First, a little context. We’ve cast a giant net to catch some of the best mobile marketing executions around the globe. As we sift through hundreds of examples, we’re noticing some patterns that separate the world-class executions from the rest.
We thought we’d share a beta version in the interest of being somewhat (if not perfectly) helpful sooner, rather than later, since so many Council members are actively working on mobile executions for 2011. And we’d certainly welcome your feedback and suggestions as we evolve to the next iteration.
We’ve clustered the attributes into three groups—Good for the Consumer, Good for the Brand, and Speed to Scale. We’ll cover the list in detail across three blog posts—roll it all up at the end and you’ve got yourself a good start on a Mobile Marketing Scorecard.
Foremost, world-class mobile executions have to be Good for the Consumer.
- Disposes of an acute customer pain point—mobile is perfectly suited to help people solve their everyday problems and annoyances, no matter where they are. The best mobile initiatives completely resolve pain points that are often taken for granted because they are such longstanding ones. The Orange County Transportation Authority (OCTA) created “Text4Next”, which enables riders of its metro bus system to “ping” the authority for text updates on when the correct bus will arrive at their bus stop for pickup. No more time wasted at the bus stop waiting for unpredictable buses to show up
- Capitalizes on natural customer behavior—your mobile execution ought to fit naturally into your target audience’s behavior. For OCTA, that meant choosing a text-based system, not an app. While 75% of its commuters have mobile devices, a much smaller portion have smartphones. Moreover, most of those customers are multi-tasking on their mobile phones while they wait for the bus, anyhow. It’s the perfect behavioral “aperture” for OCTA to target with mobile.
- Integrates seamlessly into the smartphone experience—the consumer shouldn’t be forced to switch apps or modes of use to engage with or benefit from your mobile execution. Call this the “interruption factor”, if you like. Don’t lead me to jump out of an app. Don’t make me navigate three clicks back to the original mobile web page I was reading.
- Matches call-to-action with consumer’s mental context—when the consumer is presented with the call-to-action, it should fit his frame-of-mind like a glove. You’ll know you’ve hit paydirt if you see jawdropping click thru rates (or whatever behavior your call-to-action implores). My personal favorite example of late? In a mobile ad, Virgin Media allows Premier League Football fans to populate their smartphone calendar with all Premier League games in a click (great example of the pain point attribute above, by the way). Thought bubble over my head: “Perfect! Now, I don’t have to worry about forgetting when the best games are on the tellie.” What better time to present me with the “Explore Virgin Media’s football packages” call-to-action? Like. A. Glove.
If, based on your mobile marketing experience, you’ve got suggestions for other “Good for the Consumer” attributes, let us know. We’ll cover the other attribute groups in the next two posts. As well, access Council’s Mobile Marketing Resource Center.
Here’s a quick preview of the next two attribute groups:
Good for the Brand
- Enriches core brand attributes
- Integrated into the brand experience
- Quid pro quo consumer data gathering
Speed to Scale
- Borrows cultural equity
- Orchestrated with mass media
- Weaves in viral propellants
- (if needed) Promoted with “talkable teaching”
Related posts:
on 22 February 11
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Excellent thoughts and eager to see the full report in March. The above report has consolidated some of my thoughts and learned many things. Happy to see such reports.
Rav
on 23 February 11
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[...] Email Print This Post Tweet In last week’s post, I introduced a set of “Good for the Consumer” criteria that are popping out of our research on [...]