by Brett Gordon

When thinking of SMS marketing, using it for politics isn’t necessarily the first thing that jumps into your mind. However, with the recent explosion of cell phone and smartphone use over the past 6-7 years, SMS marketing for politics has become imperative to any political campaign. In fact, President Obama leveraged SMS in his favor during the 2008 presidential election so well that he ended up winning Mobile Marketer of the Year for his efforts.

So why did a presidential candidate like Obama choose to go mobile? For starters, almost literally everyone over the legal voting age of 18 carries some type of a cell phone with them all the time. In fact, the percentage is well over 90%. Along with this, 99% of those phones are capable of sending and receiving SMS text messages. So with a shocking majority of people over 18 using cell phones, and 99% of those phones being SMS capable, what politician WOULDN’T want to go mobile with their campaign?

Not only does mobile give an advantage since seemingly every has a cell phone, but they are also the most personal medium in which you can reach the people. People text everyday, and statistically speaking, 1.2 TRILLION text messages will be sent this year alone. No other medium gives politicians the capacity to send messages DIRECTLY to their voters’ hands. If direct, personal communication is not the epitome of all that is holy in marketing, then we challenge you to find it.

SMS messaging also gives politicians the ability to communicate with their voters without coming across as spammy. Why? SMS messaging requires voters to opt-in to the service in order to receive text messages. So just by building up your database, you know everyone you text has already made it clear that they are interested in what you have to say. Your messages won’t be unwelcome since they already opted-in. If they get tired of your messages, then they can simply reply STOP to opt-out. It’s as simple as that.

To opt-in to your service, all voters need to do is text your short code with your keyword. That’s it. No bells and whistles, no confusion; simple and straight to the point. Voters love this and so do politicians.

If you’re a politician and you are looking for a way to communicate DIRECTLY and PERSONALLY with your voters and prospective voters, then mobile marketing is EXACTLY what you need. Simply put, there is NO better way to for politicians to communicate and interact with their voters. So what’s the wait? Implement SMS marketing into your political campaign today and who knows, you may just follow in Obama’s footsteps and become the next President of the United States.

Mobile Marketing and Social Media in the Restroom | Where CAN’T You Market?

April 16, 2013/0 Comments/in mobile marketing, social media, social media marketing /by Brett Gordon

If you are new to the mobile marketing industry, then you probably have no idea that there is virtually no place that you cannot market to. Actually, we might be able to use the word “literally” instead of “virtually” now because of newly discovered information regarding mobile marketing, social media, and where they are commonly used. We already know that 91% of all adults have or own a smartphone, but where are they using them?

For starters, we know they are using them on the streets, in stores, at restaurants, at the mall, at work, at home, before bed, in bed, in the morning when they wake up, and basically everywhere in between. And when we say everywhere, we mean EVERYWHERE. A recent study conducted by CreditDonkey has found that a whopping 52% of American social media users admit to using Facebook while in the restroom. Of that 52%, 54% were men and 40.4% were women. Along with these restroom numbers, it was also found that 51.4% of men admitted to using social media while drunk, while 41.4% of women admit to using social media while drunk. Of course, women are probably thinking right now, “Well obviously the men’s numbers are higher, men are pigs.” Which may be the case, but the numbers are still prevalent for both sexes and should be seen as huge windows of opportunity for marketers.

Speaking of the battle of the sexes, women actually have a higher propensity to use social media while watching television, with 83.3% hopping on social media while their TVs are on in the background. Only 79.8% of men do this. 72.5% of women and 69.5% of men visit sites while traveling, and both sexes are guilty of getting on their phones while at work with 62.4% of men and 58% of women messing around on the clock. Who do you think used their phones more while shopping? Men right? While the women are shopping? Nope. 44.1% of women used social media while shopping relative to 36% of men.

Probably the biggest and most frightening of these statistics is the fact that 14.8% of men and 11.8% of women admit to hopping on social media while driving. To be more specific, 19% of social media users have accessed Facebook while driving and 15.1% have used Twitter. Of course, this is nothing we endorse in any way shape or form, but it does illustrate how people are using their smartphones literally EVERYWHERE. You can now add the restroom, while watching TV, while drunk, and while driving to our initial list at the top of this article. We are still trying to find places where people AREN’T using their smartphones, but those places are becoming few and far in between. It will eventually get to the point where we may never find a place where no one uses their smartphones again.

So what does this tell us? The fact that everyone is using their smartphones EVERYWHERE?! Well, you might want to start by implementing a mobile marketing strategy into your overall marketing strategy. The best part about mobile marketing and marketing on social media is that it is CHEAP compared to any form of outbound marketing (television, radio, billboards, print media, etc.) This should not be a hard decision! Integrate mobile marketing into your marketing strategy today and take advantage of all these users who are on their phones all the time!

March Madness Mobile Marketing 2013 – Huge Hit

April 11, 2013/0 Comments/in ad-supported free streaming, free streaming, mobile marketing /by Brett Gordon

The Louisville Cardinals won the NCAA National Basketball Championship on April 8th beating out the Michigan Wolverines, capping off another great tournament. However, the Cardinals were not the only winners during March Madness. Turner Broadcasting, mobile marketing, and fans also won big with the smashing success of ad-supported free streaming of all tournament games.

With over 50 million live streams run during the tournament, Turner reported a 168% increase since last year. That means 50 million people were seeing the advertisements put in place by marketers across all platforms including desktop and mobile. The primary marketers were Capital One, Buick, AT&T, and Infiniti. The impressive part about this was that all the games were broadcasted live on television, even if some games were played at the same time. Turner was able to do this by utilizing cable networks TNT, TBS, and truTV on top of the main CBS broadcast. So even despite the fact that fans could watch any of the tournament games they wanted on TV, 50 million of them still chose to view the games on their mobile or desktop devices.

