How Beneficial is Mobile Marketing?

Photo Credit: iStock.com/Artist’s mangpor_2004

Mobile marketing, as commonly understood, is the use of personal phones of the public to promote business offers and ideas. They consist of personalized information that comes in multiple forms, such as a SMS, MMS, Email, web-based apps, QR Codes, etc. In other words, mobile marketing can be defined as “the use of the mobile medium as a means of marketing communication” and the “distribution of any kind of promotional or advertising messages to customer through wireless networks”.

Like everything else in life, this too, comes with a variety of good and bad characteristics. There are some definite perks and disadvantages every analyst should know about it.

The Benefits of Mobile Marketing

The advantages are many but let’s discuss the major ones only. Apart from being super accessible, low cost, and customized; it has many other desirable merits to vouch for its general usability.

• Direct User Interaction

The Marketers interact directly with the potential customers or simply with the users of mobile phones wherever they are. The messages are usually personalized and sometimes they may directly generate a dialogue.

• Huge Potential to Go Viral

Since mobile messages can be forwarded as well as shared by word of mouth with other people around, it has a huge capacity to make a business offer viral in the targeted local community. Companies receive a lot more exposure this way without making any extra efforts.

• Immediate Results

Results are instant when it comes to mobile phone marketing. Since mobile phones are portable and almost always switched on, the message is received the moment it is sent. Even if it’s turned off, you can be sure that they will receive it as soon as it’s turned on again. The communication with mobile users is direct, instant, and almost always available in a separate conversation saved on their mobiles. Hence, it also works as a constant reminder whenever they plan on buying the services that you offer.

The Downside of Mobile Marketing

The perks of using mobile marketing are numerous. But it has various downsides as well. Some typical issues being:

• Lower Privacy

This issue goes back to the advent of technology which hardly ever did anything to improve the privacy matters for its users. It also becomes a major issue when it comes to mobile devices. Mobile marketers need to respect the fact that users would only be attracted to their service if they care for their online privacy. Any promotional activity should occur only with the user’s permission for it.

• Navigation Problem

Mobile devices generally have small screens, with even smaller keypads. This poses patience issues for some users, and for others, it becomes a complete no-no to subscribe to a promotional offer on phone. Even if they do subscribe, chances are that most of the ads would go unnoticed or unchecked because users find it too tedious to check each one of them in detail.

• User education

With each new model of mobile device, average users need continuous re-education. Every mobile marketing campaign relies heavily on the users’ response to their advertising. Inability to use the device properly clearly indicates a disadvantage for both the marketer and the user himself.