I want to start by saying how skeptical I use to be of mobile taking off as a medium. I always thought it would be extremely intrusive (and annoying!) to be bombarded with advertising on your cell phone. Why would people be receptive to that? If anything, it would make their opinion of a brand go down….particularly nowadays where consumers are much more selective about the information they absorb. Despite my doubt, it’s been coming up more and more so I decided to hone up on the subject. I started researching the topic, attended a few conferences and, viola, I’m now a believer! So what changed my mind?

 

For starters, you can’t argue the numbers. There are a total of 3.3 billion mobile users in the world, 1.3 billion of which access the web from their phones.  To put that in perspective: .9 billion people own computers, 1.4 billion people have credit cards, and 1.5 billion people have a television. Wow! Looking back, there have debatably been five major forms of mass media; the printing press, radio, television, the internet and now mobile. The most amazing thing about mobile is that it is the only mass media that can do everything the preceding four can do…that, and it’s with us all the time.  91% of people are never more than 4 feet from their phones and 7 out of 10 people sleep with their phones within reach. Despite what we were taught as kids, our cell phone is one of the few things we just don’t want to “share”.  I’m not talking about letting someone borrow your phone to make a call, but what if someone asked to borrow it for the day? I’m guessing most of you would be a little hesitant. Personally, I would be much more likely to let a friend borrow my car for the day than to hand over my cell phone. Going without a car for the day doesn’t sound so bad, but giving up my cell phone? I would be lost!

 

So, yes, the mobile population is huge and people are engaged, but what’s even more interesting is the way our mobile behavior is changing. And what do we have to thank for this shift? The iPhone…
1.  95% of iPhone users regularly surf the Web
2.  Data service revenue increased from $2.7 billion in 2005 to $6.9 billion in 2007.  When did the iPhone launch? Oh yea, 2007.
3.  Number of queries on Google search from iPhones’ surpasses those of Symbian based phones and Symbian based phones hold 40% of the market share worldwide.
4. Google sees 50 times the number of searches from iPhones’ than any other mobile device

 

This is why so many major companies are launching iPhone optimized services despite the very low 1% market share and why we need to stop thinking of mobile as a medium similar to TV, Radio, print, even the internet. Often when I attend mobile presentations I’m shown campaigns that I, personally, don’t find innovative. An offer promotion via text message is great, but nothing to praise the mountains about. A campaign that recently caught my attention is the Nike Photo ID campaign that ran in Europe. Here’s how it worked – Nike encouraged consumers to take a picture with their camera phones and text it to Nike, behind the scenes Nike leveraged a technology that pulled the two major colors from the photo, and within seconds the consumer received a text back with their customized Nike ID shoe in those two prominent colors…making the consumer the designer! Of course the text also included a promotional code linked to their Nike ID shoe, making the path to purchase easy. Why was this campaign so great? It’s simple, encourages engagement with the brand, promotes the Nike ID product, and it’s fun for the audience. The video driving to the campaign is pretty sweet so check it out and you’ll notice a little shout out to Tennessee at about 5 seconds in so naturally I had to put it in here.

 

So what’s next? Since more and more phones now come with GPS we have the opportunity to provide more relevant information to people and I see location based mobile marketing taking off. Another thing to be on the watch for with mobile is the built in payment channel capabilities.  Although this has not taken off in the U.S it has in many Asian markets and cell phones have, ultimately, replaced wallets.  Consumers link their phones to a credit card or bank card and simply wave their phones when they make a purchase. Google Android sparked a deal with Visa giving users real time updates on their card usage and, although it’s not built in payment it is building the relationship between mobile and payment channels. My guess is it will be in the U.S. very soon and I can’t wait since I am forever forgetting my wallet at home.