The past few years have been an exciting time for businesses and marketers with opportunities abound due to the explosive growth of mobile applications.

Mobile apps have created the incredible opportunity for marketing channels, but on the other hand, over the past few years brands have had to accept that consumers have found themselves in the drivers seat. They pick the subject matter they want to view and now have the opportunity to view it anytime or anyplace they want. Brands must understand this and create mobile offerings with this in mind.

Mobile apps have created the incredible opportunity | Photo: Nichole Kasper (Flikr)

It is worth the effort – mobile is now more popular than TV for consuming content. In the US, we now average over 3 hours per day on our mobile devices.

How does your brand make sure it captures the interest of your potential users?

Think Like A Customer

Approach your mobile application development from the perspective of a consumer. All too often brands create a list of what they want to accomplish with a mobile app and never once stop to consider how their customers interact with their brand and what customers would want from their mobile app.

Look At The Data

Data collection has never been easier to do. With data you can not only understand your customers better, but also be able to communicate with them on their mobile device in a way that interests them. Modern customers have come to expect brands to understand their preferences and deliver information that it pertinent.

Personalization

Delivering  personalized and relevant content to your users is the best way to increase and retain users. Brands that personalize content have seen not only an increase in user retention but also an increase in the duration of in-app session. Data can be used to improve user experiences.

Location

Mobile marketing is about more than engaging with the customer, it’s also about doing it at the right time and in the right context. Location data is part of what makes mobile marketing so powerful. Retail outlets are a easy example to look at to see how to leverage the power of location data. Businesses that can deliver relevant continent about sales or new items when a customer is within 2-5 miles of a retail outlet has seen very impressive results.

Value To The Customer

If your application is not offering value for your customers, it will not get used. If your mobile applications are simply sales and marketing tools that don’t offer value to your customers,  you are basically telling customers that you want their money, but are not willing to build a relationship of trust.

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91 percent of teens ages 13–17 go online using mobile devices | Photo: Omar Jordan Fawahl (Flikr)

If your brand appeals to a younger market you probably already know by now that mobile marketing is crucial.

The numbers are somewhat staggering. According to Pew Research Center an astounding 91% of teens ages 13–17 go online using mobile devices, at least occasionally, while 73% of teens own smart phones. This isn’t occasional activity either, as 92% say they are on the Internet daily, while 23% say they use the Internet ‘almost constantly’.

But businesses need to understand that when marketing to Millennials it takes more than just understanding that they have embraced mobile devices.

When you start your mobile application development make sure you take into account specific tendencies of your audience.

Pew Research Center’s research describes Millennials as wanting to forge a distinctive path, while past generations tried to fit in or ‘be cool’, Millennials like to do things their own way.  Being less traditional than previous generations, research has found with Millennials that loyalty is harder to earn as they often question the norm.  Often the traditional advertising tactics don’t get through to Millennials.

How then do you market to Millennials?

Go Visual

Teens love visual content and mobile apps that have focused on visual content such as Instagram or Snapchat are a big hit with Millennials.

Be Real

The content you deliver needs to be real. Contrived efforts to impress them may not only fall flat but can backfire in terms of a social media backlash. Millennials respond negatively to things that feel fake.

Think Mobile First

Given the overwhelming importance of mobile to Millennials it is essential that your marketing is mobile-friendly and and that you take a mobile-first approach with content. If you are not preparing for your content to be viewed on a mobile device it might be displaying poorly and turning away perspective customers.

Some exciting examples of a using these principles are provided by Snapchat.

Stories, which is Snapchat’s most popular feature, lets users to string together a collection of photos and videos into a longer-form format that is a mix of user generated and brand generated content. Snapchat has also created Discover which showcases curated material from media publishers, like an interactive news magazine inside Snapchat. Each outlet releases a daily bulletin with a limited amount content that users can view or skip. This makes for an exciting opportunity for advertisers that might change the way many approach mobile advertising. Discover is built to showcase a blend of content, including images, video and what they call gorgeous ads.

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Mobile is more important than ever. In fact, smartphones now make up an incredible 75 percent of the mobile market (comScore), which is up from 65 percent of the market only a year ago.

