In all of marketing history, few marketing techniques have come as close to delivering a personal touch as mobile marketing. Mobile devices are items that most people either keep on their person or in sight for most of their waking hours. This article will build on this information and give you some helpful hints to make this type of networking work for you.
Use dedicated short code. The can be pricey, but they insure that you keep your brand intact. Avoid shared short codes if you are a larger company. Not only because you want people to recognize your own code, but there may be some legal consequences if the other company sharing the same code abuses the system.
Add QR codes every time you print something. Printable QR codes are in high demand, so put your code on anything you possibly can, even on postcards, fliers, or newspapers. The more people you have that see your code, the more likely you are to gain new customers from the display.
Ask customers for their cell phone numbers. The easiest way to do this is with your current email subscribers. When they fill out the form to subscribe, you can ask them to add their phone numbers in, for any alerts or special deals. This is a quick method of gaining new customers for mobile marketing.
Understand the regulations for mobile marketing. Mobile marketing campaigns are heavily regulated, just like anything that has to do with mobile phones. Look up your local and federal guidelines, and make sure you stay well within them. If you do not, you can face penalties that range anywhere from fines to jail time.
When marketing through e-mails or text message, try to include the recipients name in the message. This personal approach makes customers feel important, instead of like just a customer number. Successful businesses help each of its customers to feel individually important because they are important to a businesses growth and success.
If you operate an on-location business like a restaurant, small store, or any other live location, make sure that you’re emphasizing your location in your mobile marketing. Businesses like these have a much larger niche market, and someone just swinging by the area for a while might love to stop in and grab a bite to eat.
You may have been aware of the ability to offer free applications to your customers, but it also easy to create those applications yourself. Improve your marketing strategy by offering a special app for your customers only. There are many different features from which you can choose when designing your apps.
For all of your product sales and information, you want to set up a link for a mobile-specific landing page. All phones need to be able to use a mobile friendly page, and you want that link to be very easy to find so that your customers can bookmark them directly on their phones and visit often.
The fastest growing category with mobile browsers and mobile apps are social networking websites. So business must accept social networking and go where the people are. Mobile marketing success will depend upon your business making a presence on the social networking sites and using it correctly to grow your business.
If you decide to incorporate SMS messaging as part of your mobile marketing campaign, you should clearly state how frequently messages will be sent when customers opt-in, and have an easy way to opt-out. SMS, if used improperly, can really backfire because of its inherent ties into a mobile devices notification systems. This can be extremely intrusive. Be honest and tell your customers what your SMS campaign will be like and stick to a certain number of messages you can send every month. Honesty can make your brand more trustworthy.
Include audio and video in your mobile marketing strategy. Mobile marketing is more than text messages and e-mails. Today, with faster mobile download speeds, audio and video are key components to any successful strategy. Consider offering audio or video podcasts, short audio interviews or live, on-the-scene video to your media mix.
Remember to link properly when using mobile devices. Do not link to your home website, link to the mobile version of your website so that your customers can get the entire picture. If you do not have a mobile version, you really need to get to work on it and have one for the mobile users.
Don’t overdo. Be aware that different people have different mobile pricing plans, so one message from you could put them over their SMS limit; how receptive do you think they’ll be to your messages when you cost them too much money? Send out the fewest mobile messages per day that you can.
Check out what your competition is doing. Look for their blog or website on your own smartphone and see what they are up to. Take a look at the social media that they are promoting and how they are engaging their customers. When you take a look at your competition, it will give you some ideas about what you need to do.
You should make it easy for people to unsubscribe from your distribution list. Most companies include a few commands at the end of their messages: for instance, a customer can unsubscribe by texting back ‘stop’. You should use a simple command and provide clear instructions about unsubscribing from your mobile campaign.
To summarize, you have an opportunity to connect with people on a personal scale that is otherwise unheard of in marketing. Use the tips provided here in this article to ensure that you are delivering content that is desirable to the customer and relevant to the message you are trying to send out.
