Mobile advertising makeover: 3S framework for success
By : SriRam Vanchinathan
GM - Mobile Advertising
Advertisers can excel in the mobile advertising execution by taking a cue from Leonardo Da Vinci’s quote – “Simplicity is the ultimate Sophistication”.
Few general statements we tend to hear from the marketers: “we want to do something very innovative or something nobody has done”. All these aspirational goals are a good starting point for leveraging the powers of Mobile advertising, however they just happen to be the means to an elusive end: how can our mobile ad campaign reach customers in a seamless engaging way and drive desired behavior like conversions or downloads or purchase?
With cell phone subscriptions outnumbering the world population, Mobile advertising has emerged as a key medium for marketers and business owners. The goals from digital marketing however, still remain the same: attract new customers, retain loyal customers, and spread brand awareness. The fact of the matter is few marketers have managed to get the mix right on mobile medium. The key questions while preparing a mobile advertising campaign for marketers:
- Do we know our audience and understand their behavioural instincts?
- Have we used the potential of simplicity of mobile communication channels?
- Are we planning for mobile separately or is it a part of integrated marketing plan?
Advertisers need to plan for the mobile advertising in the same way the traditional advertising gets strategized. The approach to bring mobile advertising under the umbrella of integrated marketing plan is the first step towards maximizing results. The best way to achieve this is by following the three ‘S’ mechanism while devising a mobile advertising plan. Keep it Simple, Scalable and Sustainable.
The advertisers may claim – that’s how they form any media strategy. But the real difference is in using the same metrics in the digital realm, keeping in mind the powers and constraints of mobile medium. The most common thing in digital advertising is to buy purchase keywords and look for responses. This model despite being simple is not a sustainable one. The entire holy trinity of Simplicity, Scalability and Sustainability needs to be addressed throughout the ad campaign keeping the communication, creative, content and channels synced with each other for maximum impact.
Simplicity with creativity
Mobile advertising is all about finding ways to reach your customers on the devices they use the most. So the foremost is to ensure the choice of content, language, format and channel is done in the most judicious manner. As people will view ads on a much smaller screen than a desktop monitor, it is essential to confirm the ads are still visible and carry the same impact when viewed on small screens. While video has been widely considered the go to medium in digital advertising, the simple telecom channels such as SMS guarantees an open rate of 90% and Rich content messaging virtually guarantees enhanced customer engagement through multimedia Ad format.
mADmart, multi-operator powered mobile advertising marketplace, used the missed call prompt channel to enable the brand maximise the reach to the desired urban and rural population in 3 states and engage with the target audience in their regional language in a non-intrusive and delightful manner. Contextual creative messages pre-recorded in child’s voice for various situations when the number is busy, the number is not reachable and the number is switched off, did the job of attracting full attention of the callers and the short 15 second message ensured complete attention during the interaction.
Scalability with precision
Mobile is the most personal device customers have. This unique feature of mobile equips marketers with the ability to understand customers truly and communicate with them in a personalised manner. This approach of mass personalisation will ensure brands have the ability to consider demographic, behavioral and psychographic traits cumulatively to stimulate brand awareness and drive engagement at massive scale. The ability to run multi-region campaign with the precision of consumer insights is a unique way to chase exponential outcomes in branding and customer awareness campaigns.
mADmart enabled Hiranandani, a Real estate developer in Mumbai, leverage simple SMS channel to reach out to more than 2 lakhs affluent customers across Mumbai region. The SMS message communicated the investment benefits associated with the early investment in the property and included a dedicated number for recipients to give a missed call in order to register their interest.
Sustainability with continuous improvement
Mobile advertising conventionally gets used in an ad-hoc manner and is not an integral plan of the overall advertising plan. The ability to utilize insights from one campaign’s performance to drive another mobile advertising campaign or feed the inputs to traditional media campaign is something that has not been the norm so far. The sustainability to conduct and expand mobile campaigns ensures the proven practices of the campaign gets replicated across different times and locations. It also helps brands to leverage the interactive capability of mobile to ensure the captive audience obtained through one campaign is led through the different stages of the purchase funnel, in subsequent campaigns.
mADmart enabled HDFC LAP (Loan against property) to run a multi-city campaign across India. The campaign started from Thane and spread to Pune, Chandigarh, Surat, Delhi and Kolkata over a period of 3-4 months. The program offered pinpointed reach coupled with location based targeting through pin-codes around industrial zones to ensure relevant communication and reduce wastage. Based on the campaign performance from one region the campaigns’ targeting criteria in other regions were improved i.e. further refinement in targeting conditions from bank customers’ to current account holders, from 25-40 year old males to 30-40 year old males. These targeting condition improvement further improved the response rates and delivered efficient results.
The three S come together to deliver the 4th S: Success
Mobile being the single best scalable medium aided with a simple communication approach can ensure a sustainable advertising campaign performance. The idea behind this article is not to share a defined structure rather a set of guiding principles that can be used while devising a mobile advertising plan to ensure best results are derived and the campaign’s success gets measured on metrics that matter in the digital world.
