Mobile Marketing Strategy or “How Did They Know I was Hungry?”
You have just parked the car and are on the way to pick up your dry cleaning or buy some cough drops at the neighborhood pharmacy. Suddenly, your cell phone lights up, asking if you would like a discount coupon to buy a pizza at the shop on the corner? You stare at the phone, in dismay, wondering how the pizza shop knew you were there and knew you were hungry?? Doesn’t it realize that you are trying to eat healthily? How does this work?
This is “Mobile Marketing”
You have been downloading apps on your cell phone. For example, apps like “Google Maps” or “Angry Birds” or “Yahoo”. Marketers are buying “location based” impressions from these companies so as you get within 100 feet or 2 blocks or 1 mile of the pizza shop (depending on what “geo fence” was bought) the coupon offer is generated to your phone.
Amazing, right? Intrusive, maybe? Annoying, sometimes.
Creative? Successful?
All of the above! This is where marketing is today. And this is only one of the ways it works. I attended a workshop conducted recently by a mobile marketing guru, Candice McFarlane, Director of Client Services at Ping Mobile. She shared this example as well as others, including one where you are in Las Vegas: You're searching for a hotel to stay that night. Suddenly, on your phone, you get an offer for a 15% discount at a local hotel. They knew you were searching and reached out to you.
Is this type of marketing applicable to your business? Maybe, maybe not. But it's important to stay abreast of the latest techniques so that when it's time to devise your marketing strategy, you know potential new tactics, and when they will lead to success and when they won't.
Let me know what you think. Are emerging mobile marketing ideas interesting to your business? Give me a call or leave a comment below.
By Barbara Fowler, Partner & CMO 908-956-4529 bfowler@chiefoutsiders.com
Barbara Fowler believes that great companies are grown through leaders who develop marketing strategies that make the customer experience rewarding and significant and through employee/customer engagement. To help achieve these conditions, she has worked in start-up, turnaround and profitable companies all around the globe, specializing in the development, implementation and achievement of sales targets. She has held a variety of challenging positions both in the home office and field, effectively leading culturally diverse organizations and implementing development programs for CMOs worldwide. She is an adjunct professor at Rutgers University, as well as an global CMO and thought leader for our strategic marketing consulting firm.
Chief Outsiders' blog is written by top CMOs and executive guests for CEOs looking for business growth strategies, current thinking on effective leadership skills, and ideas and insights from real-world marketing strategy implementation.