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All About Mobile Marketing

By Joyce Jacobsen


Everyone who is anyone wants a piece of the mobile marketing pie. Why? What is it? And why are people so excited about it? Simple. Marketing with the help of mobile phones brings you much closer to your customer and because of that you are able to sell your products much more easily.

In fact, contrary to what you might think, Mobile marketing isn't all that recent a phenomenon. It all started out with the evolution of SMS (or short messaging service) in the early 2000s. In Europe and in certain parts of Asia, enterprising business owners got hold of Mobile phone numbers and then started to send data to their customers.

It is only in the U.S. that it is relatively new. But all that changed when in June 2008, CellSigns proclaimed that seventy five billion messages were sent every single month, in comparison to just eighteen billion just about eighteen months before! A lot of people like to give the credit for texting to "American Idol"!

So if you are about to venture into the field of Mobile Market, who should you choose as your customers? Today's generation Y of course. A lot of people also rope in Baby Boomers, but this is not such a smart thing to do. Baby Boomers still remember what life was like before the onset of the internet and mobiles. Gen Y on the other hand is more comfortable with their cell phones. One has only to see them texting away all the time to reinforce this fact.

Why Mobile Marketing?

A lot of people wonder why they should recourse to mobile marketing. Here are some reasons:

* The mobile phone is personal. Can you imagine anybody sharing their mobile phones with anyone? Laptops are personal, but not as personal as mobiles.

* The mobile phone is always switched on and carried around! This has a great implication for marketers. Messages sent by marketers to people can be acted upon immediately! This is not true for the internet because it requires you to log on and then open your account.

* Lastly, the mobile phone is incredibly versatile because it has a built in payment system! You can take care of any billing using the users' mobile network.
Some Cons

But mobile marketing isn't all good. There are some cons to it as well.

* Privacy is a big factor. A lot of people hate it when their cell phone inboxes are flooded with messages from marketers. It is always a good idea to provide clear instructions for users to NOT receive any messages, should they choose to do so.

* Mobile phones aren't standard. Actually there are even fewer standards than PCs! They have different screen sizes and operating systems.

* Since the mobile phone is a small device, the navigation properties are suspect. This becomes a disadvantage, especially when you keep the mobile web in mind.

Mobile marketing like everything has its pros and cons, but you can cash in on it for sure!




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