Along with this, mobile device use in general is also seeing a sharp uptick in the number of people using its video streaming capabilities. A 309% increase in minutes viewed on mobile phones and a 194% increase in minutes viewed on tablets has been reported. Turner Broadcasting reported that March Madness alone had 5.8 million different users using broadband to watch live video of the games. That’s a 170% increase from last year’s tournament.

Turner mentioned that social media activity also experienced an increase in engagement from last year, with 1.4 million comments being generated by the tournament, or a 16% increase.

So what does this mean for marketers? Well, to put it bluntly, marketers need to start taking advantage of streaming video’s advertising capabilities, especially during big sporting events like March Madness or the Super Bowl. Turner Broadcasting has proven that people ARE watching streaming video, and they are watching it by the millions. Just by placing an ad within a network’s streaming video interface, you are guaranteeing yourself exposure to millions of people. Along with this, most of them are on mobile devices, so it will be easier for them to click on your ads and become engaged with your brand as opposed to seeing an ad on the street or a billboard where it would take more effort on their part to engage with you.

As a marketer, you shouldn’t even have to think twice about this. Take advantage of ad-supported free streaming today and expose yourself and your company to the millions of people who are now watching TV on their mobile devices!

Niche Mobile Marketing Apps | Take Advantage of Small Business Markets

April 8, 2013/0 Comments/in mobile apps, mobile marketing, niche mobile marketing /by Brett Gordon

Marketers traditionally have wanted to go after the largest markets they can find. However, taking advantage of niche markets, despite their smaller numbers, can be surprisingly profitable, especially if you do it right. This has become particularly true with mobile marketing. If you take the time to develop the proper niche mobile marketing strategy and corner a niche market, not only will you be exceptionally profitable, but you will face virtually ZERO competition and will be able to enjoy the advantages of having an extremely loyal group of customers.

There are essentially 5 steps to developing a successful niche mobile marketing strategy. Follow them and you will be rewarded grandly.

Know Your Customers

This is probably the most important step of developing ANY marketing strategy. You need to know your market in and out. Study your market, speak and discuss with members of your target demographic, and follow and learn their activities. Make sure to read as much as you can into what their primary problems, issues, and worries are. If they want to do something better, learn how you can solve that problem for them. Be willing to stop and talk with them at any time, gather as much information as you can about them, and generally immerse yourself into their worlds so you can better understand them and how they operate.

Once you’ve become an expert on your target demographic, you should be able to satisfy their wants and needs quickly and efficiently. If you do not do any of this, you will effectively become an “outsider” to your targets and they will not be able to relate or identify with you. Make sure you know your target demographic to a tee and you’ll be off to a great start.

Learn Customers’ App Wants and Needs and Create a Customized Offering

Now that you’re an expert on your targets, you can start to figure out exactly what it is that they want on their mobile apps. Keeping it simple will usually give you the best results, so focus on sticking with what is proven to work, then add more features as you see necessary as you go along. Realize that you don’t always have to add more. Sometimes just sticking with the original simple idea with minimal features on the app will give you better results than if the app becomes cluttered with unnecessary add-ons.

For example, if you are working with a restaurant that does take-out, then you will probably want to add a feature that allows consumers to place orders through the app. However, if you’re working with a high-end restaurant, then you would have no use for that feature on the app.

You want to be creative, but you don’t want to overdo it. NEVER take the one-size fits all approach. Treat each client and company as an individual entity, because they are. Research and find out what it is that makes each company special, then tailor your marketing to reflect that.

Figure Out Where Their “Homes” Are

DON’T use the same mediums and channels for your niche market that you would use for other markets. Niche markets are special, so you need to treat them as such. You’ll want to start by finding out where their favorite hangout and meeting spots are. They might like a particular internet forum, so go find them there, chat with them, and find out what’s important to them and what’s not. They may host events like conventions, online webinars, conferences, or seminars; so go to them and interact with your targets. When you show your customers that you are willing to adapt to them, instead of the other way around, they will notice and you will be accepted with open arms. Once you’ve gotten to this point, working with them to make an ideal app will be easy.

Get the Ball Rolling With Freebies

Once you’ve established connections within the niche market you are targeting, you’ll want to get them to try and test out your app. The best way to do this is to simply offer it to them for free. Everyone loves free stuff and the best way to get feedback on anything is to have people test it out for free. The feedback you get back will be honest and straightforward, and may even be a little more positive since you let them try it without having to pay. Make sure you are listening intently to everything they say to you about the app, good or bad. This stage of the app development process is critical because it will ultimately determine the overall quality and usefulness of the app. If you are getting positive feedback, be sure to gather these as testimonials. You can use these testimonials in the future when you are launching the product publicly.

Realize that niche markets are ultra-connected communities of people. So if you get one good referral, that one referral could be the key to your app catching on like wildfire. Never underestimate any of the referrals you are getting. Knowing this, it is never a bad idea to add extra incentive on top of the free app so that more people will be willing to give you feedback.

Adapt, React, and Respond

Just because you’ve launched your app and gotten plenty of feedback does not mean that you are done. App development is a never ending process, and if you don’t learn to adapt, react, and respond to your customers’ ongoing feedback for your app, it will become destined for failure. The most important thing to remember when designing an app is that it should directly reflect the wants, needs, and feedback of your users. If you do this, your success is all but guaranteed.