Mobile has taken over and become the primary way that users engage with and access digital media.

While many businesses and entrepreneurs have experienced success with mobile applications and mobile web site, there are opportunities for many businesses to improve the results of their mobile program.

Whether you are using a mobile web site, iPhone application, Android application or all three, these four tips can help you improve the results of you mobile program. Look them over and discuss them with your mobile application developer to improve your mobile program.

Understand How A Customer Interacts with Brands

There are several opportunities for businesses to improve the results of their mobile program | Photo: tyrande101 (Flikr)

In 2015, smart phone users (practically everyone), will find themselves regularly bouncing from one device to another across the course of the day.  From laptop to smartphone to tablet and back and forth, a  customer may interact with your brand in several ways before making a purchase. From doing research at home or while in the office to showrooming, you need to anticipate customers interacting with your brand in a multitude of ways.

Businesses must understand this a present a clear and unified path to purchase regardless of the medium consumers choose to use to interact with your brand, You should anticipate customers starting searching on one device and continuing doing research on another and possibly making their purchase by another medium all together.

What Do Your Customers Want?

Often when mobile apps don’t catch on like brands want it is due to them failing to consider their consumer and their wants and behavior. You need to analyze what customers would want from mobile offerings from your brand and give it to them.  Far too many brands fail to understand what consumers are looking for from them and create apps that offer little or none of the features that consumers are looking for.

Include a Call to Action

When it comes to mobile media many have forgotten marketing basics like including a call to action. Mobile is a new medium where new rules apply but that doesn’t meant that proven principles should be thrown out the window.

Don’t Plan Your Mobile Program In A Vacuum

Don’t have only one group in your organization responsible for your mobile application, marketing or IT won’t see the whole picture and be able to create the proper digital experience. Today mobile is how we do business and brands must include input from all parts of the organization to create apps that perform.

Photo: http://bit.ly/1DZZ5QO

There is no denying that mobile is no longer the “next big thing”.  Mobile is here and mobile is now.

Regardless of what statistic you look at, mobile tends to show growth, and if you are like many business people, making your business mobile friendly is still sitting on your list of things to do.

But you can’t wait any longer.

As consumers are getting more comfortable with mobile their expectations are rising | Photo: Kārlis Dambrāns (Flickr)

According to Marin Software, in a recent report, ad clicks on mobile devices have now overtaken clicks on desktops. Mobile devices now account of 44.8 percent of all ad impressions and 50 percent of clicks. On top of that, IMRG and Capgemini’s recently found that that mobile devices now account for 40 percent of all online retail sales. This number is growing at a rapid rate as it accounted for 37 percent in the previous quarter.

As consumers are getting more comfortable with mobile their expectations are rising. Retailers that are not delivering the experiences that customers want simply move on to businesses that do.

With mobile shopping getting more popular we are seeing growth in related areas as well, for instance 27 percent of customers plan on using mobile payments in the next six months.

Obviously mobile is where business is headed and if you don’t have a mobile application yet, plan on talking to a mobile application developer soon. But when you do keep in mind where the industry is headed and be prepared for the state it is in when you are able to present your business’s mobile friendly face to the public.

The trends are obvious when it comes to mobile in general, but what are the more specific trends to look for in the industry?

Personalization

The relevance of your message is more important than ever. Is your messaging tailored to your individual customers? Are you asking your self if your customers will value your message?

Don’t fall into the trap of putting too much emphasis on trendy messaging while ignoring relevance. You will want to put yourself in your consumers’ shoes when they are using that app.  Would you messaging be considered welcome and relevant from that perspective?

Location

Context is more important than ever when it comes to conversions. Mobile is all about location. With mobile it is easy to reach consumers in specific geographies or even at a specific location. By providing the context of location, you increase the power of your message. By reaching people at the right moment, you increase your chances of creating sales.

Travel

When it comes to travel mobile is growing at an accelerated rate. Last year 28 percent of people used their mobile device to book their daily commute, a figure double that of 2013. (BuzzCity) Look for mobile to rapidly become the de facto tool in the travel industry. This presents great opportunities for mobile friendly businesses to appeal to consumers while traveling or commuting.

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