Mobile Marketing: Meaning and Types

Mobile marketing is a multi-channel, digital marketing strategy aimed at reaching a target audience on their smartphones, tablets, and/or other mobile devices, via websites, email, SMS and MMS, social media, and apps.

Mobile is disrupting the way people engage with brands. Everything that can be done on a desktop computer is now available on a mobile device. From opening an email to visiting your website to reading your content, it’s all accessible through a small mobile screen. Consider:

• 80% of internet users own a smartphone.
• Mobile platforms, such as smartphones and tablets, host up to 60% of digital media time for users in the U.S.
• Google anticipates search queries on mobile devices to surpass desktop searches by the end of 2015.

Effective mobile advertising means understanding your mobile audience, designing content with mobile platforms in mind, and making strategic use of SMS/MMS marketing and mobile apps.

Types of Mobile Marketing

Mobile marketing has proven to be effective as now, the consumer has an increased control over the kind of advertisements that are sent to him. There was a time when most messages sent to consumers were not very useful, posing a serious threat to mobile marketing.

Corrective actions, both by corporations and network providers have helped to weed out unscrupulous elements, making mobile marketing an ethical way of promotion and publicity. Some types of mobile marketing are as follows.

1. Short Message Service (SMS)

Short message service initiated the concept of mobile marketing and still is used to promote a variety of products and services. Although, it has been put to a lot of abuse, regulations in the past few years have meant a revival of this form of mobile marketing.

The biggest advantage of SMS marketing is its reach and the low cost of marketing. Every cell phone has an ability to receive an SMS, which essentially means a larger target audience for corporations.

2. Multimedia Message Service (MMS)

Multimedia messages score over SMS as being a more effective form of marketing as it provides the user with images, audio and video. MMS can also be used to run advertisements as one gets to see on a TV, and offers a more efficient way of marketing a product, however, the cost of sending an MMS is more than that of an SMS.

3. Mobile Applications

Mobile applications have proved to be a great tool for mobile marketers, as these are innovative and offer the user a host of features. There are certain widgets that are displayed on the home screen of mobile phones, allowing the user to directly log into them, and advertisements can be placed on these applications to promote a product.

4. Bluetooth Mobile Marketing

This type of marketing helps in customizing the type of advertisements a user will receive, and most of it is based upon the geographical location of the user. This is an effective form of marketing as it helps in delivering relevant information to the user, and helps in filtering the advertisements which may not be useful for the user.

For example, the probability of a person enrolling for a dancing or a yoga course is more if the venue is closer to where he stays. This is the prime reason why Bluetooth mobile marketing is an effective tool for serving custom ads to the user.

5. Mobile Internet Advertisements

When you are online, you might have seen several advertisements popping up on your computer screen. Mobile Internet advertisements work in the same way, and deliver high-quality content to users. These are mostly built for smartphone users who have a reliable Internet connection.

Apart from the general consumer advertisements, mobile marketing has also helped entrepreneurs to expand their business and network with people. The QR (quick-response barcodes) allow interested parties to know more about a business project.

Today, iPhone is equipped with Near Field Communication, which allows users to buy stuff online, as one does from a computer. Truly, there are more exciting times ahead, and innovations in technology can provide some magnificent options to corporations as well as consumers.