Europe, US - Communication is Key in Mobile Marketing

Failure to communicate the benefits of receiving mobile marketing material means brands are missing out on the opportunities this channel offers, according to research seen by Marketing Week.

British consumers have a bigger appetite for offers via their mobile phones than those in France, Germany or the US, according to a study of 4,400 handset owners by Velti and the DMA.

The report, Promoting to the Mobile Consumer - shown exclusively to Marketing Week - reveals that 75% of Brits are happy to receive promotions this way, compared to 72% of Americans, 50% of French people and 46% of Germans.

“Mobile is the fastest way to get offers to customers and using it also offers a significant advantage over other channels in its immediacy in both delivery and redemption,” says Mark Brill, chair of the DMA Mobile Marketing Council.

However, Krishna Subramanian, chief marketing officer at mobile marketing and advertising provider Velti, warns: “Brands should actively seek to understand consumer preferences for receiving mobile offers and develop creative campaigns that actively engage the user in content.”

Comparing mobile consumers in the UK with France, the British have a different set of promotional preferences than their cross-Channel counterparts. Text messages are the most preferred method in English-speaking countries, while France has the highest level of acceptance of emails or microsite delivery. French consumers are also twice as favourable towards voice-based promotional messages on their mobile as those in other countries. However, mobile apps are gaining in popularity in all developed markets.

The types of promotions people prefer to receive also varies by country. Money-off is considered the best discount in the US, just ahead of two-for-one deals and is ranked a close second in the UK among two-thirds of consumers.

Mobile offers also have a high pass-on rate, with about three-quarters of consumers regularly sending deals to family and friends.

This figure would be higher in the UK and US if there was an incentive for people to pass on promotions, according to Brill. Consumers are more likely to participate in mobile engagement if there is a clear incentive in it for them, such as an additional benefit for sharing a promotional offer, he adds.

“Word of mouth is still a very powerful method of gaining influence over consumers and brands should not underestimate the power of pass-along offers to extend the reach of their marketing campaign,” advises Subramanian. “Marketers should also focus on creating emotional affinity with their brand, such as VIP access to an event, as opposed to concentrating solely on financial rewards.”

He continues: “Mobile is the most personal of all channels used largely for communication with friends and family. It’s essential, therefore, that marketers gain consumers’ trust if they want to be ‘invited in’. This can only be achieved by following best practice, understanding the needs of their particular audience and meeting consumer expectations.”

In the UK and US, acceptance rates for promotional marketing received over mobile are lower than for promotions in general. But a willingness for these offers to be promoted via the mobile channel is likely to rise over time.

This change will not occur overnight, according to the report, which points out that most brands and network operators still struggle to demonstrate to consumers the benefits of receiving promotional marketing and gaining permission to do so.

Brill warns: “It’s a double-edged sword. It’s clear that consumers are still sceptical about engaging with marketing promotions through their phones.”

To overcome this problem, advertisers and marketers need to do more to demonstrate exactly what is on offer, according to the research, which reveals that about half of consumers either believe they pay to receive offers or are not sure if they do or not.

“Resistance to promotional marketing is often due to the fact that many believe the inbound promotional offers they receive are charged to their airtime account. This misconception affects as many as a quarter of consumers in the US and France, one in five in Germany and one in seven in the UK,” says Subramanian.

“Given the exponential growth potential of the mobile channel, it is important that both advertisers and networks help people understand that promotional benefits offered via mobile are not done at a cost to the user,” he adds.

Advertisers have a significant advantage over mobile operators when it comes to making offers, with consumers in the US nearly seven times more likely to want mobile promotions from brands rather than from their network operator.

“This is surprising as we expected that consumers would want to hear from their network carriers about benefits such as getting a free handset or extra mobile credit or airtime,” says Subramanian. “There is an opportunity for mobile networks to extend and deepen relationships with subscribers through opt-in promotional offers.”

However, only half of networks are making such offers in France, falling to one in five in the US. Permission to receive offers may explain this promotional gap, since network operators can only send service-based messages in Europe without a specific opt-in to marketing. The same is not true in the US, yet three-quarters of those surveyed claimed not to have received an offer from their network in the past month.

