Mobile marketing is popularizing in today’s world as mobile phones have slipped into our lives and become an integral part of our daily routine. There is no denying fact that everyone owns mobile phones these days that are not only used for the traditional dialing and messaging purposes but a variety of other applications.
Mobile is gradually changing the way businesses have looked towards marketing and targeted different platforms for this purpose. The time has started to come when we see businesses paying attention to the nuance marketing trends and channels that gather most of the customer response or have much greater benefits for their business.
For small businesses, who have a major issue of budget constraint while settling on their marketing strategies, need to be smart in engaging customers and adapt techniques that are both cost effective and customer engaging at the same time.
Market trends suggest that over a few years, you can expect businesses to run a bit differently and dramatically, the credit of which clearly goes to mobile trends for small businesses.
Though there are many reasons why this change is expected to happen, most of it can be credited to the increasing mobile usage of customers over time.
Now, place yourself in the customer’s shoes. If you are at home or traveling, you do not turn on your personal computer or laptop for every small thing that you have to look for.
Instead, you turn to your smart phone that has everything to quench your thirst. For day to day activities like shopping, facebook, deals etc, the customers prefer their mobile phones than any other devices. Consider the statistics below:
More consumers are using smartphones to make online purchases with U.S. mobile payments expected to grow to $142 billion by 2019 (Forrester).
New businesses are being found through online research by 36% of consumers (Vistaprint Digital).
So, if you are the owner of a small business there are chances that you might have taken calls, emails or messages from people who are ready to build your mobile site.
However, if you haven’t paid much attention to them, here I am all prepared to convince you to try mobile marketing as it can work wonderfully by engaging a large number of customers and helping you achieve better revenues.
A study by Smart Insights found that mobile marketing is one of the top-rated digital marketing techniques in 2017.
Responsive Web Applications |
Mobile marketing brings a whole new level of optimization for the customer. Google also implemented its Mobile optimization guidelines, a website that basically adapts to different devices or digital platforms like smartphones, tablets, desktop etc.
Responsive design is compelling more and more customers to open websites or other web portals on their mobile phones. Businesses now have optimized websites for smartphones that help the customer view content at their ease without having to worry about the graininess and resolution of a small screen.
A good responsive website does the task of engaging customers by providing them the ease of browsing on their mobile devices.
Location Based Keyword Search |
With the help of mobile marketing, you can also add location based keyword search that can be used as customer engagement tool.
Consider, for example, Google’s example of mobile marketing, where you search for a thing, let’s say a restaurant and Google complete it by adding the ‘near me’ key words. This way the customer gets a list of restaurants near them and it makes the search much easier on mobile devices than on any other devices.
Again a win – win situation for customer engagement through mobile marketing.
Mobile Apps |
According to a recent survey, 90 percent of the Americans check their mobile phones once in an hour. You can take advantage of this fact and create a mobile application for your business that can be used to engage customers and provide with speedy information.
This type of trend in smartphone usage is making way for mobile application development. But before designing a mobile app make sure you know what is the purpose of your business and what does the app facilitate.
Market trends also suggest that small businesses will add to the triple digit growth of mobile app market by 2018. That’s much to look forward to!
Mobile Payments |
Another great mobile marketing tactic is facilitation of mobile payment channels for gathering better customer responses. A few companies like Paytm that are already ruling the mobile payment market by allowing users to keep money in their wallets and pay with just one touch.
Similarly, Samsung and Apple pay are doing a great job too for their customers. These applications have made customers much more comfortable with online purchases. Furthermore, there is no big deal even if you forget your cards at home as these apps provide a seamless shopping or payment experience for the customer
Mobile marketing can work in wonderful ways for a small business and help it achieve its goal of increased customer engagement. This is also enabling them to stay up to date with technology and the latest marketing trends.
If you haven’t tried mobile marketing for your business, it is the time that you take action and see the mobile success that has effectively being proved for different small and large businesses across the world. So, start today and witness customer engagement for your business with a few easy mobile marketing strategies.