For marketers, it seems that mobile phones can be a lucrative channel for offers - if targeted in the right way.

Source: By Tanzeel Akhtar on 5th January 2012.

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Europe - Social Networking Use Among Mobile Users Grows in Europe

Mobile phones have been playing a major role in our daily lives nowadays. We are getting more engaged with mobile phones and seem like we can't live with them. Hmm do you feel kind of insecure when your phone is not with you?

The number people accessing social networking sites in France, Germany, Italy, Spain and the U.K. using their mobile phone has grown by 44 percent in the last year, market research company comScore said on Monday.

In September, 55 million users in the five countries accessed social networking sites or blogs on their mobile device, representing about one in four of the total mobile audience, according to comScore. Nearly half of these users reported doing it on a daily basis, a 67 percent increase compared to the same month last year, it said.

Twitter and LinkedIn more than doubled its audiences, but Facebook is still the biggest by a wide margin. Facebook's audience grew from about 25 million to more than 39 million. That compares to 8.6 million users for Twitter and 2.2 million users for LinkedIn, according to comScore's data.

Of the five countries, U.K. was the one with the highest penetration of smartphone users at approximately 47 percent, while Germany is lagging behind at 33 percent. That is reflected in the number of users who accessed social networking sites or blogs in the two countries: 35 percent in the U.K. compared to about 17 percent in Germany.

Using a browser is still the most popular means of access, but the use of applications is growing rapidly.

The growing popularity of social networking hasn't been missed by operators, mobile phone vendors and sites themselves, which are looking to increase the audience by working together on cheaper smartphones.

Last week, Orange launched three Alcatel One Touch phones with dedicated Facebook buttons that will be priced below €100 (US$135). Earlier this month MediaTek, a designer of software and chipsets for low-end phones, said it will put Facebook on feature phones that will cost below $50 before subsidies.

Source: By Mikael Ricknäs, IDG News on 21st November 2011.

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Europe - ComScore: Mobiles drive 4.6% of internet traffic

Can you actually see that "sending text messages" has gained the highest percentage among other usages of mobile phones? Apparently, sending SMS is the most popular means of communication in today's world. Don't you think so? Look at the table below and believe it with your eyes.

Source: http://www.nma.co.uk/news/comscore-mobiles-drive-46-of-internet-traffic/3031350.article from Ronan Shields on 27th October 2011.

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Europe - Big 5 Euro Mobile Markets Hit $1 Billion By 2014

The European markets in mobile advertising, led by the UK, are expanding faster than previously projected and are estimated to reach $1.03 billion by 2014, according to research from mobileSQUARED.

The big five represented by the UK, Spain, Italy, Germany and France will account for nearly $264 million in mobile spend this year, spiking to more than $400 million next year. They then maintain a hockey stick trajectory to $1.79 billion in 2016.

In an earlier report, mobileSQUARED had pegged 2015 as the milestone year when the five leading markets would grow their mobile ad economy to over $1 billion.

Smartphones -- Android in particular -- across Europe are "massively increasing the number of mobile Internet and app users and associated levels of available inventory to be exploited by the mobile ad networks," says a white paper published from the mobileSQUARED research by adsmobi.

Mobile banner ads will lead the way in spend, adsmobi and mobileSQUARED content, although there will be differences across regional markets.

In the UK, for instance, they expect banners to account for over 60% of spend, while in France, Germany and Italy they will comprise 45%. In 2011, the mobile display market is valued at $134.4 million. According to mobileSQUARED data, InMobi serves the largest number of ads in the major European markets, followed by adsmobi and YOC.

The dominance of the UK in mobile ad spend reflects the penetration of smartphones in that market. By year's end, smartphones will account for 39% of UK mobile users. Italy is right behind at 28% and France at 25%. There will be 93.3 million mobile Internet users in the big five Euro markets at the end of this year.

By 2016, the UK is expected to see 80% of its mobile subscribers on smartphones.

Source: http://www.mediapost.com/publications/?fa=Articles.showArticle&art_aid=158584 by Steve Smith on 15th September 2011.

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